B
Baasha
I recently cloned my old SSD (system drive) to a new PCI-E NVMe SSD using EaseUS ToDo Backup.
After the clone was successful, I wiped the old SSD (using EaseUS Partition Master) and rebooted. Now, the PC doesn't boot into Windows. The old SSD has been removed from the system completely (uninstalled/disconnected) and so the new cloned SSD is the C:\ drive.
It keeps going into a boot loop failure and I've been spending all of yesterday evening and all day today trying to fix it to no avail. I tried the various guides online (rebuild BCD, DISM commands, Startup Repair etc. etc.) and nothing seems to work.
While before it was booting to the Recovery screen, now it boots to a BSOD with "Critical Process Died" with no BSOD code. It happens even if I try to boot into Safe Mode; i.e. Safe Mode does not work.
My C:\ drive (the newly cloned SSD) is a GPT disk and so in Diskpart, I see that it has four (4) partitions (see attachment):
1.) System - 100MB - this partition has no letter assigned to it and is the one with the EFI iirc
2.) Reserved - 16MB - not sure what this is
3.) Primary - 893GB - main partition where Windows 10 is installed i.e. "C:\" drive
4.) Recovery - 505MB - recovery partition
I followed this guide on Dell's website (my PC is custom built by myself) and when I get to the part with 'bootrec /FixBoot' it says "Access Denied." I saw some guides online about how to set that partition to "ntfs" by using "bootsect /nt60 sys" and although it said it was set, the end result was no different - kept getting boot failure loop.
I then used a USB flash drive to download the latest ISO from Microsoft and created a bootable USB with Rufus. I went into Command Prompt with this installation media and tried some DISM commands.
The 'install.wim' file is in the 'X:\sources' folder and so I ran the following command in CMD:
'dism /Image:C:\ /ScratchDir:C:\Scratch /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth /Source:WIM:F:\sources\install.wim:1 /LimitedAccess'
*F:\ drive is the installation media (USB Flash Drive)
It goes up to ~ 55% and then to 100% immediately with the error:
'Error 0x800f081f: The source files could not be found'
I even tried copying the 'install.wim' file to the root of the C:\ drive and then running the above command like so:
'dism /Image:C:\ /ScratchDir:C:\Scratch /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth /Source:WIM:C:\install.wim:1 /LimitedAccess'
and still get the same 'Error 0x800f081f: The source files could not be found'.
So, my questions are:
1.) How on earth do I run the DISM command to "RestoreHealth" in Windows PE? It doesn't seem to "find" the 'install.wim' file even when it's in the root of the C:\ drive.
2.) Is there a way to completely delete all the non "Primary" partitions in the C:\ drive and then recreate them as well as the boot files/records? Is this safe to do? How do we do it?
3.) I have another computer that I can install the PCI-E NVMe SSD in that is also running Windows 10 - is there a way I can fix the boot record/files on this drive by using a separate computer (so it would be another drive letter like M etc.)? What are the commands to use to completely fix the boot files/records on the drive within Windows 10 on another computer?
I have a lot of programs, games, and files that I really do NOT want to reinstall from scratch so please do not suggest doing a clean install of Windows 10 - that is the absolute last resort if nothing else works. I am asking for help here to avoid doing that so please let me know how this issue can be resolved.
Thanks in advance.
P.S. screenshot of the different partitions on the cloned SSD:
Continue reading...
After the clone was successful, I wiped the old SSD (using EaseUS Partition Master) and rebooted. Now, the PC doesn't boot into Windows. The old SSD has been removed from the system completely (uninstalled/disconnected) and so the new cloned SSD is the C:\ drive.
It keeps going into a boot loop failure and I've been spending all of yesterday evening and all day today trying to fix it to no avail. I tried the various guides online (rebuild BCD, DISM commands, Startup Repair etc. etc.) and nothing seems to work.
While before it was booting to the Recovery screen, now it boots to a BSOD with "Critical Process Died" with no BSOD code. It happens even if I try to boot into Safe Mode; i.e. Safe Mode does not work.
My C:\ drive (the newly cloned SSD) is a GPT disk and so in Diskpart, I see that it has four (4) partitions (see attachment):
1.) System - 100MB - this partition has no letter assigned to it and is the one with the EFI iirc
2.) Reserved - 16MB - not sure what this is
3.) Primary - 893GB - main partition where Windows 10 is installed i.e. "C:\" drive
4.) Recovery - 505MB - recovery partition
I followed this guide on Dell's website (my PC is custom built by myself) and when I get to the part with 'bootrec /FixBoot' it says "Access Denied." I saw some guides online about how to set that partition to "ntfs" by using "bootsect /nt60 sys" and although it said it was set, the end result was no different - kept getting boot failure loop.
I then used a USB flash drive to download the latest ISO from Microsoft and created a bootable USB with Rufus. I went into Command Prompt with this installation media and tried some DISM commands.
The 'install.wim' file is in the 'X:\sources' folder and so I ran the following command in CMD:
'dism /Image:C:\ /ScratchDir:C:\Scratch /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth /Source:WIM:F:\sources\install.wim:1 /LimitedAccess'
*F:\ drive is the installation media (USB Flash Drive)
It goes up to ~ 55% and then to 100% immediately with the error:
'Error 0x800f081f: The source files could not be found'
I even tried copying the 'install.wim' file to the root of the C:\ drive and then running the above command like so:
'dism /Image:C:\ /ScratchDir:C:\Scratch /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth /Source:WIM:C:\install.wim:1 /LimitedAccess'
and still get the same 'Error 0x800f081f: The source files could not be found'.
So, my questions are:
1.) How on earth do I run the DISM command to "RestoreHealth" in Windows PE? It doesn't seem to "find" the 'install.wim' file even when it's in the root of the C:\ drive.
2.) Is there a way to completely delete all the non "Primary" partitions in the C:\ drive and then recreate them as well as the boot files/records? Is this safe to do? How do we do it?
3.) I have another computer that I can install the PCI-E NVMe SSD in that is also running Windows 10 - is there a way I can fix the boot record/files on this drive by using a separate computer (so it would be another drive letter like M etc.)? What are the commands to use to completely fix the boot files/records on the drive within Windows 10 on another computer?
I have a lot of programs, games, and files that I really do NOT want to reinstall from scratch so please do not suggest doing a clean install of Windows 10 - that is the absolute last resort if nothing else works. I am asking for help here to avoid doing that so please let me know how this issue can be resolved.
Thanks in advance.
P.S. screenshot of the different partitions on the cloned SSD:
Continue reading...