Hey everyone,

I’m having an issue booting Unraid and I’m running out of ideas, so any advice or suggested fixes would be appreciated.

I use Unraid as a Plex server. I was running on an old Dell Optiplex, everything worked great other then the Optiplex being old and showing it's age. I’ve now built a new system and it’s been nothing but issues so far.

First: after building the PC, I spent two days trying to get the internet working, only to eventually realise the Ethernet port on the motherboard was dead (I suspected something was wrong from the start as the port light never came on). I got a replacement motherboard and the internet worked instantly, so all good there.

Once that was sorted, everything looked fine. I got into Unraid, Plex was up and running, watched a film through it before bed… then the next morning, I couldn’t connect to Plex or Unraid. The PC itself was still on, fans spinning, etc., but the server was completely unreachable.

I restarted the PC and, ever since, I haven’t been able to get Unraid to boot. It just hangs at the boot menu and goes nowhere.

Here’s everything I’ve tried so far:

• Booting into safe mode

• Full power cycle

• Fast Boot and Secure Boot disabled

• Reset BIOS to defaults

• Disconnecting both HDDs

• Fresh Unraid install (same USB, only copying the licence key)

• Reset CMOS (out of sheer frustration)

I've swapped no parts yet (other than the inital baord) and not tired removing RAM as it requires taking the CPU cooler off, but I’ll do it if needed.

I’m fairly new to Unraid so I’m just trying things based on guesses and forum posts, but nothing has helped so far.

Specs:

• Intel Core i5-13500

• Thermalright AXP120-X67

• Asus ROG STRIX B760-I Gaming WiFi

• 32GB Kingston Fury DDR5

• 2 × 16TB Seagate Exos X16

• 500GB Samsung 970 EVO M.2

• Enhance ENP-8345L-OVT - 450W

• Samsung BAR Plus 64G USB (plugged into USB 2.0 port)

• 3D-printed Lab Rax (case)

If anyone has any idea what this could be, or anything else I should try, please let me know. Happy to provide logs/screenshots if I can actually get it to boot far enough to grab them.

I'm at work right not so the attached image isn't mine but it's exatcly the point mine freezes at, I never get past this.

Edited November 6, 2025Nov 6 by Gary-W

If it doesn't boot with a fresh install, it suggests a hardware issue, though it may be worth trying that with a different flash drive to be sure.

That's what I'm afraid off. It'd be just my luck to have another failure right after returning a faulty motherboard.

I'll try with a different flash drive tonight and see if that gets any different results.

Memtest?

I've not done one - I'll give it a go tonight, after trying a seperate USB, and report back with results.

Edited November 6, 2025Nov 6 by Gary-W

So i've done the mem test. After about 20 mins it stopped with 14 erros and 'Unexpected interrupt on CPU 16'.

I then tried runnig again but only on CPU 16 and it froze up around 6-8 seconds. Tried a few times to the same result everytime.

I take it this is a CPU issue and I should get a replacement?

2 hours ago, Gary-W said:

I take it this is a CPU issue and I should get a replacement?

Most likely. You have a 13th gen Intel CPU which is notorious (as well as 14th gen.) for having stability issues.