Stuck in startup repair boot loop, C drive is in RAW

I have Acer Nitro 5 AN515-52 laptop running 64 bit windows 10 version 21H2 (Build 19044.1706). I checked the windows version 4 weeks ago and not sure that it's the same or not. I haven't done any updates since then.


When I started my laptop today, I saw a BSOD, then it went into an automatic startup repair loop. I ran chkdsk in the advanced recovery mode and it found no errors. After restarting my laptop, it again went into the same startup repair loop. After starting again, then seeing the sign in screen, after entering the password, windows froze and the laptop restarted. I entered the login password again, then my desktop screen came, then again the laptop froze. Again the cycle of startup repair started. After multiple attempts, I was able to login into windows again. I ran the DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth command in admin cmd prompt and kept getting the error that I don't have a write permission to a temp folder in c:/users/data..something like that. I forgot to take a photograph of that. Now I am stuck again in the boot loop. In the system recovery, after running the disk part and list vol commands, now I am seeing that my C drive is in RAW file format. What should I do to resolve this issue?

I know that formatting c drive will resolve the trouble but that will also mean that I'll have to spend hours installing windows and all my software from scratch.



My C drive is an nvme SSD in which I have installed all my software and my D drive is a SATA hard drive where I keep all my work files.

dalchina said:

a. Create a live boot disk (Windows PE + utilities) on a working PC and boot your PC from that. A typical program included on those is Crystal Diskinfo (or there's a portable version of that). With that you can run a SMART check on your disk.

Okay. I'll try and do that.

dalchina said:

b. Remove the internal disk and put it in a caddy, connect to another PC and then run a disk check on it.

I don't have access to a caddy right now. I'll go to the market and get one if other methods fail.

dalchina said:

I note you appear to have an EFI partition and a Recovery partition on each disk. Why might that be? Are you dual-booting? You say not... what's the history of D: ? Previous O/S disk?

When I bought this laptop originally in 2019, it came just with a SATA hard drive and I installed the OS on that. After 4-5 months, I installed an SSD into it and migrated the windows installation and software installation data using samsung utility that came with my SSD.

dalchina said:

Have you noticed how the routine and regular use of disk imaging is endlessly recommended here so you can readily recover by yourself from just such a situation, and much more quickly, avoiding a clean install?


Have you already been using disk imaging, or will this now perhaps prompt you to do so if you haven't?

Yes. I've noticed. Now I'm feeling foolish for not doing a disk imaging ever. In over 20 years of using Windows computers, I am facing this issue for the first time.

dalchina said:

Thanks. This begs the question as to what the laptop actually boots from and whether it could (assuming the system disk can be fixed) boot independently of the second disk.

I mentioned about these partitions in 2019 in this thread.
Merging dynamic partitions?

Okay. Some development. I haven't used Windows PE yet.

I tried to run chkdsk on c drive in the windows advanced recovery.

Here's what I saw initially while the process was running.







When I ran chkdsk again on C drive, I got this error.

Okay. Something weird is happening. When I booted using the Windows PE bootable USB drive, I can access all files of my C drive!







I checked the file system and it shows as NTFS!



I ran crystal disk info and here are the results.



Can I do an image backup of my C drive inside this PE environment?

You beat me to my answer!