intel 750 pci-E Nvme boot on Z77 is bootable

[TheOsTech]

I started this thread to answer the question of boot ability of the new intel 750 nvme ssd on the z77 platform.
p8z77-v deluxe + intel 750 nvme = bootable

I am still testing and its a little buggy requiring me to enter the bios and exit without saving every reboot, but i am writing on the pc that i booted to and its working great.

I will post back with more information shortly and I hope others with a z77 platform and this ssd will post their experience as well.

p8z77-V deluxe
i7 3770k non oc atm, 4.4 otherwise
nh-d14 cooler
780 TI
2133 muskin ddr3 ram
coolermaster 942


intel 520 ssd sata
samsung 850 ssd sata
intel 750 ssd pci-e

win 8 on the way to 8.1

 

[Kushiro]

While its lovely that you have taken the time to post about this, the entering and exiting of the bios would render any time saved during boot from say a current SSD. Nice to know though, hopefully they release an update so you dont have to do that.

 

[TheOsTech]

It appears that the uefi windows boot loader that was already on my 850 pro is being used to start the boot process on the pci-e ssd. some of the oddities may come from windows seting up the drive as a gpt uefi partition istead of using the rom boot chip. While the ssd itself will show in windows as a non uefi device "ss pata" the windows boot manager seems to be all that is required to go from uefi boot to windows.

The questions that remain are

Will this drive work if installed without an accompanying uefi sata device holding the bootloader?

What causes windows preboot process to reboot unless i start the boot process from a bios exit, even when all i do is hit esc and exit without saving?

Newbie_ns810 thank you for the reply. My intention is more to experiment for a better understanding of the technology and to gain the speed boost of operating windows on the blazing fast pci-e ssd. The boot loop hoop is annoying but my system only gets rebooted once a day. When my sql server is not needed this weekend i will be able to experiment more. Right now I am limited to overnights until I transfer a few clients to azure sql servers.

It would be lovely to see asus release a beta bios update to support nvme boot and I have seen JJ post in the forms that they are aware that some clients want this. He seemed doubtful that the poll they are running would get enough clients voting for support to make it worth their while. He wanted over 1000 for z77 and two other chipset to even consider it. So far the numbers are short of what he is looking for. It is frustrating that they wont even release a beta bios for testing that a single engineer could probably finish for each chipset in a day or two. It cant be that hard as i can already boot. Ultimately it comes down to sales I'm sure. Why give anyone a reason not to buy a new mb, memory cpu just because they already forked out a bunch for upgrades early last year? Sorry sucka buy new again!

Maybe someone in the community with some experience modifying uefi bios will be able to make the required changes. Bios recovery is pretty easy these days.

I will post back as I learn more.

 

[TheOsTech]

I pulled all my drives except the pci-e nvme+dvd-rom and reinstalled 8.0 in uefi mode. worked great no issues now on 8.1. Waited to re attach and format old boot drive(850 pro) until after 8.1 upgrade and drivers in.

There is a 10 second pre-boot delay due to the asus csm attempting uefi boot first i believe. I will test that tonight.

The bottom line is that if you have win 8 and the intel pre-boot driver you should be able to use the intel 750 ssd pci-e without issue as a boot device on p8z77-v deluxe bios 2104. I would guess most or all z77 boards from asus will behave the same. Just remember to disconnect all other drives before installing to avoid any issues and do not reconnect until after you hit the end of your updates 8.1 or 10 even maybe.