How to make drive boot

a. You could try booting your PC from Macrium Reflect's boot disk (install free prog and create the disk) and use the
Fix boot
utility on that disk.

or

b. You might also have some success by booting your PC from a Win 10 installation disk, clicking on 'Repair your computer' and navigating to Startup Repair.

Run Startup Repair in Windows 10

Please post a screenshot of the partition on the disk as seen from the 2nd PC using a 3rd party partition manager such as Minitool Partition Wizard, ensuring all text is visible thus:

Check that appropriate partitions have drive letters assigned.

Are there any other disks in the problem PC? Are they visible from a command prompt when you boot from the Win 10 install disk?

Try removing them. You could also boot your problem PC from a live boot disk such as Kyhi's and view your disk thus.
You are being redirected...

I'm frightened to use Acronis again but can see options there to make is a basic HDD, a dynamic HDD and suchlike. I don't want to lose the data or the apps on that HDD.

I guess from that you haven't yet started using disk imaging regularly and routinely as is so, so so often recommended here e.g. Macrium Reflect (free-paid) + large enough external storage.

Then you have potentially multiple dates to which you can restore partitions, and recover from many bad situations without help, and a full backup too.

The very first thing you need to do, is to get the drive to show up in the BIOS.
If it doesn't show up there, you have a connection problem or a hardware problem.

sean5302 said:

Please excuse my ignorance.
When I normally take a screenshot I use Shift, print screen, paste.
That's not working here.
I've uploaded the screen from Acronis on the second PC. No, I haven't. I've cocked that up. I'll try again.

I'll go and investigate the first PC now to check for hardware connection faults.

Thanks.

Option One, here: How to Upload and Post Screenshots and Files at Ten Forums




Here try this...

1. Hit the print screen key when the image you want is on the screen.
2. Go to Start > Windows Accessories > Paint and open that program.
3. Go to Paste > Paste, to paste the screen shot you just took into Paint.
4. Go to File >Save As... and save the image as a .png file. Save it on your desktop.


THEN use Option One in the tutorial above.

Like so...











/edit Here is your pic...












But like I said above....you first need to be able to SEE the drive in your BIOS. Then we can work on getting the computer to boot from it.


THEN you need to uninstall that cancerous Acronis program and start using Macrium Reflect (free or paid).
Unlike Acronis, Macrium uses only one process and one service.

I used to use Acronis myself. But after the 2010 version it just got too bloated and... cancerous.

sean5302 said:

On the afflicted PC I've done the following:
1. Checked continuity across each wire in the 7 pin Sata cable. All OK.
2. Put a known good hdd there. Same problem, not detected by PC bios.
3. Checked bios on afflicted PC. There is only Onboard NIC IPV4 and IPV6 present.
4. On pressing PC power button, the PC hdd light does come on, as if it's seeing it.

I note your question about how to get the afflicted PC to see the hdd in the bios. That's what I'm stuck with.

Some things to check...

1. Try a different SATA port on the motherboard.
2. Try a different SATA cable.
3. Stick a USB stick in the affected comp somewhere, and see if IT shows up in the BIOS.
4. Try a different cable from the power supply to the hard drive.

Ok, skip step three. We already know that works, from post #3