Hard drive boots in one laptop but not another

[shmueldabomb441]

I have a Samsung 860 EVO SSD running for 6 months on my Lenovo N580 which i wanted to put in my HP Notebook 15-bs033cl instead of some other HDD which is in my bs033cl(not the one it came with). I remember the 860 EVO working in the bs033cl a few months ago when i put it in. For a few reasons, i then needed to take it out a few minutes after putting it in last time, but put it back in soon after... and lo and behold it wasn't working. But when i took it out and put it back in a third time, it worked. Fast forward a few months to now, i needed to replace the bracket for the HDD in the bs033cl(it went missing). I got the replacement bracket, and tried swapping in the 860 EVO again. I get the same error as last time: "Boot Device Not Found." I plug the 860 EVO back into the N580, and it works fine. Plug it into the bs033cl, "Boot Device Not Found". I tried reseating it several times with no luck.  To put it shortly, my SDD works in one laptop, but wont work in the one i want it to(the bs033cl). What's up??

[Echo_Lake]

@shmueldabomb441
Thank you for posting on the HP Support Community.

I recommend you perform the following steps to isolate the issue and arrive at a fix:

Firstly, let's perform a Hard Reset: Follow steps from the link: https://hp.care/2GnkMa8.

Next: Restore BIOS default settings.

1. Turn off the computer and wait five seconds.
2. Press the Power button to start the computer and repeatedly press the F10 key to enter the BIOS setup menu.
3. On the BIOS Setup screen, press F9 to select and load the BIOS Setup Default settings.
4. Press F10 to Save and Exit.
5. Use the arrow keys to select Yes, then press Enter when asked Exit Saving Changes?
6. Follow the prompts to restart your computer. (If the error message displays proceed to the next step)

Next: Test the hard drive using HP PC Hardware Diagnostics
Please click here to download sp98768.exe, or go to the HP PC Hardware Diagnostics Supporting Website

1. Plug the AC adapter into the computer.
2. Press the Power button for at least five seconds to turn off the computer.
3. Turn on the computer and start pressing Esc repeatedly, about once every second. When the menu appears, press the F2 key.
4. When the HP PC Hardware Diagnostics menu displays, click Component Tests.
5. In the Component Tests menu, click Hard Drive.
6. Click the Quick Test.
7. Click Run once. If the computer has more than one hard drive, click Test All Hard Drives. The Quick Test begins.
8. If the computer has more than one hard drive, select the drive you want to test. To test all the hard drives, select Test All Hard Drives.

When a test is complete, the results display on the screen. Test results are also available in the Test Logs on the main menu.

If the hard drive passes the Quick Test, but a problem still exists with the hard drive, run the Extensive Test. This test includes the SMART Check, Short DST, Optimized DST, and Long DST. To run a specific test, select it from the Hard Drive Tests menu.

Hope this helps! Keep me posted for further assistance.
Please click “Accept as Solution” if you feel my post solved your issue, it will help others find the solution.

[shmueldabomb441]

Neither one worked. The drive passed the test with no errors. It still doesn't work. 

[Echo_Lake]

@shmueldabomb441
Thank you for posting back. 

This sounds like a hardware related issue,

I would request you to reach out to our Support and our Support Engineers should be able to check the available service options in order to diagnose the computer physically. HP Support can be reached by clicking on the following link:  www.hp.com/contacthp/​​​​​​​

Please feel free to contact us here anytime you need any further assistance. Please click “Accept as Solution” if you feel my post solved your issue, it will help others find the solution.

[shmueldabomb441 · Accepted solution]

I talked to an experienced computer technician. He laughed at how obvious it was. You cant just transplant a hard drive from one PC to another and have everything work the same. The computer has security features and unique IDs which will deny another configuration of hardware(i.e. a different computer) to use all of its functionality(whether that be the booting functionality or some minor functionality varies).  You need to configure your drive using a windows feature called Sysprep. Particularly,  "generalize" it while booting in OOBE (out of box experience) mode. This removes any PC-specific information and allows the system to transfer seamlessly to a new machine. This solved the problem.