Bitlocker VHD on secondary drive, Primary drive formatted

MeHere · 28 Jan 2023

I have my PW and bitlocker recovery key files on USB.

I have a secondary SATA drive, D, that I virtually formatted a small section and encrypted with Bitlocker and placed files in. When things were working well I could go to Computer Management, attach the VHD drive and it would show up as E drive in my system, unlock it, and use it normally.

My primary C drive is an SSD drive that suddenly died. I had to purchase a replacement and reinstall Windows 10.

Now, when I enter Windows, I can see the file on D for my virtual drive that is bitlocked. It has no extension, just a filename, because bitlocker is not installed or activated anywhere on the system now. When I use Computer Management like I used to do to open the VHD and use it with the attach command, I cannot see it.

After thinking about, I added the VHD extension to the virtual drive. I can now see it in Computer Management, but when clicked it says it is corrupt. Pretty sure it is due to Bitlocker. Still confused on what to do next.....

Question - Can I somehow access the virtual drive like I once did in the system by doing something? If not, how else can I extract the data to build a new VHD with this fresh OS install and start over again?

Thanks

PS - I did try adding an extension to the file name to make it a .vhd file. I can now see it in Disk Management but when I attempt to mount it the program states it is corrupted. Surely due to the bitlocker encryption. Unsure where to go from here.

hsehestedt · 28 Jan 2023

You noted that BitLocker is not installed on the system now. Is that because you were originally running Windows Pro and are now running Windows Home?

If you are running Pro, then BitLocker is most definitely installed. If you are running Home edition but were previously running Pro, you should upgrade this installation to Pro.

MeHere · 28 Jan 2023

hsehestedt said:

You noted that BitLocker is not installed on the system now. Is that because you were originally running Windows Pro and are now running Windows Home?

If you are running Pro, then BitLocker is most definitely installed. If you are running Home edition but were previously running Pro, you should upgrade this installation to Pro.

Sorry, should have said that Bitlocker seems it is not active on the drive I need. I installed the original OS Win10 Pro. I can see Bitlocker as a program when I look at the drives, but the only action I can do is turn on (encrypt) C or D. I cannot mount my VHD file, my D drive, because Bitlocker does not recognize it as being a locked file and Disk Management thinks it is corrupt.

hsehestedt · 28 Jan 2023

BitLocker is not something that is "active" on a drive. The drive is simply encrypted by BitLocker or it is not. That doesn't change even if you reinstall Windows on your primary drive or you take that secondary drive to another machine.

So, clarify something for me, please:

Which did you encrypt: Did you encrypt the physical drive itself or the virtual hard disk?

MeHere · 28 Jan 2023

hsehestedt said:

BitLocker is not something that is "active" on a drive. The drive is simply encrypted by BitLocker or it is not. That doesn't change even if you reinstall Windows on your primary drive or you take that secondary drive to another machine.

So, clarify something for me, please:

Which did you encrypt: Did you encrypt the physical drive itself or the virtual hard disk?

Virtual

hsehestedt · 28 Jan 2023

So, the procedure then would be to mount the virtual drive. Once mounted, you would right-click the virtual drive and choose to unlock the drive. As an alternative it could be unlocked from the command line. Is this what you are doing?

MeHere · 28 Jan 2023

hsehestedt said:

So, the procedure then would be to mount the virtual drive. Once mounted, you would right-click the virtual drive and choose to unlock the drive. As an alternative it could be unlocked from the command line. Is this what you are doing?

When I attempt to mount the virtual drive in Windows I get a "corrupted" message. I thought it was due to being encrypted, possibly not?

hsehestedt · 28 Jan 2023

No, you have to be able to mount the VHD first in order to then unlock it.

Could you do something for me please?

First, tell me what drive the drive letter is for the physical drive that the VHD is on. Then, open an elevated command prompt and run this command:

manage-bde -status

Post the resulting output.

Then try to mount the VHD and run the manage-bde -status command once more. Post the results again.

MeHere · 28 Jan 2023

The VHD file is located on "E: Old"

Bitlocker VHD on secondary drive, Primary drive formatted-bitlocker.jpg

When I attempt to mount the VHD file in E in Windows I get "the disc image file is corrupted".

Second bde status

Bitlocker VHD on secondary drive, Primary drive formatted-bitlocker-2.jpg

hsehestedt · 28 Jan 2023

Yeah, everything checks out. I would have to think that the image file really is corrupted.

Do you know the history of that VHD just prior to this problem? When you say that the C: drive suddenly died, did it cause a crash of the system, maybe while the VHD was being written to?