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BSOD results in endless loop and no access to drive
Hi Guys,
I have yet another Win10 BSOD problem.
Haven't previously had any success with getting up and running with all my apps and settings intact.
Have had to completely reinstall Win10 three times since mid June. (At least two previous episodes resulted from now corrected power supply issues.)
Current problem began when I selected a Restart from the menu following an Emsisoft upgrade.
Wanted to see if this time I could recover without having to re-install all my apps and settings.
Found myself in an endless loop of 'Diagnosing your PC" etc, but no progress.
While looking for my Win10 Boot USB, found one that booted up to Macrium Reflect.
Accepted Macrium option to repair the boot sector.
Now booted up to a different BSOD - complaining about lack of access to WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\Winload.exe
Attached, and booted from, old Win8.1 HDD; as expected (and hoped!) all my Win10 partitions and data contents show up intact (I have D:, E:, G:, H: on a 1Tb HDD, and but for the odd app that insists on it, no data files are on C:.)
Copied winload.exe from my partners Win10 PC to I:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\Winload.exe; no change - same complaining BSOD on Win10 reboot.
Wondered if booting into safe mode may give me some options, but have never had success trying F8.
Found and followed instructions on How to Get to Safe Mode in Windows 10 - Windows 10 for BCDEDIT /SET {SETDEFAULT} BOOTMENUPOLICY LEGACY
An F8 reboot took me to 'WINDOWS BOOT MANAGER", with a black screen stating "Windows failed to start. A recent hardware or software change might be the cause. To fix the problem..." and then the text about using my installation media.
I booted to Win10 USB, selected Repair from the second screen, then Troubleshoot > Advanced options.
Startup Repair fell into an apparently ineffective "Attempting repair" which was endless... So I rebooted.
Selected Troubleshoot > Reset to retain apps and settings; but the message is, "The drive where Windows is installed is locked. Unlock the drive and try again."
So I checked again under Win8.1, and the 1Tb Win10 drive is still visible and accessible.
Another F8 Safe mode boot took me back to WINDOWS BOOT MANAGER black screen. I pay more attention to a message lower on the screen:-
"Status: 0xc000000e
"Info: A required device isn't connected or can't be accessed."
Back to Win10 USB, and similar info appears on a BSOD like the one previously complaining about winload.exe.
I suspect that at least part of the problem may be the result of what Macrium did to the boot sector.
So I'm stuck (except I suppose for doing a re-install yet again - and I've backed up the user settings on C: in anticipation!).
One other fact which may be relevant/ helpful to a resolution.
Ever since my last reinstall, my boot sequence includes an OS selection with two Win10 options. The first is labelled 'Win10'; the second one is labelled 'Win10 on Vol2'
During the above troubleshooting, a similar selection (just without the 'on Vol2') appears. Selecting the second one avoids the message about the drive being inaccessible, and proceeds to 'Diagnosing... Attempting repairs', endless, with no progress. Very weird.
If I have to do another complete reinstall (and then redo all the settings and apps over again), how can I eliminate the OS option screen with two choices for Win10?
Any ideas/contributions will be much appreciated. And sorry but I obviously cant upload a diagnosis file.
Thanks.
Ross
Last edited by okkid; 23 Oct 2016 at 23:40.