Strange boot problems after replacing HDD with SSD in all-in-one PC (with both windows and linux)

[Lorenmator]

Hello all,
i am trying to upgrade an old HP All-in-One PC (HP 24-g001ng).
In order to make it (somewhat) fast again, i want to replace the 2.5” HDD with an SSD (Crucial BX500). The SSD is connected to the same SATA/Power combi-port that the HDD was connected to. Goal is to keep the data, so i copied the Windows 10 installation to the SSD.

First, it seemed to work, but instabilities emerged pretty quickly.
Most of them are Bluescreens when starting the OS, however they do not appear always and seem quite random. When i am able to boot into windows, it is quite stable but ocasionally there were also BSOD crashes. There are various error messages when booting, sometimes one of 4 different Bluescreens and sometimes the BIOS saying there was no boot device found:

Windows Errors

BIOS Error

I tried the following things to narrow the problem down, without success:

• install a fresh windows to rule out the specific installation - boot problems remains
• retry with the HDD to rule out the other hardware components - no instabilites there
• try the SSD in another system to rule out a defect - SSD works fine
• install Linux (Mint 22.2) to rule out windows as an OS - there are (in addition to the BIOS Error) 2 different boot errors with Linux:

Linux Error 1

Linux Error 2

Since i ruled out every part, i have no idea where this problem comes from. maybe it is a combination of hardware components? I hope it’s not a hardware defect and there is some way to sort this out. Thanks in advance for any help or hints!

I am generally able to boot, so I can install any linux (or other OS) and use it to test stuff.

additional notes:

• it is pretty random if and which error message appears when booting. Of course they are distinct for Windows and Linux. The BIOS message occurs with both OS’s installed.
• after installing/recopying windows, the problems occur only after using the system for some time (several hours) and the frequency then seems to increase over time. It happened a few times that i tried something and thought i had solved the problem since the boot problems did not appear immediately.
• SMART health tests on the SSD pass without any problems found.
• The proposed system diagnoses in the BIOS error message does not find anything.
• Windows recovery options like automatic repair or CHKDSK or manually rebuilding the EFI partition did not help.

[dirtmeister]

When moving any OS from one drive to another I have always used clonezilla to backup the OS or drive to an external hard drive. Then replace the drive and restore from the clonezilla backup…

[Lorenmator]

I’ve used Gparted to copy the data, but i will consider Clonezilla next. Never used it, but sounds decent

However i’m quite certain that the problem does not arise from the cloning process, since it occurs with freshly installed Windows and Linux…

[dirtmeister]

What is your partition layout??? Could there be a conflict in the efi bootloader??

[k3ninho]

You don’t say that you’ve set the new device to be the boot target in the UEFI/BIOS – you need to tell the UEFI setup that the thing it needs to go to next to boot your system. If you done that but it’s not making that data stick, there’s 2 options for what’s going wrong with the chips storing this configuration data: one where the NVRAM is full and can be cleared down to allow this to be reset (eg this example on an old Dell, see also the Arch Wiki on UEFI) or the bad one where the NVRAM is physically exhausted and can’t be rewritten so you need a clone of the firmware on a new chip.

K3n.

[vad]

@Lorenmator

try the SSD in another system to rule out a defect - SSD works fine

Why do you assume your SSD works correctly? What does this exactly mean, did you boot into the same Windows partition on another computer multiple times and it worked OK? Have you tried to checksum the entire drive? Literally sha1sum over the entire block device while its offline. reboot/use another machine to repeat. Or chkdsk on Windows? The latter could be destructive, but you’re playing with fire anyway

I only see three explanations: bad SSD, poor cable/connection, something fatally wrong with the SATA in there.

I hope it’s not a hardware defect

Hope dies last. Even when you should’ve given up a long time ago.

[starshipeleven]

So both windows and linux randomly fail to boot because the bootloader does not find the os, and sometimes even the bios cant find the drive to boot from. To me this sounds like a hardware issue. Is the sata and the sata power cable firmly connected?

Can you try a different cable (brand)? This happened to me in the past with both sata cables and mini-sas to sata cables. Sata cable and connector on the drive were not making good contact for whatever reason (probably mechanical tolerances were both out in opposite directions) and the issue disappears with a different cable.

[Lorenmator]

@k3ninho

there’s 2 options for what’s going wrong with the chips storing this configuration data

i think i dont quite understand yet how the EFI stuff works. is the data you’re talking about stored on the EFI partition or the actual system/BIOS (or both)?
I thought if i reinstall an OS from scratch, i create a new EFI partition and thus all associated data (“path to the OS”) is reset, so there shouldn’t be a problem with partition that right? unless it’s stored on the system so it “survives” the reinstall

Also, how do the “efivarfs” filesystem and the /boot/efi partition relate to each other in this context?

$ df -h

$ df -h
Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
tmpfs           687M  1,6M  685M   1% /run
efivarfs        128K   88K   36K  72% /sys/firmware/efi/efivars
/dev/sda2       183G  7,9G  166G   5% /
tmpfs           3,4G     0  3,4G   0% /dev/shm
tmpfs           5,0M   12K  5,0M   1% /run/lock
/dev/sda1       380M  6,2M  374M   2% /boot/efi
/dev/sda3       183G  6,5M  173G   1% /home
tmpfs           687M  184K  686M   1% /run/user/29999

$ efivar --list

$ efivar --list
605dab50-e046-4300-abb6-3dd810dd8b23-MokListTrustedRT
605dab50-e046-4300-abb6-3dd810dd8b23-SbatLevelRT
605dab50-e046-4300-abb6-3dd810dd8b23-MokListXRT
605dab50-e046-4300-abb6-3dd810dd8b23-MokListRT
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ec87d643-eba4-4bb5-a1e5-3f3e36b20da9-SysInfoBornonDate
ec87d643-eba4-4bb5-a1e5-3f3e36b20da9-BiosDate
ec87d643-eba4-4bb5-a1e5-3f3e36b20da9-SystemBiosVer
ec87d643-eba4-4bb5-a1e5-3f3e36b20da9-SystemBoardID
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-BootCurrent
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-OsIndicationsSupported
63a58801-3ee7-4c09-81a7-42142dd7d8ee-HPSignFlag
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01368881-c4ad-4b1d-b631-d57a8ec8db6b-SB_USB_POINT
0a602c5b-05a0-40c4-9181-edcd891d0013-GNVS_PTR
01368881-c4ad-4b1d-b631-d57a8ec8db6b-FPDT_Variable
4bafc2b4-02dc-4104-b236-d6f1b98d9e84-S3SS
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-SetupMode
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-SecureBoot
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-SignatureSupport
01368881-c4ad-4b1d-b631-d57a8ec8db6b-RSCInfoAddresss
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-BootOrder
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ba57e015-65b3-4c3c-b274-659192f699e3-BugCheckCode
ba57e015-65b3-4c3c-b274-659192f699e3-BugCheckParameter1
ba57e015-65b3-4c3c-b274-659192f699e3-BugCheckProgress
77fa9abd-0359-4d32-bd60-28f4e78f784b-Kernel_RvkSiStatus
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d719b2cb-3d3a-4596-a3bc-dad00e67656f-dbx
ec87d643-eba4-4bb5-a1e5-3f3e36b20da9-Setup
707c9176-a4c1-4e27-851d-1c37b7ca73c8-DiagsInfo
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707c9176-a4c1-4e27-851d-1c37b7ca73c8-HpPassphraseStructureVariable
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-OsIndications
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-Boot0004
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8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-Boot0002
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-Boot0001
eaec226f-c9a3-477a-a826-ddc716cdc0e3-UnlockIDCopy
77fa9abd-0359-4d32-bd60-28f4e78f784b-Kernel_EntRevokeSiStatus
77fa9abd-0359-4d32-bd60-28f4e78f784b-Kernel_ATPSiStatus
77fa9abd-0359-4d32-bd60-28f4e78f784b-Kernel_WinSiStatus
77fa9abd-0359-4d32-bd60-28f4e78f784b-Kernel_SkuSiStatus
77fa9abd-0359-4d32-bd60-28f4e78f784b-Kernel_SiStatus
77fa9abd-0359-4d32-bd60-28f4e78f784b-CurrentPolicy
63a58801-3ee7-4c09-81a7-42142dd7d8ee-BornOnDate
63a58801-3ee7-4c09-81a7-42142dd7d8ee-HPKeyExisted
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-PK
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-KEK
d719b2cb-3d3a-4596-a3bc-dad00e67656f-db
b540a530-6978-4da7-91cb-7207d764d262-FastBootOption
e20939be-32d4-41be-a150-897f85d49829-MemoryOverwriteRequestControl
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-Lang
45cf35f6-0d6e-4d04-856a-0370a5b16f53-DefaultBootOrder
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-ErrOut
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-ConIn
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4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-WriteOnceStatus
63a58801-3ee7-4c09-81a7-42142dd7d8ee-FirstBootLan
ec87d643-eba4-4bb5-a1e5-3f3e36b20da9-PowerOnTime
ec87d643-eba4-4bb5-a1e5-3f3e36b20da9-UsbSupport
c811fa38-42c8-4579-a9bb-60e94eddfb34-AMITSESetup
8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c-PlatformLang
98872116-cda0-4ef0-8ea9-29341288f913-HpBiosFlag
63a58801-3ee7-4c09-81a7-42142dd7d8ee-HpRestoreSecurityDefault
01368881-c4ad-4b1d-b631-d57a8ec8db6b-MonotonicCounter
d1405d16-7afc-4695-bb12-41459d3695a2-NetworkStackVar
63a58801-3ee7-4c09-81a7-42142dd7d8ee-ManufacturingMode
707c9176-a4c1-4e27-851d-1c37b7ca73c8-ucal
e08126e5-b93c-4f5e-8e81-6dfcf34ff88e-FirmwareUpdateCountVar
f0b9a350-9ba2-4627-954e-5e8ef91c1a34-HpCleanNvram4ReadBack
5b1b6fcc-a701-4c01-a3eb-8236be8f4058-OwnershipTag
b088f8c5-d551-4908-98b9-d3d8b90a05ac-SystemIds
72cb10a8-b2e3-407f-98fa-1b25c58af28b-HPSYSID
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0200020700
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0200020500
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0200020600
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0300030400
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0200020400
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0100010400
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0100011a00
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0000000500
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4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071e00
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071d00
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071c00
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071b00
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071a00
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071900
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071800
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071700
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071600
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071500
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071400
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071300
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071200
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071100
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00071000
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070f00
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070e00
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070d00
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070c00
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070b00
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070a00
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070900
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070800
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070700
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070600
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070500
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070400
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070300
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070200
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070100
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0b00070000
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0100011900
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0300030800
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0200020800
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0100010700
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0100010500
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiVar0100010800
4b3082a3-80c6-4d7e-9cd0-583917265df1-DmiArray
4599d26f-1a11-49b8-b91f-858745cff824-StdDefaults

In any case, i didn’t try this

@k3ninho

NVRAM is full and can be cleared down to allow this to be reset (eg this example on an old Dell

yet, since the efivarfs is not full (see above) and the linked example said i could brick something so i’m rather careful there.

@vad

did you boot into the same Windows partition on another computer multiple times and it worked OK? Have you tried to checksum the entire drive?

I’ll look into that later, need to setup a second system to test.

@vad

Or chkdsk on Windows? The latter could be destructive, but you’re playing with fire anyway

Chkdsk was some of the first things i tried with the faulty windows installation, but it didn’t help. “destructive” only applies to the data/installation, not the hardware, right? ^^’

@starshipeleven

Is the sata and the sata power cable firmly connected?

I’m pretty sure i connected it properly since i have changed many times between HDD and SSD. I now also reconnected the cable on the mainboard side (didn’t try that so far), but no effect.

The original SATA cable (DD0N91HD001) has 2 seperate connectors for power and data on the mainboard side but one combined one on the hard drive side. so to try another SATA cable i’d also need a different power cable (physically can’t plug the new SATA along the combined data/power). And the power cable on the mainboard side is some small 4 pin connector (similar to a fan header) which i don’t have a second one of.

SATA cable

Image taken from https://www.store.refurbit.co.uk/product/hp-24-e034na-aio-dd0n91hd001-laptop-hard-drive-cable/

I could bypass that problem by powering the SSD from an external PSU. But i don’t know if it’s safe to do such thing.

[starshipeleven]

@Lorenmator

I could bypass that problem by powering the SSD from an external PSU. But i don’t know if it’s safe to do such thing.

Afaik it is safe. I’ve done it for sata or sas drives, and if you see usb to sata 3.5 drive adapters (or usb to ide adapters) they all have an external psu.