Unable to reset or recover Windows 10 using bootable USB drive

Hello!

I initially had Windows 7 on my Toshiba Satellite laptop. I tried to factory restore, but the original partition with the manufacturer files was missing. I decided to upgrade to Windows 10 for free, as I had an activated Widows 7 OS. The upgrade was successful, but there was some mouse lag. I suspected some remnants of either viruses or malware so I thought I would do a complete recovery or reset.

I was able to create the bootable USB drive. After I started the recovery process, it took some time but it seemed to work. After it reached 100% on the progress bar, the computer automatically restarted and booted to the USB drive and started the process all over again. I tried powering off the computer from the troubleshooting screen and restarting without the USB stick, but then I got an error that there was no boot disk. I then started to get hard drive locked errors, etc. I tried all repair options available and the computer will attempt them, but other than that, I appear to be dead in the water. I'm putting my last hope in the command prompt, but I'm way to rusty at DOS to try it.

Is there anyone who can offer any suggestions on how I can fix this?

Many thanks! :)

dalchina said:

Hi, starting from the fact the recovery partition went AWOL, but you expected it to be there, then the multiple problems.. you should start by running chkdsk from a command prompt.

So boot from your USB drive (or a live boot CD if you have one to hand), navigate via Repair your PC, Troubleshooting to a command prompt. Type

chkdsk C:\ /F

for each partition that exists.
Report any failures.

If the disk proves to be ok, you can of course clean install Win 10 - it will activate automatically.
Prior to that you may wish to use disk imaging to create a complete backup in case you need to recover anything, and clean up your partition structure before doing so.

If you have backups of anything significant on your drive, that's sort of ok, but you'll have to reinstall all desktop programs.

Thanks for responding. I did as you suggested and had no issues with the C:. For the other two drive letters (excluding the boot drive), I got a "Cannot open volume for direct access" message.

I'm not worried about losing everything on the laptop, I'd be happy if it were wiped completely clean.

I apologize for my lack of knowledge and understanding of this issue. There are no technicians readily available here so I am trying to do this on my own. Maybe not such a good idea! :)

You would appear to have a digital entitlement since Windows 10 has already been installed and activated on that laptop. Which is about the best news I can give you.

However as a lot of folk are finding, an upgraded machine of several years old may not upgrade properly, and will not reset, accept an in-place repair upgrade, clean install or otherwise recover a fully working Windows 10, and the simplest solution is to return the laptop to Windows 7, except that no provision has been made for recovering a system that, as you say, is dead in the water.

The Windows 10 boot menu will eventually enable you to perform some recovery functions, as will booting from the setup USB. Hopefully, you will be able to completely roll back the upgrade to the state it was in before the upgrade - unless, hopefully you have an external full backup in the form of a complete system image, which would be the simplest and quickest way to restore the status quo before Windows 10.

But first, please, some information. Toshiba has been making laptops with the Satellite brand for over 20 years - please indicate as best as you can, the model number, processor, graphics, installed memory and Hard disk size and originally installed operating system, and if that was the version of Windows 7 upgraded from, what edition (Starter, Home Basic, Home Premium, Professional or Ultimate).

That all sounds a little hard. Now for some things to try to roll back to the working 7, before trying to perform the upgrade again.

Remove the battery pack and plug in the mains power adapter, so that you can interrupt the power at will.
If you boot, and deliberately interrupt the boot (by pulling the plug) a couple of times, before the boot gets going properly, like when the little juggling balls have gone round a few times under the blue window, and hopefully on the 3rd time, then you will be brought to a part of the boot menu for troubleshooting, otherwise it can sometimes be really difficult to arrive at that part of the menu. To use the proper jargon: two consecutive failed boots should bring you to advanced startup options

The following tutorial explains it much better with pictures, I'd go through it to get some idea of what to expect.

Advanced Startup Options - Boot to in Windows 10 - Windows 10 Forums

What I would suggest you aim for is this:



Go back to the previous build

This will in theory rollback to Windows 7 before upgrading, and then we can discuss strategy for a successful upgrade.

Fafhrd said:

You would appear to have a digital entitlement since Windows 10 has already been installed and activated on that laptop. Which is about the best news I can give you.

However as a lot of folk are finding, an upgraded machine of several years old may not upgrade properly, and will not reset, accept an in-place repair upgrade, clean install or otherwise recover a fully working Windows 10, and the simplest solution is to return the laptop to Windows 7, except that no provision has been made for recovering a system that, as you say, is dead in the water.

The Windows 10 boot menu will eventually enable you to perform some recovery functions, as will booting from the setup USB. Hopefully, you will be able to completely roll back the upgrade to the state it was in before the upgrade - unless, hopefully you have an external full backup in the form of a complete system image, which would be the simplest and quickest way to restore the status quo before Windows 10.

But first, please, some information. Toshiba has been making laptops with the Satellite brand for over 20 years - please indicate as best as you can, the model number, processor, graphics, installed memory and Hard disk size and originally installed operating system, and if that was the version of Windows 7 upgraded from, what edition (Starter, Home Basic, Home Premium, Professional or Ultimate).

That all sounds a little hard. Now for some things to try to roll back to the working 7, before trying to perform the upgrade again.

Remove the battery pack and plug in the mains power adapter, so that you can interrupt the power at will.
If you boot, and deliberately interrupt the boot (by pulling the plug) a couple of times, before the boot gets going properly, like when the little juggling balls have gone round a few times under the blue window, and hopefully on the 3rd time, then you will be brought to a part of the boot menu for troubleshooting, otherwise it can sometimes be really difficult to arrive at that part of the menu. To use the proper jargon: two consecutive failed boots should bring you to advanced startup options

The following tutorial explains it much better with pictures, I'd go through it to get some idea of what to expect.

Advanced Startup Options - Boot to in Windows 10 - Windows 10 Forums

What I would suggest you aim for is this:



Go back to the previous build

This will in theory rollback to Windows 7 before upgrading, and then we can discuss strategy for a successful upgrade.

Thanks for responding. While I do have a digital entitlement, I don't have a complete system image...only the setup USB.

Here are some of the specs of the laptop:

Satellite L745D (part # PSK16C-006003) I think the OS was Windows 7 Home Premium.

Here are some of the other specs:



I don't know if this is too much information, but I took some screen shots to show what I did, and the messages that resulted. Here we go :)



I selected previous build and got this:



Resetting didn't work for me either:





I restarted the computer without the USB and got the message: "No bootable device. Insert boot disk and press any key."

I'm thinking that the digital entitlement really is the best news in all of this. haha!

dalchina said:

Hi, if you can get back to Win 7 as suggested above, then run some checks on your other partitions. Odd you can't access them.

Now, if you get back to Win 7, then check with your laptop manufacturer as to whether your laptop is actually listed as compatible with Win 10.

Note that upgrading to Win 10 - perhaps especially on an older laptop- may cause you more difficulty and a bigger learning curve than you really want.

Whilst my Win 10 is stable, I've also never been more aware of an OS and its issues in a way never true of '98, Win 2k, Vista, Win 7 or 8. I use Classic Shell as Win 10's start menu is useless. I also take great care to keep and maintain disk images to preserve my PC and my sanity. Even changing display language is a pain. (US -> UK). If you're familiar with Win 10, fine.

What you could do is this:
If you revert to Win 7, then create a disk image on an external disk (Macrium Reflect free is recommended by many).

Then, since you have the disk image (+ Macrium's boot disk), you can restore your PC exactly as it was.

So you can then wipe the disk and clean install Win 10- for example.
Or retry the upgrade after checking compatibility.

Note: if your manufacturer only lists drivers to (say) Win 8.1 this alone does not mean you can't upgrade - but you might struggle with drivers in Win 10.

(I updated my 6 year old laptop that came with Vista to Win 10 x86 and x64)
Good luck!

Thanks again for responding. My laptop is a few years old, so I guess that is not helping my situation. At this point, I can't get back to Windows 7. If I had my time back, I would not have upgraded and would have checked out this great forum before hitting "any key"! :)

dalchina said:

Hi, here's the Toshiba compatibility check list
Toshiba : Model List

Your model is not in the list, so is not deemed Win 10 compatible.

From
Toshiba : Windows 10 Upgrade

Oh, that's disappointing, but thank you for telling me. I'm at a loss at how to get back to Windows 7. I can't buy a new laptop right now, so do you think I should buy a new Windows 7 operating system? I have a valid product code from my previous install, but I've lost the CD.