BIOS freezes when USB hard drive is plugged in

bioshard drive

I have a Fit-PC3 with a Phoenix BIOS (Securecore Tiano v2.1), and when I turn it on with a Samsung 3TB USB external hard drive (similar to this) plugged in, it freezes on the BIOS screen (I am unable to press F2 to enter the BIOS setup).

When I unplug the drive, it boots fine. I can then plug in the drive later, and it works perfectly.

The drive has its own power supply plugged in to the mains.

I have changed the boot order in the BIOS, so my internal HD is listed first, and the external HD is listed second, and marked as disabled (there is an "!" next to it).

I have turned off UEFI boot and turned on Legacy mode.

I have overwritten the master boot record on the drive with zeroes using dd.

I have tried plugging it into different USB ports.

Possible duplicates: Ext HDD = Frozen @ Splash Screen, Shuttle FB51 mobo does not boot with external USB drive attached, Troubleshooting a failed hard-drive that halts BIOS

The results are the same if I plug in the hard drive via a USB hub but when plugged in to another PC (ASUS BIOS) that PC boots fine.

Any ideas how to get it to boot?

Best Answer

Here are some suggestions, in the hope that they will help :

  • Update the BIOS as detailed in this Fit-PC3 Support page, if a newer version to yours does exist.
  • Enter BIOS setup and set Legacy support for UMS (USB Mass Storage) devices to Disabled, if you have such an option. This will only prevent your PC from booting from USB devices, which is not a problem. This only affects the BIOS, while Windows will still detect all disks.
  • Among the many BIOS versions in existence, the above setting might have other names such as "Legacy USB storage detect", or "Legacy USB Support" or "USB Device Legacy Support". Or they might be separate options. Sometimes these settings may be on an "Integrated Peripherals" page in the BIOS.
  • Reformat the disk using the Fit-PC3 computer.
  • Try a newer enclosure (if it is not new). I just lately encountered here a post where an enclosure that internally used 32-bit addressing had a problem with a disk larger than 2 TB.
  • Replace the disk, if still under warranty (but I don't really expect this to help).
  • Admit defeat and never boot with this disk turned on.
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