Enable or Disable ReFS File System in Windows 8.1 and Windows 10  

Brink said:

Nils,

It sounds like you may have some other issue at hand since the registry changes made by this don't affect anything other than being able to format with ReFS afterards.


You might see if doing a system restore using a restore point dated before this started may help.

No, he is right. I tried the registry change on three computers with the same exact result. I had to restart with a Repair Disc and do a System Restore to my latest restore point to fix the problem. Windows then rebooted normally. I went through this same sequence on a Dell E6520 running Windows 10 Pro, build 14393.51, a Dell XPS 8500 running the same, and a DIY running the same. The registry key used to work on build 10586 without issue but kills any chance of a warm or cold restart on the Anniversary Update. I suggest you remove the tutorial until you can research and fix.

Brink said:

It's currently working without issue on my Windows 10 Pro build 14905 with a second internal data drive formatted using ReFS.

Are you dual booting, or have a different setup than the usual?

Yes. Dual booting 14393.51 with 14905 on two systems and 14393.15 and Windows 7 on the Dell E6520. The restarts never reach the dual boot menus. What follows is a gray screen with no more disk drive activity. Two of the computers are using Samsung 850 EVO SSDs and the Dell XPS 8500 is using a 64GB m2SATA cache with a 2TB HDD. I considered trying the registry patch on one of the systems dual booting with 14905 by setting the default to the 14393 drive as a failover but I don't think that will discover anything new. Whatever it is, it needs to be investigated because dual booting the retail and insider builds is a pretty useful scenario. The XPS 8500 is using an ReFS formatted storage space consisting of a pair of large HDDs in a two-way mirror configuration. That, of course, did not require the patch to set up. The DIY is using an NTFS formatted storage space in the same configuration. The Dell E6520 has nothing else special. The DIY and the XPS 8500 dual boots are on separate spindles. The E6520 dual boot is set up as two partitions on a 1TB SSD.

Brink said:

Did you format a drive with ReFS before this issue started, or just by simply enabling it?

No. I have not formatted an ReFS drive in months and then only once as a test. That was on build 10586 of course.

Brink said:

Did you format a drive with ReFS before this issue started, or just by simply enabling it?

Just by enabling.

AlphaSparqy said:

It's not the operating system per-se. It is the diskpart program on the .iso / installed for 14393.x builds.
(I can't verify the 14905 build as I'm not using it yet at all...)

I used my 14393 installer .iso and used the Windows PE (shift + F10) and you can format it there, but as soon as you go back into Windows 10 Build 14393.x, it shows as RAW.

I then used my 10586 installer .iso and used the Windows PE there, and formatted it as ReFS and on reboot back into Windows 10 Build 14393.x, the ReFS partition is intact and working fine.

My next step is to just swap out the diskpart program sitting in the 14393 installer and my installed environment with the one from 10586. The executable should work, tho I'm not sure if there is any sort of system file integrity mechanism that will block it.

(I only registered on the site to leave this message, as I was running into the exact same problem as you guys were adding these details.)

I understand that Windows is not yet loaded when the freeze happens but I don't understand the relationship between the registry entry and the multi-boot issue when no installation is taking place and no data disk is being formatted yet.