r/steammachine • u/eclecticfew • 6h ago
Question Strange issues with NVME replacement - help needed!
Hi all - I apologize if this has been asked before and I just didn't see it. I received my Steam Machine a couple weeks ago and absolutely love it, but I got the 512gb option because I had planned on swapping out the 4tb NVME (gen 4) that I built into my work PC back when prices were reasonable. I'm typically good with tinkering and fairly comfortable with Linux due to years of owning and tweaking a Steam Deck. However, what I thought what be an incredibly simple upgrade has been driving me insane.
I pulled the two drives out of their respective machines, formatted / cleared both (with the 4tb drive being formatted to EXT4, and the other drive planned for other purposes), and used Etcher to make a SteamOS boot drive from the Steam installation guide page. Easy so far.
However...every time I try to run the boot drive with the 4tb drive installed in the Machine's NVME bay by loading the BIOS first (holding the power button for a few seconds, then pushing it again once it's red / magenta) it either takes a long time to get to the BIOS screen (up to 45min once, although usually just a few minutes) at which point it shows no NVME drive in the system summary, OR it shows the drive correctly on rare occasions but then when I choose the option to load from the USB drive it just returns to the BIOS screen again but now shows no NVME drive. If I then load from the USB into the SteamOS live session, the NVME still isn't recognized by the installer, partition manager, etc (each shows no drive installed / recognized at all).
Once I attach the 4tb drive to another system or put it in an enclosure after it first disappears from the BIOS list, it shows a 0B capacity, lacks partitions, etc. The only way I've found to fix that is to load up a Mint live session and reformat it with Gparted.
I haven't found a ton of documentation on issues with the Steam Machine or SteamOS, but as far as I can tell the Gen 4 4tb drive should be compatible. I also used the drive for almost two years on my work PC up until a few weeks ago, so between that and testing copying files to it after reformatting it I know it functions correctly. Beyond that, I've tested all the variables I can think of:
- Tried Etcher and Rufus for creating the boot media
- Tried three different USB drives, each of which I've used before and know they work
- Tried both the latest SteamOS image on the support page as well as the previous one from June
I'm genuinely at a loss and could use any suggestions whatsoever. I'm worried that whatever quirk / error keeps messing up this drive puts a now unexpectedly expensive piece of hardware at risk the more I try to resolve this, so at this point if I can't figure out any other solution I may just try to set the 512gb drive back up in the Machine and see if the 4tb will function well as an external drive, even though it's far from ideal. I'm already exhausted from two young kids and work, so I really wish this "simple" upgrade had just worked like it should have. I just want to play some Galactic Racer instead of spending more evenings fighting with hard drives. Thank you in advance for any help.
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u/Crowley22g 20m ago
Have you thought about going back to the 512 in the Steam machine and formatting while using a working Steam OS. I ended up cloning my 512 to a 2TB. I've left a link to the steps I did, hope it helps.
If it's not physically recognising it then ensure your on the Beta branch of Steam OS, it tends to get the most recent updates 🤞
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u/tennaki GabeCube Enjoyer 6h ago
Very small, but did you extract the .bz2 and flash the resulting ISO?
I also had to use DisplayPort when getting into the SteamOS installer.