Windows 10: Confused - am I booting in UEFI properly - msinfo32 shows I am but..?

I have installed Windows 10 pro on my self built PC using an Asus Z170-A motherboard. I used a USB in UEFI mode made using the Windows media creation tool. Motherboard BIOS updated.

I have these drives:

N1-Samsung SSD 950 PRO 256G has GPT partitions
P5: WDC WD40EZRZ-00WN9B0
P6: ASUS BW-161HT

Sometimes they show up in the boot order in the UEFI bios other times not depending whether I have CSM or Secure Boot set. Whatever shows it boots OK as long as Windows Boot Manager is there.

Sometimes just "Windows Boot Manager" shows. Once I saw Windows Boot Manager (N1-Samsung SSD 950 PRO 256G)

I never have seen the drives as:
UEFI: N1-Samsung SSD 950 PRO 256G (has GPT partitions OK)
UEFI: P5: WDC WD40EZRZ-00WN9B0
UEFI: P6: ASUS BW-161HT
Should I see these? What should I see?

What settings should I have for CSM and Secure Boot?

Any help much appreciated.

Philip

:)

 

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The only time I see UEFI in front of a boot option is when I'm trying to boot from my install media. My boot entry for Windows 10 just shows Windows Boot Manager (Crucial_Ct.......

 

Thanks for the reply. So Ok I shouldn't worry about no UEFI prefix.
How do you have the Compatibility Support Module (CSM) and Secure Boot set in UEFI Bios?

Philip

 

CSM is off and Secure Boot is on. They were the defaults when I got my laptop. As far as I know CSM only needs to be enabled if you have added a device that has firmware that does not support UEFI. I've turned it on, and didn't notice any difference at all. Then turned it back off and left it that way.

 

If you installed in UEFI mode, you should see an EFI partition in disk management. My laptop has it and my desktop PC doesn't. My desktop PC only has legacy BIOS.

 

Thanks Alphanumeric,

Just tried CSM off and Secure Boot on. The ONLY "Drive" I can then see to select, anywhere, in the UEFI Bios is "Windows Boot Manager"
Right clicking in Disk Managment in W10 confirms the C drive Samsung SM950 Pro is GPT formatted not MBR so again confirms boot is in UEFI.

It is just the absence of drives in Bios that concerns me. Everyone else seems to have them no problem. Am I missing a trick?

 

Hi, yesterday dealt with a similar thing, wanting to give boot priority to my DVD-RW drive in UEFI as I had in BIOS in prevous laptops. (UEFI and BIOS are two different things- UEFI is UEFI and BIOS is BIOS).

But no DVD drive in sight. (It worked in Windows).

It turned out in my UEFI - Aptio American Megatrends if I recall- that I had to hit F7 on restart to select a different drive to boot from - and that was a transient change. I.e. I couldn't change the default SSD boot permanently. Further, the text shown was very unclear- the DVD-RW drive was represented by a string including DVDRAM. Even the tech guy was confused.

So you may wish to explore how your particular incarnation of UEFI works.. I don't know if there's a standard for this.

 

All my current PC's have a quick boot BIOS option. On my ASUS desktop motherboards it's F8, on my ASUS laptop its the Esc key. Pressing that key on boot up gets me a onetime boot device option. It will then list all the bootable devices it can find. If I have a bootable thumb drive plugged in it will be in the list. If it's UEFI capable it will have a UEFI in front of its description. I can then select it and boot to it that one time. On the next reboot it will default back to what ever was set in the BIOS originally. If I enter the full BIOS setup menu the options are different. Even the boot devices menu is different. In that menu there is no UEFI in front of a device entry. Any changes here are permanent until you go back in and change them again.

 

What I can't understand is that with CSM off and Secure Boot on there are "NO" device entries in UEFI boot list other than "Windows Boot Manager"! They are in the Sata Information list but not in the Boot list area. See attachments:

 

That's normal, as far as I know. That's all I see on my laptop, Windows Boot manager. With no other bootable devices plugged in. My second SSD isn't bootable and won't show up in that list. If I plug my bootable thumb drive in its listed though. It shows up as boot option 2.

 

Hi,

That's to be expected. Imagine the following situation : two HDs each containing a Window 10 install for example and their respective SATA ports enabled.
These two should show in the bootable device list in bios with csm off and secure boot enabled.

CSM is a computability mode that allows you to boot from older non UEFI compliant hardware, MBR disks and so forth.
Note also that in order to run CSM, secure boot needs to be disabled. Most BOIS/UEFI require you to turn off Secure Boot first in order to access CSM mode.

Cheers, *Wink

 

Ok, so only Bootable drives will be allowed in the Boot list. I suppose my N1-Samsung SSD 950 PRO 256G drive, with W10 on it, isn't on it's own bootable but is through Windows Boot Manager. The SSD doesn't show in the Sata list either as it uses the M2 slot in the motherboard. I tried my W10 install USB again and indeed it can come up as UEFI: bootable. Where do you get to learn this stuff other than here?
Thanks guys for your comments.

 

I have CSM off, UEFI boot always and secure boot set on both of my PCs. I only ever see the Windows Boot Manager unless I select boot override and insert a UEFI bootable USB flash drive or DVD. I then see the UEFI prefix for these devices and can boot from them.