Long bootup time & SSD appears in "safely remove device"

[skyportal]

First, here's some maybe relevant details about the build with the problem:
- Mobo: Asus P5E-VM HDMI (the cable and ports are SATA 3gb/s, but the SSD is 6gb/s)
- 4 sticks of 2GB ddr2 ram
- SATA DVD drive
- SATA mechanical hdd (disconnected)

I put a new SSD (which I've verified to work flawlessly in a new build) into the old build described above. I permanently disconnected the old mechanical hdd, then did a fresh install of Windows7. However, there's a problem:

* It takes a very long time to reach the Windows login screen. POSTing is quick (about 4 sec), but right after the POST screen, I get a black screen with a single blinking cursor at the top right. This lasts for about 35 seconds, the cursor moves down a space for a second, and then the Windows 7 splash screen finally appears.

* Also, with SSD's, this splash screen should usually finish before the 4 colorful "window panes" connect. However, in my case, the splash screen lasts for several seconds past the moment they connect. This time frame is almost as long as when this old build was booting off the mechanical hard drive.

After the splash screen, everything else loads normally.

So what I tried is take the SATA cables for the DVD drive and old mechanical hdd and switch it to the SSD one by one, in case any of them were higher priority ports on the mobo. But nothing changed. I checked and AHCI mode is also enabled.

Any help would be appreciated. I put the SSD into my old build to speed things up, but it's frustrating how everything seems slower than before with the mechanical hdd. Thanks!

 

[skyportal]

Is the motherboard just too old? Does SATA 3gbs cause SSD's to perform at the speed of a mechanical hdd?

 

[Henri108]

Did you put the little plastic on the SSD connection side? (the one that puts it in 3gbs mode)

 

[Liger88]

Is the motherboard just too old? Does SATA 3gbs cause SSD's to perform at the speed of a mechanical hdd?

That shouldn't be a factor. My old Q9550/775 MOBO had no problems dealing with a 6Gbps SSD @ 3Gbps rate.

I'd update the MOBO's BIOS and verify the boot order has the SSD at the beginning. Did you clone the drive over from the HDD or is this a fresh install?

 

[Jorona]

Pull everything from the USB ports and boot it. I bet you've got a USB boot priority issue.

 

[JBark]

This is a common problem that many old mobos with the ICH9R have. First fix is to update to the most current BIOS. If you're lucky, it has an updated Intel RAID Option ROM that will fix the problem with SSDs not being recognized properly. If that doesn't fix it, then you likely need a modified BIOS that has the more recent Option ROM included. There used to be a great post on the OCZ forums that had a huge list of BIOSes that had already been modified, but I think that forum is gone. You can see the old page here:
https://web.archive.org/web/2011020...S-files-with-updated-Intel-ICH9-10R-RAID-ROMs

Your mobo is listed on that page, so it was done before. I googled around, and didn't find any other links for it, though.

You can try it yourself, if you're so inclined. I did it for my old Shuttle.
http://www.win-raid.com/t12f16-Guide-AMI-non-UEFI-BIOS-Modding.html

Options ROMs can be found here:
https://www.bios-mods.com/resources/index.php?dir=Option+Roms/RAID+Bios/

If you're really brave, you can download the one I just modified to make sure the instructions work:
http://wikisend.com/download/347284/p5e-vm-asus-hdmi-0709-modified-ich9r.rom

That's the final 0709 BIOS with the Intel 8.9.1 Option ROM, which should work according to the old OCZ page. But as always, no guarantees, could break things completely for all I know.

 

[skyportal]

I'd update the MOBO's BIOS and verify the boot order has the SSD at the beginning. Did you clone the drive over from the HDD or is this a fresh install?

This is a common problem that many old mobos with the ICH9R have. First fix is to update to the most current BIOS. If you're lucky, it has an updated Intel RAID Option ROM that will fix the problem with SSDs not being recognized properly.

It worked! Thanks a bunch you guys. I was on the 2nd to last BIOS, so I updated to the last one, and now the blank page with the blinking cursor disappears after 2 seconds. Thanks also to everyone else who suggested other ideas too.

The only thing that still bugs me is that the Windows 7 logo still lasts for 2 seconds past the colors meeting in the center. Seems too long for an SSD. The whole "boot" time to the Windows login screen takes about 21 seconds. The SSD is definitely first in the boot order.

This is a completely fresh install of Windows 7, not cloned over.