I've got the E15 e5 575g i5 model and I have installed the WD m.2 nvme and cloned it with HDD

Gauravmalik423

while changing the boot priority in BIOS Settings I've set no.1 the m.2, no.2 HDD and then the boot manager and saved the settings  but even after that the windows is booting with the HDD, what should I do now?

aphanic

There are several options you can do to solve it, outside of getting rid of the HDD out of there that is:

• Format the HDD, if it was properly cloned then everything it has has been duplicated in the other drive right? No need to have the things duplicated, unless, you are yet to see if you can boot off of the M.2 drive. You should check that first of course, for example by removing the HDD and booting the computer.
  
  
• Get rid of the code or partition that makes the HDD bootable. This solution is a bit naughty, but it's a valid way of getting it not to appear to be bootable anymore. You'll have to do it from when you haven't booted from it or Windows won't let you.
  
  Booting from the M.2 is fine, and you can also do it from a Windows installation media (pressing Shift+F10 brings up a CMD over there).
  
  In any case, launch DiskPart, it's a console program to manage partitions and the first step is to list the disks that are connected to the machine (stuff in yellow is what you need to type, explanation after the picture):
  
   
  
  The first command, "list disk" shows the disks that are connected, you'll see I have just two, the internal M.2 and an USB stick this time. "sel disk 0" selects the disk, in this case I chose the 0 which happens to be the M.2 for you it could very well be the 2.5'' one.
  
  Now, "det disk" is the interesting thing, because it shows you details of the disk, such as the brand and model. That's just to make sure you're not messing around with the M.2 disk because the next steps in which we get rid of the boot partition or disable it are to be performed in the 2.5''er.
  
  Let's assume, that disk 0 is the right one and proceed on:
  
  
  
  There, "list part" shows the partitions the disk has, you see there are plenty, but we're looking for the EFI/ESP one (assuming you have an UEFI system that is). It's the one listed as System and its size is usually rather small, 100 MB this time.
  
  The command to delete that partition is "del part" (after selecting it with "sel part X"). You see it failed in there, because I am running directly on this drive, but it will probably fail as well because of the kind of partition it is. That's what that override parameter is for if I were to type "del part override" poof, the partition would be gone.
  
  No EFI partition, not possible to boot from that disk. As simple as that.
  
  You may have noticed that on the first screenshot there was an asterisk in the Gpt column for the disk. That means its partition is GPT, if there weren't in your case, you wouldn't need to delete the partition, after selecting it just typing "inactive" would be enough to mark it as a regular partition and not a boot one.
  
  That's about it, the "exit" command gets you out of there.

There are probably way more ways to make it so the M.2 is the priority one to boot from, I find it odd that changing its priority in the BIOS wasn't enough but hey, you can always go the hard way. And you shouldn't feel bad for having deleted that partition, the same way it can be deleted it can be recreated. It's just a couple more steps.

Although I assume that eventually you'd want that disk to either have a different version of Windows installed or use it completely as a data disk and nothing more. Again, DiskPart can help you with that.

Once the disk is selected (so after "sel disk X") the command "clean" will remove everything (not per se, the data remains, but no way to access it). That, followed by "create part prim" would get you a single partition occupying the whole space of the disk. It would still need formatting, but that's just another command away: format recommended quick label="Whatever you want to call it"

And there it is, a data partition for whatever you want to put there.

There are all sorts of modifiers for each command, for example, if you wanted a partition that didn't span the whole disk but just 250MB you'd write "create part prim size=250M", typically typing "help command" (e.g. "help create part") will get you information on what else you can add.

brummyfan2

Hi,
Do you have OS in both drives? If so, remove HDD and try booting with only M.2 SSD.