GMTEK Mini PC Stuck at Aptio Setup AMI

[Tom Saurus]

I had used Devine to do a download over night. It had finished and then I went to Rename My TV Series to rename and then the computer froze. I pressed CTRL ALT DELETE and it didn't seem to work. I went away for about a minute and when I came back the screen was completely black. I pressed in the power button and it still remained black. Then I unplugged the power adapter and then I unplugged it for a longer time.

I am hoping I have not lost Windows and everything I have on this hard drive. On the main screen of this Aptio Setup AMI it says near the bottom:

SATA Information:

Serial ATA port 1 empty

I need some help as no matter what I choose it brings me right back to this Aptio Setup AMI.

[Tom Saurus]

No matter what I select it seems to be stuck at this. Maybe the hard drive failed. Nothing positive seems to be able to be found via a Google search. I really enjoyed this Mini PC. I hate that I have probably lost everything that was on the 1 TB SSD drive. It is terribly depressing.

[Tom Saurus]

It is a NVME 1 TB hard drive. I hope I can put it in an enclosure and get the files off it. It says no NVME device found. So it looks like it is dead. This had destroyed my confidence in Mini PCs.

[videoAI]

I hope this helps ..

Initial Assessment
Your computer appears to be stuck in BIOS/UEFI firmware setup,
which suggests a potential boot device detection problem.
The "SATA Information: Serial ATA port 1 empty" message is particularly concerning.

Possible Scenarios
1. Hard Drive Disconnection
2. Drive Failure
3. BIOS/UEFI Configuration Issue
4. Potential Motherboard Problem

Diagnostic Steps

Physical Inspection
1. Verify hard drive connections:
- Ensure SATA cable is firmly connected
- Check power cable connection
- Try alternate SATA ports on motherboard
- If possible, reseat the hard drive

BIOS/UEFI Checks
1. Enter BIOS/UEFI Setup (by pressing F2, Del, or F12 during startup)
2. Navigate to:
- Storage Configuration
- Boot Order
- SATA Controller Settings

Potential Recovery Actions
- If drive is detected: Verify boot order
- If drive is not detected:
- Try different SATA cable
- Test hard drive on another computer
- Consider professional data recovery

Immediate Recommendations
1. Do not panic about data loss yet
2. Carefully check physical connections
3. If comfortable, try removing and reinserting hard drive
4. Consider professional diagnostic if above steps fail

[davexnet]

Have you a live environment you can boot from, Hirens (Windows) or a live Linux USB?
What do see on the screen when you turn it on? Messages from The bios/post?
Windows logo?

[Tom Saurus]

Thanks guys for your posts. I took the cover off and it is 1 TB NVME drive. I unscrewed the screw holding it pulled it out and put it back in.

It takes quite sometime when turning it on to finally get to this Aptio Setup AMI screen. The GMTEK logo flashes briefly on the screen and this is all I get.

Nothing seems to work. You have an option to save settings and exit and you do that and you are immediatley right back to this screen.

It looks like a failed NVME hard drive.

[Tom Saurus]

Looks like I bought it just about 5 months ago. I set it up on June 20th, 2025. Maybe I can buy a enclosure to test the drive and hopefully get the files off of. Maybe the company will send me a new NVME 1 TB hard drive. If I get though this I am going to transfer everything off that hard drive or a new one every day and never trust it is not going to fail. I have my Beelink mini pc that is in my Mom's room that I set up for her to watch video files off of.

With having to buy heating oil soon as the new season starts I was not wanting to outlay money for stuff such as this. I better sign into Amazon Canada and contact the company and see what they say. Maybe they have some advice to get it going again.

[mail2tom]

Good luck. They boast a 1 year "warranty".

[Tom Saurus]

I went to my Amazon Canada account and signed in. I don't think I will be able to get GMTEK to do anything for me. I won't buy another one. I do want to check that NVME drive with an enclosure so advice to what to get would be nice.

I guess I will buy another Beelink and be vigilant about backing everything up every day. My ISP will be happy as I won't be using much of my bandwidth for awhile. I am sad about it all.

It says to email them in China. I hate spending out money for a new one but I don't have the heart to take back the one I let Mom use and I think I will buy a spare one after awhile as well. I also have to buy more hard drives to back up what I have on my portable hard drives as they can go bad as well.

I think I will buy a new NVME hard drive for the GMTEK one too at some point but getting Windows 11 on it I would need help with that as well. I better get a usb stick to boot Windows off that in the event that would help.

[Tom Saurus]

Thank you everyone for your posts. This has happened to other people according to Reddit:

https://www.reddit.com/r/MiniPCs/comments/1lbgpc2/gmktec_g3_plus_nvme_drive_failed_after_5_months/

So I must move on spend the money and get another Windows 11 computer. This time I will make sure I clone the NVME boot drive and send stuff to external hard drives every day. It was a wonderful computer while it lasted. I hope I learn from this and I become better prepared in the future.

It hurts to spend the money setting my savings plan back a bit. But live and learn and be grateful for terrific places such as this. I don't think I will buy GMTek again in the future. Well I better stop whining and move on with my day.

[videoAI]

Well Tom ..

At least you can take some confront from the fact that the holiday season is upon us
and it is an opportune time to purchase electronics at a discount.

Good luck retrieving your data and an early holiday greetings from all of us ..

[Tom Saurus]

Thank you and seasons greetings to everyone as well. Looks like I will get another Beelink with lower specs than the GMTEK. I think I will wait until next week and see if there is a price drop. There is no guarantee the Beelink will last but my first one is still going after nearly two years. My Windows 7 Desktop is still going after 12 years. I had it shut off for a whole month because I had switched most everything over to the GMTEK mini pc. It did work well up until now but it is what it is. Though these freeze ups have happened out to the blue looks like I should have took that as a sign something was about to fail. At least there is the GST rebate check coming in January to help out.

[johns0]

I had a similar problem and found it was a faulty cpu power supply cable,replaced it and it works fine now.The cable wasn't a main power line,just a 4 pin plugin.

[Tom Saurus]

Thank you for this information.