I'm facing a frustrating issue while trying to install Windows 11 on my new Samsung 990 EVO Plus NVMe SSD. The installation seems to go smoothly, but after it finishes and I unplug the USB installation media as instructed, the system just boots back into the BIOS. If I plug the USB back in, it leads me to the Windows setup screen again. I'm also not seeing the Samsung SSD in the boot priority options within the BIOS, which makes me wonder if it's not being recognized as a bootable device. Here are my PC specs: CPU: i5-12600KF, GPU: Maxsun Arc B580 iCraft, Motherboard: Gigabyte H610M H DDR4 (Rev. 1.1), RAM: T-Force Delta DDR4 3200MHz, and the SSD is the Samsung 990 EVO Plus. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
2 Answers
It's definitely frustrating when systems don't recognize drives correctly. Since you've tested the SSD on different setups and it didn't work, it might be worth trying a new Windows installer created with Rufus, assuming the ISO is correct. If Windows 10 isn't recognizing the SSD either, loading the Intel RST drivers is a good step, but have you double-checked the BIOS settings? Sometimes simply resetting them to default can help. Let me know how it goes!
It sounds like your system might be set up to boot from UEFI rather than directly considering drives as boot options. This is normal; you should see something like "Windows Boot Manager" in the BIOS instead of the drive itself. First, check if your SSD is configured correctly as a GPT drive. You can do this by booting from your Windows installation medium, then pressing Shift + F10 to open a command prompt. Type "diskpart", then "list disk" to see if your SSD has a star in the GPT column. Let me know what that shows!
Thanks, I checked and the SSD is indeed set up as GPT. I've also disabled CSM and Secure Boot during installation, but the loop continues. I'm starting to think there might be an issue with the SSD itself. Any further thoughts?
I’ll give resetting the BIOS to default a try. Thanks for the tip! I'll post back with what happens after the new installer.