First, my setup:
Mobo: ASRock Z170 Extreme 7+ (BIOS Version 7.10)
Processor: Intel Core i5 6600K 3.5 GHz
HDDs: 1x Samsung 950 Pro M.2 256GB; 1x Intel 320 Series 80GB; 2x 1TB WD Black
Memory: 4x 4GB G.Skill DDR4 3000
I recently purchased the 950 Pro to replace the Intel SSD as my boot drive. Install onto the board went smoothly, booted up into EFI setup and everything looked good (CSM enabled, AHCI mode). Installed Windows 10 (RS1) without any issue. Started to install drivers in audit mode and started getting random freezing (hard freeze, screen frozen, cursor doesn’t move). I have tried turning CSM off, changing the SATA mode to RAID, reinstalling RS1 and even installing latest insider build (secure erasing the ssd between each install). The problem is very re-producible (at the moment, trying to install NIC drivers and it freezes before I can click Next for the first time). The interesting thing is the system seems stable if I do any other tasks on it but if I install drivers, it seems to freeze almost every time. Any help at all would be greatly appreciated.
Brandon
@ArcaneFeenix :
Hello Brandon,
welcome at Win-RAID Forum!
Although I do not yet have any concrete idea regarding the origin of your problems, I wold like to know, which NVME driver are you using and why you didn’t disable CSM completely from scratch?
Regards
Dieter (alias Fernando)
Fernando,
I have tried the inbox driver, the 1.1 driver from Samsung’s site and the 1.4.7.17 driver from here. All to no avail. First install was with CSM enabled and the second install (with the latest insider build) was with CSM off. I have no reason to have CSM on that I am aware of and would prefer to have it off anyway. Have just been testing the waters with the different options.
The system freezes completely which, to me, seems hardware more than a driver issue. One thing to note is that the reset button doesn’t always work when this happens. More times than not, I have to press and hold the power button to shut it off.
Something else to note is that I can make the system freeze instantly by opening Samsung Magician. When it pops up stating that it is scanning for devices, it will sit for about 10 seconds then hard freeze. Every. Single. Time. And when I am trying to install the NIC drivers, I haven’t even gotten to the point of install - it freezes at the initial "… is preparing the install wizard…"
Please know that the system was stable, without any issues, when I was running off the Intel SSD. These problems were only introduced when I started to use the 950 Pro.
Thanks for the reply.
Brandon
Fingers crossed, I think I may have fixed it. I failed to load the NVME driver during setup (didn’t cross my mind). I tried it with this last install and I am able to open Samsung Magician and was successful in installing all of the drivers without any freezing.
Brandon