Some users don’t know what to do when they find their M.2 SSD not detected on the Windows PC. If you meet this problem and have no idea how to solve it, then this post is what you need.
Having an M.2 SSD on a Windows computer will greatly improve your PC performance, but some users confront a strange problem: the M.2 SSD has been plugged into the PC, but it doesn’t show up. And there are 2 different situations:
▶ Case 1. M.2 SSD not detected in BIOS Some users find that the SSD doesn’t show at start-up in BIOS. When Windows is running, it shows up in Explorer, Disk Management, etc. And you can access it. But if you check in BIOS, M.2 SSD doesn’t show up.
▶ Case 2. M.2 SSD not showing up on Windows Another situation is when you enter Windows, but you can’t see M.2 SSD in File Explorer/This PC. It can only be checked in Device Manager or BIOS.
After knowing the possible reasons why M.2 SSD not showing up, now it's time to fix this problem. In this section, we'll separately show you how to solve M.2 SSD not detected in BIOS and in Windows. You can try some of the solutions to repair the issue.
If your SSD disk is not detected in BIOS, try the following steps.
◤ Way 1. check the power and cables
Step 1. Disconnect Your PC's power supply. If you are using a laptop, you can take out the battery.
Step 2. Open the PC's case or disassemble your laptop's shell. Re-plug your M.2 SSD.
You can find the M.2 connector on the lower middle of the motherboard and there’s a horizontal slot labeled SATA or PCIe. Please remove the mounting screw opposite the slot and Insert the M.2 SSD.
In a laptop, you need to open M.2 slot > Slide M.2 SSD to the slot
◤ Way 2. Check BIOS settings
Step 1. Restart your computer and press the F2 key or any key according to your PC to enter the BIOS interface.
Step 2. Check if the SATA port to which the M.2 SSD is connected is turned OFF in System Setup. If it is OFF, turn it ON. Restart your computer and enter BIOS again to see if the M.2 SSD is detected now.
◤ Way 3. Check SSD
M.2 SSD not recognized in BIOS might also be caused by a faulty or damaged SSD. In this scenario, you can use diagnostic tools such as S.M.A.R.T or CHKDSK to troubleshoot the problem. If you cannot fix the M.2 SSD, you may check the return policy and replace the drive.
If your M.2 SSD just does not appear in This PC/Computer, you'll need to use the Windows built-in utility Device Manager in conjunction with some helpful software to resolve the issue.
To avoid losing data when running the patches, make a backup of your files ahead of time.
◤ Way 1. Update device drivers
Step 1. Right-click on the Start icon and select Device Manager.
Step 2. Find your M.2 SSD, right-click on it, and select “Update Driver Software”.
Step 3. Select “Search automatically for updated driver software” in the pop-up window. This will update the device drivers automatically. If it doesn’t work to update the driver, just right-click the M.2 SSD and select “Uninstall”. Then restart your computer, and Windows will reinstall the driver by itself.
◤ Way 2. Use hardware and devices troubleshooter
Step 1. Type Hardware and Devices on the search box and click to start.
Step 2. Click "Next" and wait for scanning.
◤ Way 3. Use the disk & drive tool to fix the issue
From here, the methods require a handy Windows disk tool, AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard. It is a free tool for Windows 11/10/8/8.1/7/XP. This tool can initialize the disk, format the system disk, and change the drive letter for SSD not showing up issue. And you can adjust the partition size, test disk speed, defrag HDD, etc. with this tool.
Option 1. Initialize SSD Step 1. Right-click on the SSD and select “Initialize Disk”.
Step 2. Choose to initialize the disk as MBR or GPT style in the pop-up window.
Step 3. Click “Apply” and then “Proceed” to commit the operation.
Option 2. Format SSD It’s not that convenient to use Windows built-in tool to format your system SSD, if you need to format a system disk, this tool will be very helpful.
Step 1. Right-click on the partition of the M.2 SSD and hit “Format Partition”.
Step 2. In the pop-up window, you can reset the partition label, file system, and cluster size. Click “OK” to confirm the changes.
Option 3. Change drive letter Step 1. Right-click on the M.2 SSD partition, select “Advanced” and then “Change Drive Letter”.
Step 2. Select a new drive letter in the pop-up window. You can choose whichever drive letter you like except the ones that are occupied by other drives.
Step 3. Click “Apply” and then “Proceed” to commit the operation.
If you find your M.2 SSD not detected in BIOS or This PC, then you can follow the methods in this post to try to fix this problem by yourself.
AOMEI Partition Assistant has a clear interface and simple operations, all users can easily use it to manage their Windows computers. Besides the functions we mentioned in this post, you can see there are many other features like migrating OS, cloning disk, converting a disk to MBR/GPT without data loss, moving install apps and folders, and so on. What’s more, it also offers the Server Edition for Windows Server 2022/2019/2016/2012(R2)/2008(R2)/2003 users.