Ultra Fast Boot problem

[khronoe]

I did a fresh reload on my system last night to get everything updated with some new hardware that I have and everything seems to be working fine except Ultrafast boot.

I have the Asrock 990FX Extreme 4, dual EVGA Geforce 660 GT in SLI (SLI board attached) with upgrade vbios to support UEFI boot, 128 gb SSD, 2x 3tb Segate hard drives, BluRay and DVD RW drive. All drives are connected to primary SATA ports (not the two Marvell ports) and it's set to AHCI mode. I have also upgrade my UEFI to the last version for my board, 2.50.

I can get everything to run great until I select Ultra Fast boot. When I do select it, the system boots to a blank screen with a solid cursor and will progress no further.

The only thing that I know of that I haven't tried yet is to take out one of the 660s to see if it will boot. I'm not sure if dual cards causes a problem with ultra fast boot or not.

Thanks!

[khronoe]

Re: Ultra Fast Boot problem

One more thing I forgot to mention, I think this could also be related to CSM. While trouble shooting, when I disable CSM I encounter the same issue.

[Doner]

Re: Ultra Fast Boot problem

On the Fatal1ty 990FX Killer there's a lot more to do than just set the option to Ultra fast boot ( like you can with fast boot) . I would get the motherboards manual for setting up RAID configuration. and installing windows.

Your storage config must be set to RAID and you must boot to UEFI boot to set up the drives. Then boot to windows installer and install windows to created RAID array.

Edit: I found your installation guide from AsRock. Its identical to mine. Go to page 5 "Way 2": ftp://66.226.78.21/manual/raid/990FX...e4/English.pdf <- Click that

I'm sure you wish you knew this BEFORE you did your fresh install. But maybe you're one of those that like to install windows.

[khronoe]

Re: Ultra Fast Boot problem

I did that once upon a time but I thought you could do it without using RAID and use ACHI instead. At least it's a fresh install if I need to do it again, that's not the hard part of it all haha.

[parsec]

Re: Ultra Fast Boot problem

You need to install Win 8 in UEFI booting mode, which means CSM disabled (or Secure Boot enabled) when you install Windows, and let the Win 8 installer create the UEFI booting partitions, GPT, recovery, etc. Otherwise UltraFast boot does not work.

The need for the RAID configuration mentioned above is correct if you are using RAID, but you should have no need to do that if you're not using RAID, just to configure UEFI booting in AHCI mode. UEFI booting is required for RAID on the new AMD chipsets, but RAID is not required for UEFI booting.

A potential (really a given) issue is the video source must be compatible with the UEFI video protocol called GOP. That means the VBIOS of your video card(s) must be GOP compatible. EVGA 600 series cards require a VBIOS update to be GOP compatible.

You can get that VBIOS on request from EVGA support. I have no idea how comfortable you are doing video card VBIOS updates, but believe me it is required, otherwise no video to the monitor. EVGA 700 series cards are GOP compatible from the factory. EVGA is ahead of the game regarding GOP compatibility compared to other video card manufactures.

[khronoe]

Re: Ultra Fast Boot problem

Hey parsec, I thought/hoped you'd probably weigh in, you've helped me in some past threads.

So in short, everything that's been stated here, I'm pretty sure I've done and tried.

Currently, my system is configured as such:

- SATA Mode set to RAID, volume configured as RAID Ready on my SSD (only way it will let me create it). As you said parsec, I was pretty sure I could do this with AHCI only but tried RAID just to make sure.
- Both of the 660s have had their BIOS upgraded from EVGA. I did that even before I created the post. Both are in 16x slots, have power and are connected with the SLI board.
- Windows 8.1 has been installed in UEFI mode from a USB drive that I created with GPT using Rufus
- Regarding CSM, that option is only available from my ACPI menu and it disappears when I change my boot mode to Fast or Ultra Fast, so I'm assuming it's negating it. See notes below
- At this moment, Secure Boot is not enabled. I've haven't gotten to the point where I can enable it yet. My process has been...
- Configure UEFI
- Install Windows 8.1 using UEFI USB drive
- Begin configuring Ultra Fast boot before going any further. This is where I get stuck. My next step would be to enable Secure Boot.
- The Marvell controller is currently enabled. I've tried various combinations with it in AHCI and IDE mode. I only mention this because when I did get Ultra Fast boot to work in the past, I had to turn this controller off because Windows would blue screen consistently with it enabled.

One more thing about CSM, during my trial and error process, whenever I would get to the blank screen with a cursor, my machine was completely locked at that point and the only recourse I have is to use the clear BIOS button to reset it and reconfigure it. After one of those resets, just out of curiosity, I set CSM to disabled first thing and changed nothing else and again I encountered the blank screen with a cursor. So I think it's related to CSM, just not sure what I can do to fix it.

Now....

Before your replay parsec, I was working on my system last night and discovered a couple of things. If I removed one of the 660s, I could get the system to boot via Ultra Fast boot, but I would get blue screens and it seems like it was literally every other reboot that they would happen. So one boot would be fine, then to test things, I would shut down and power back up and get a blue screen. On the next boot, it would seem to boot fine, rinse and repeat. Note that this is with the SATA controller in RAID mode. It's entirely possible this will be the results with AHCI as well, I just haven't tried that option yet.

At the moment, I have my system running fine without Ultra Fast boot turned on. I'm still in RAID mode on the SATA controller, both 660s running in SLI mode and everything is humming right along. I did this reload and have not even attempted to enable Ultra Fast for fear of destabilizing my system again. I've basically been tinkering with it during the day and trying to make sure it's working in the evenings so that I can game with my family.

So, after reading all of that....am I missing something? I've never gotten Ultra Fast boot to work 100% on this system and had just given up on it until two days ago when I thought I'd take another crack at it while I was reloading.

[parsec]

Re: Ultra Fast Boot problem

First, the CSM option is the true "switch" to enable or disable UEFI booting. Yes CSM can be found in the ACPI screen, but has been moved elsewhere in newer boards/BIOS, not that it matters where it is. Setting CSM to disabled actually enables UEFI booting, and enabling CSM disables UEFI booting. The default BIOS/UEFI setting for CSM is disabled, so that must be reset on every BIOS clear.

Next, enabling Secure Boot will automatically set CSM to disabled, since Secure boot ONLY works with CSM disabled. Enabling Secure Boot can (and will in some BIOS's) cause the CSM option to be removed from view, I assume as a safety feature so it can't be changed to enabled.

The next rule IMO is, you do not need to have Secure Boot enabled to allow UEFI booting, given that your BIOS has the CSM option available. Many guides will tell you to enable Secure Boot to enable UEFI booting, since that is the simplest way to disable the CSM option, and they have no idea if CSM is an option in a board's BIOS. It works but leaves out the details.

I assume some BIOS's will change CSM to disabled when Fast Boot is set to Ultra Fast. But that is a dumbed-down response IMO.

Now that you've told us you have your video cards with GOP compatible VBIOS, I must say this is why we ask, plead, and beg people to supply details about their PC. Not aimed at you khronoe in particular, just sayin', but it saves ALL of us time and grief!!!!!!

[khronoe]

Re: Ultra Fast Boot problem

I'll tinker a bit more with Secure Boot to see if it causes the problem with my current load. Based on what you've said, if CSM is the issue and I enable Secure Boot then I should immediately encounter the issue. If I do not then I know there is another issue.

I do know that Secure Boot is not required for Ultra Fast boot, which is why I hadn't enabled yet on this current load and wanted to get to the bottom of the issue before I introduced another potential issue.

I understand what you're saying about the vbios, which is why (not that I'm being defensive haha) I put it on the second line in my original post hehe. I knew that was going to be asked.

[khronoe]

Re: Ultra Fast Boot problem

It's definitely CSM. I just tried a couple of things and immediately had problems.

First, I enabled Secure Boot and rebooted to a blue screen. I went back in and checked my UEFI settings and CSM was set to enabled, secure boot did not automatically disable it. Soooo.... I disabled CSM and immediately had the problem again. I'm back to thinking it's related to SLI. Doing some research on that now.

[parsec]

Re: Ultra Fast Boot problem

It's definitely CSM. I just tried a couple of things and immediately had problems.

First, I enabled Secure Boot and rebooted to a blue screen. I went back in and checked my UEFI settings and CSM was set to enabled, secure boot did not automatically disable it. Soooo.... I disabled CSM and immediately had the problem again. I'm back to thinking it's related to SLI. Doing some research on that now.

That is ridiculous, for the BIOS to not disable CSM with Secure Boot enabled, two different ASRock boards (for Intel CPUs) I use do that automatically. If that is true with your UEFI, that is a major bug in the UEFI, the change should happen instantly when Secure Boot is enabled. Secure Boot only works when UEFI booting, so your UEFI's reaction makes no sense.

Not sure about the SLI situation, I've never seen info about that either way, working or not working. You could try each card by itself, and see if the VBIOS update took on both cards, a pain I know. I would post in the EVGA forum about this and see what they say, they ought to know, the EVGA support staff.

FWIW, I had an EVGA 660 that refused to take the VBIOS update, or something went wrong and the card was basically worthless after that. I had to return it and got a 760, which did not need an update. I did an EVGA 650 just fine, still use it UEFI booting, so the 660 problem I had is a mystery.