I have an issue and I'm not sure if it's possibly a bios setting or what, but after the system post through the bios and starts to load Windows 10 Pro 64bit, the system will hang and not boot. The little dots that go around in a circle start like normal, then they will start slowing down then skipping and will not finish the boot into Windows. I have all my drivers installed from EVGA's website (installed the chipset driver the proper way with using the -overall switch). It does not happen on every boot, but I would say 90% to 95% this happens. Only thing that seems to guaranty a successful boot into Windows is for me to go into the bios, then to "Save and Exit" and select "Windows Managed Boot" or something like that from the boot override, then the system boots up fine.
 
I have reinstalled Windows, moved my NVMe drives from the motherboard to PCI-e slot adapters. Even reinstalled Windows running the NVMe drives through VROC and it's still getting stuck during the Windows boot.
 
Windows 10 Pro 64bit Version 2004
EVGA Z299 Dark with bios 1.23
Intel Core i9-10900X. CPU is water cooled, clocked at 4.3GHz with Intel Turbo Boost 3.0 and C State disabled (system got stuck before I disabled these also).
EVGA RTX 2080 Super Hydro Copper, locked up with both 451.67 and 452.06 Game Ready drivers.
G.Skill 3200MHz Memory running stock speed and timings.
2 WD BLACK SN750 NVMe M.2 2280 1TB PCI-Express 3.0 x4 WDS100T3X0C drives. Gets stuck whether drives installed on motherboard, PCI-e slot adapters running in SATA or VROC mode.
2 WD 3TB spinner drives in raid mirror. Drives were placed in raid mirror mode on my EVGA X99 Classified motherboard and transferred to the X299 Dark motherboard.
 
Suggestions? Thanks!

Sajin
So you’re running the cpu at lower than default speeds? Why? Does it have a problem? How does the system run on bios optimized defaults?

Eh, no. Default speed is 3.7GHz. Will it go higher? Yes, I can benchmark at 5.06GHz all day long, but 4.3GHz all cores 24/7 is good for me. It still gets stuck on Windows boot with default settings. When I get home, I'm going to detach my mirror raided spinner drives and see if that could be it. I created that raid on the X99 Classified motherboard, so maybe there is something going on there. That's about the only other thing I can think of that might be causing the hang up during boot.

bob16314

kram36
I created that raid on the X99 Classified motherboard, so maybe there is something going on there. 

Sounds probable..Maybe just connect/use only 1 drive for now and put a fresh copy of Windows on it..Then add other ones later..Be what I would do.

It's definitely something to do with those raid mirror spinner drives. When I disconnect them from the system, the computer boots perfectly fine every time. I can get it to boot with those spinner drives attached, but it's a fight. Right now I got the system booted and using the Rapid Storage Technology program to verify and repair (if it finds any errors) the drives. If that doesn't work, I'll copy the files to another drive, delete the array and build a new array from the X299 Dark motherboard.
 
When the system hangs on boot up, I see the drive light flash, like Windows is reading the spinner drives and is loading the driver for the RST, but something happens and it just hangs and will not go any further. Not sure if it's the driver itself or the spinner drives raid being created on the X99 platform. Won't be a happy camper if I copy all those files to another drive, delete and rebuild the array and it still hangs up on boot.

Not my drives, at least I don't think it is. Verify and Repair came back with 0 issues. Tried some different drivers and had to completely disable the Raid to get the system to load.

Okay, been working on this issue for a bit. There must be a bios bug. Never had this issue with my X99 Classified motherboard.
 
If I have hot swap enabled, Windows wants me to have another drive plugged into the SATA a port besides just my mirror raided drives or Windows will not boot, just sits there with the dots circling very slowly. While that is happening I can walk over to the pc and put a drive into my hot swap bay and then the dots start going faster and Windows boots up.
 
Or I can turn off hot swap on every SATA port in the bios and Windows boots rights up. This is not acceptable as I need to have hot swap enabled so I can swap drives in and out while in Windows.
 
If this is not a bios bug, then I have a faulty motherboard.

arestavo
Also, stupid question - have you tried hot swap enabled without the hot swap bay plugged in at all? Could be that the backplane is going out causing issues.

Ding ding ding! That's the issue. Turned hot swap back on, except for my mirror raided drives, unplugged my hot swap bay from the SATA port, did several boots and reboots now and Windows has not hung once. So why is this happening on the X299 Dark and it never happened on any board I have had in this case before? I bought this case specifically because it has a hot swap bay built into it https://www.newegg.com/all-black-xigmatek-elysium-black-atx-super-tower/p/N82E16811815011 and I have had several motherboards in this case with no issues having the bay plugged into the motherboard and no hard drive being in the bay. For some reason the X299 Dark is thinking there is a drive in the bay and is trying to read it.
 
I love this case and I am not getting rid of it. Bought it 3/11/2012
 

arestavo
There is a chance that the bay has a problem - all things wear out with time (connectors are rated for so many insertions, after all).

However, get with EVGA with a ticket. It may be something that their BIOS team missed.

Worse comes to worse, is that hot swap bay replaceable, or do you have 5.25" bays to spare that can fit a different model? If so, try to get a new one from a place that accepts returns and test it.

It's definitely something with that built in case hot swap bay. Not sure why the X299 Dark reacts to it this way and no other motherboard has. Yes I do have room for a 5.25" hot swap bay and I do have one that was in another pc I have. I pulled it out of that system and put it into this system and it works perfectly. I can leave the power of the hot swap 5.25" bay device on and the motherboard does not think there is a dive in it and Windows isn't looking for a drive and getting hung up while booting into Windows.
 
Will have to see if I can mod the case built in hot swap bay with another hot swap bay device. I guess all is good now,  but what a frustrating few days it has been with this issue.
 
I will have to say I'm loving this build when it boots correctly. I have a couple WD 1TB SN750 NVMe drives running in Raid 0 from the VROC controller.
 
This is how each drives runs on the VROC controller not in Raid 0.
 

 
Not running on the VROC controller. Yes for some reason running on the VROC controller the drive speed benchmark shows slower numbers, but the system feels much more snappy running from the VROC controller.
 

 
This is how the drives run in Raid 0 on the VROC controller.
 

 
Intel Core i9-10900X @ 4.3GHz GFlops speed.
 

 
Cinebench R15 @ 4.3GHz. The i7-5930K score was from my X99 Classified running @ 4.2GHz.
 

arestavo
Glad you found the root cause!

^^ +1  Probably a bit maddening trying to pinpoint the issue. Glad it's solved.  You mentioned you're using the WD SN750. Are these the ones with heat sink, and do they fit with M2 cover on? Guessing no heat sink model. thanks.