After a major upgrade (including ASrock haswell Extreme9ac mobo), I had big troubles getting my new PC to boot properly. Sometimes it would boot, but it would pause for a long time just before Windows . Other times it would stall for ages at the Asrock logo screen.
I tried everything. I repaired Windows, went back a restore point, tried every different UEFI setting I thought might help, double- and triple-checked my boot order, checked and reinstalled all my drives, tried different sata ports, and replaced my sata cables. I had about 6 drives installed, so all this troubleshooting was very time consuming and a real pain in the arse. Finally, I isolated the problem.
I had two 'identical' SSDs on the system, one of which was my boot drive with Windows on it. Both SSDs were the OCZ-Agility3 128GB model (I also had an OCZ-Agility3 64GB installed - not sure if this added to the problem). It seems that the UEFI is too stupid to tell them apart properly, and this was causing the long delays during boot.
It also made setting up the boot order a tricky game of trial and error since UEFI doesn't distinguish between them and would give them the exact same name, even though programs like AIDA64 are able to tell them apart and reveal their unique names. Anyway, it would eventually boot to the correct SSD, but not before stalling and getting confused for a long time.
Once I unplugged the non-boot OCZ SSD, everything worked perfectly, and Windows booted in seconds. As soon as I plugged it back in, the problem came back. The drive itself is fine. I could unplug it before boot and plug it in while in Windows, and it worked perfectly. Also, this exact drive configuration worked flawlessly without any boot problems on my previous board, which was also an Asrock (Extreme 4 Ivy). My OS, both now and before the upgrade, was Win7 64 Home.
I've since resolved the issue by ditching the second OCZ and replacing it with a Samsung. The Samsung has a different name, so now UEFI doesn't get confused anymore, and everything's fine. Since I've resolved my problem, I don't need tech support for it. But I wanted to bring it to the attention of the tech support guys, and perhaps anyone else in my position.
I tried everything. I repaired Windows, went back a restore point, tried every different UEFI setting I thought might help, double- and triple-checked my boot order, checked and reinstalled all my drives, tried different sata ports, and replaced my sata cables. I had about 6 drives installed, so all this troubleshooting was very time consuming and a real pain in the arse. Finally, I isolated the problem.
I had two 'identical' SSDs on the system, one of which was my boot drive with Windows on it. Both SSDs were the OCZ-Agility3 128GB model (I also had an OCZ-Agility3 64GB installed - not sure if this added to the problem). It seems that the UEFI is too stupid to tell them apart properly, and this was causing the long delays during boot.
It also made setting up the boot order a tricky game of trial and error since UEFI doesn't distinguish between them and would give them the exact same name, even though programs like AIDA64 are able to tell them apart and reveal their unique names. Anyway, it would eventually boot to the correct SSD, but not before stalling and getting confused for a long time.
Once I unplugged the non-boot OCZ SSD, everything worked perfectly, and Windows booted in seconds. As soon as I plugged it back in, the problem came back. The drive itself is fine. I could unplug it before boot and plug it in while in Windows, and it worked perfectly. Also, this exact drive configuration worked flawlessly without any boot problems on my previous board, which was also an Asrock (Extreme 4 Ivy). My OS, both now and before the upgrade, was Win7 64 Home.
I've since resolved the issue by ditching the second OCZ and replacing it with a Samsung. The Samsung has a different name, so now UEFI doesn't get confused anymore, and everything's fine. Since I've resolved my problem, I don't need tech support for it. But I wanted to bring it to the attention of the tech support guys, and perhaps anyone else in my position.
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