Solved Moved system to new PC: new info shows on startup

Wisewiz said:

I think the order is correct: My NVMe system disk and Windows Boot Manager, not Network or USB or Storage Disk.

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The white text yet appears at bootup though right, even before Windows HAL is loaded?

@OAT

Yep. Caught most of the text: four lines:
Intel Corporation Copyright (2004-2020)
Intel Active management Technology
BIOS Revision (number that HWiNFO reports)
BIOS Settings key <esc>

then it proceeds to login, but still shows the generic icon first, then my user pic.

Options are often limited in oem bios, it might be an alternative splash screen to the more usual oem logo. You might be able to change it somewhere in bios settings.

Or it might be a message prompting you to change a setting in bios. "something something" isn't much help.

On consumer motherboards there is usually a choice between the motherboard manufacturer logo ( Gigabyte or Asus or whatever ) or the bios manufacturer info ( e.g. AMI ).

To aid in troubleshooting the bootup screen instead of trying catch it quick enough with your camera instead use the camera as a video recorder and record the bootup screen(s) as a video. You can then watch the video and slow down the playback at the appropriate screen and do a screenshot of that image and post it here.

I suspect what you're seeing is default bios presentations which happen to be different than the previous motherboard.

@SIW2 and @BamaInArk

Edited text in post #22.

@Ghot, @zebal, @BamaInArk, @OAT, @SIW2:

I licked the login icon-picture thing by logging in on my MS account for one restart, then switching back to my local automatic login. So that's solved. Saw that possible solution somewhere on the Net.

I was wondering: If I use the Optimize Settings thing in the BIOS (F9), might that clear up the stuff that shows up during my boots?

This is a refurb, and it was a corporate PC in Toronto for a year or so, so I'm sure they fudged up the BIOS in several ways before the refurb people got to it and did whatever they do (probably not much, except for a fresh install of W11 Pro).

If that Intel Active Management Technology thing that shows up during boots is a leftover, I can't find it to get rid of it, In any case, it's not likely to have survived the changing of the main system disk from theirs to mine. Right?

trumpy81 said:

Start by disabling RAID in your BIOS, chances are that is what you are seeing, the RAID BIOS Configuration screen. The enter BIOS screen is likely to stay though.

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A note on just this, I'm working on a Dell Precision now that was set up with 2 x 500GB drives and one had failed. It boots just fine with only 1 drive even though the BIOS is still set for RAID. It will not boot if setting the BIOS to AHCI and that drive connected.

To prove viability of the computer I changed out the drive to a blank and installed Win10 Pro on it with the BIOS set for AHCI, works fine. Then I upgraded to Win11, still no issues.

When finished with it I will set the BIOS back to either 0 or 5 seconds for displaying of the P.O.S.T. and leave it with only one drive.

I couldn't find a danged thing in the BIOS about RAID, but I DID find (in Advanced) a switch called Intel Management and it was Enabled. Thought I'd try disabling it, and if things went badly, I'd get back into the BIOS and change it back. Restarted and was asked whether I wanted to complete the process. Said Yes, and it restarted itself, showed all the same stuff, and then restarted itself, and this time it went straight to the Lenovo logo and spinner, and then to my user pic and in, to the desktop.

Persistence pays big dividends. Many thanks to all of you who gave me advice and suggestions.

Berton said:

It boots just fine with only 1 drive even though the BIOS is still set for RAID. It will not boot if setting the BIOS to AHCI and that drive connected.

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You must have set up for RAID 1 (Mirror) so when the first drive died you were left with full data intact. If you had setup for RAID 0 (Striping), then booting would fail as half the data would be missing and it would not boot until you replaced the bad drive and rebuilt the RAID by formatting and re-installing etc..

When you format for RAID the RAID type etc. is written to the drive. This helps when you need to replace a drive or when you locate the RAID drives to another system.

Wisewiz said:

I couldn't find a danged thing in the BIOS about RAID, but I DID find (in Advanced) a switch called Intel Management and it was Enabled. Thought I'd try disabling it, and if things went badly, I'd get back into the BIOS and change it back. Restarted and was asked whether I wanted to complete the process. Said Yes, and it restarted itself, showed all the same stuff, and then restarted itself, and this time it went straight to the Lenovo logo and spinner, and then to my user pic and in, to the desktop.

Persistence pays big dividends. Many thanks to all of you who gave me advice and suggestions.

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Sorry if I misdirected you, I was thinking Lenovo used a regular non propriety BIOS, they don't ... lol

After some research I did discover that your BIOS did not have any provision for RAID. I saw mention of the Intel Management Engine, but that did not click as being the cause of your issues.

I am glad you were able to figure it out though, well done!!

@trumpy81

Thank you. You were very helpful. Happy whatever you celebrate!

trumpy81 said:

You must have set up for RAID 1 (Mirror) so when the first drive died you were left with full data intact. If you had setup for RAID 0 (Striping), then booting would fail as half the data would be missing and it would not boot until you replaced the bad drive and rebuilt the RAID.

When you format for RAID the RAID type etc. is written to the drive. This helps when you need to replace a drive or when you locate the RAID drives to another system.

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Wasn't my choice, her son had sent it out of his company from several hundred miles away. My only choice is to fix it.

Either way, you dodged a bullet there ... lol

RAID 0 drive failure would have resulted in total data loss in a two drive system, so you would have had to reformat the drive/s and reinstall Windows etc.

Yep, only RAID I use is 1 on my NAS drive with 2 x 2TB drives, getting a niggling thought of 2 x 4TB drives.

I don't normally use two drives in RAID, I typically use RAID 5 with a 4 drive setup, but I currently use SHR (Synology Hybrid RAID) on my two 8 Bay NAS, which is essentially RAID 5. That allows me to mismatch drive sizes without losing a lot of storage space like you would with traditional RAID.

RAID 5 allows one drive to fail without losing any data. If two drives fail though, I'm screwed ... lol

I would definitely upgrade to 2x 4TB drives, even if you don't need the space now, you most likely will down the track. You can never have enough storage space ... lol

To me RAID 1 striping is only good for raw storage but lose one drive all is lost. I haven't had any issue with RAID 1 mirroring with my NAS setup, now on a second one only because the first had major security with its software and now updates for it, using a Buffalo LinkStation now.