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BIOS(or motherboard firmware), doesn't recognize internal HDD connected through a SATA to USB adapter

I have two computers, a tower and a laptop.

I usually use a laptop but recently, in addition to the laptop, I came into possession of a tower, and use it for spare parts.

I removed the internal HDD (3,5 inch) from the tower. The HDD has a Windows 10 install on it and is connected to my laptop via a SATA to USB adapter (with power supply). I would like to connect this 3.5" hard drive to my laptop externally, and use this HDD as a seperate OS that I can boot into since I'm mainly on Linux and need to tinker around in Windows from time to time.

When plugging it into my laptop, Linux recognizes the HDD and I can browse the filesystem. Read/Write too. Only problem is that my laptop BIOS doesn't recognize the boot partition. I can't create a boot option either since the BIOS doesn't give me the option to browse for the bootmgfw.efi. Safe mode is disabled. I've read people say to disable CSM, but there's no such thing on the laptop in my BIOS under the boot tab.

External hard drive has MBR partition table layout.

enter image description here

The option to enable/disable CSM isn't available in my BIOS (laptop). My laptop only has BIOS. The old computer tower I took apart has UEFI.

Note- Turned out Laptop's motherboard firmware was UEFI, so ,not BIOS. (And was UEFI with CSM off(legacy mode off)).

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  • Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat.
    – DavidPostill ♦
    Commented Aug 9, 2022 at 15:02

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
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Issue fixed.

The laptop BIOS didn't recognize the HDD boot partition because the drive's partition table was formatted as an MBR partition table.

I wiped the HDD. Wrote a GPT partition table on it. Connected it back into the tower, installed Windows 10 on it and my laptop BIOS recognized the drive and I was able to boot into it.

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  • That means that what you are calling "Laptop BIOS" is actually a UEFI i.e. UEFI with CSM On. That also means that if you were to put a Legacy style Live USB in the laptop then it won't boot.
    – barlop
    Commented Aug 9, 2022 at 17:42
  • @barlop I may have been wrong. As far as I knew, UEFI systems always have these "fancy" screens and BIOS is just the old, blue, strange looking one. Didn't even know that UEFI can also be the blue looking one..
    – Dean
    Commented Aug 9, 2022 at 21:32
  • Well years ago we would says BIOS. Then suddenly we were told that its now a UEFI and has been so for many years. Motherboard Firmware is the general term. Almost any computer now and for many years(a decade? over a decade?), has been UEFI. So what matters now is whether CSM is on or off. (cntd)
    – barlop
    Commented Aug 9, 2022 at 22:26
  • (cntd) And how to tell is either from the OS telling you e.g. superuser.com/questions/1715414/… or which type of live USB you can boot. Or, if your hard drive is GPT partition table layout, then it means necessarily that you are on UEFI-CSM off. (cntd)
    – barlop
    Commented Aug 9, 2022 at 22:26
  • (cntd) The difference between BIOS and UEFI is very behind the scenes and not something u can tell by just looking oh it looks fancy. And the term UEFI can be a bit ambiguous 'cos sometimes people mean UEFI which could have CSM(legacy) on/off. Or they could mean UEFI with CSM(legacy mode) off
    – barlop
    Commented Aug 9, 2022 at 22:29

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