2 Versions of Windows installed, one is corrupt

[slizardwizard]

As titled, I have 2 versions of windows 10 on my PC somehow. i built this pc (first one) and installed win 10 off the bat. It worked fine for a couple months and then during a large update my os corrupted.

Went through hell to fix it before finally giving up (I ended up in a loop of the installation repair tool restarting constantly) and re-installing 10 along with losing quite a bit of my work in the process, but somehow the old corrupt version of windows 10 remained. So now every time i boot up, I have to select the version that is working from a menu before I can do anything, and if i dont, it defaults to the corrupt one and get stuck in a cycle of restarting, then selecting the corrupt one, then restarting ect.

The pc works fine as is once its booted, according to UserBenchMark I am a little behind where I should be with the ryzen 7 I have but I don't need the full cpu power of it (although obviously optimal performance is preferred)

Anyway I can't get this corrupt version to get off of here. I have done disk cleanup a couple times and deleted Windows.old.
I am starting to think I have to do a full wipe and re-install but I'd rather not since I would have about a full day of re-installing programs if it resorts to that

Any help is greatly appreciated

TL;DR
Corrupt version of windows 10 remains after re-install. how to get rid of it short of re-installing windows

 

[captaincharisma]

if there are 2 installs of the same version of windows on the same drive then it would be hard to make sure you delete the right one. if you can backup your important data format and repartition the disk and do a clean install of windows

 

[Math Geek]

while booted up go to the search bar and type "msconfig" the second tab is labeled "boot"

select the OS you are using which is conveniently labeled as "current os". under that box set that OS as primary by clicking the middle box that says "set as default". then select the other non working windows entry and delete it. now you only have one boot option and it's the working one.

now go to my computer and change the name of the working c: to something easy to remember. maybe "working win 10" or something obvious like that. then go to disk management. again type that into the search bar. when this opens look to see if there is a partition with the old win 10 on it. there may not be one but this is a good first check to see what's up.

you can post a screenshot of disk management to make it easy for me to see what may be going on.

 

[mazboy]

The best solution for you--the one I would use--would be to wipe the HDD (NEVER WIPE AN SSD!!!!!) and do a clean install of the OS.

First, you need to download DBAN Disk Wipe (https://dban.org/) and use it to wipe the HDD. This will make a nice surface for the OS install. If you’re not familiar with DBAN, here is how to use it: http://www.techfleece.com/2013/08/22/how-to-securely-wipe-your-hard-drive-using-dban/
Next, you need to get the latest version of Win10 onto a USB stick. Do that here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10
Disconnect all drives except the C:\ boot drive (the drive you just wiped) in the computer you are repairing. When you have that done, plug your new Win10 USB Boot stick into a port on your computer, turn it on, and let it do it’s thing. Follow the directions (be sure to select "custom install" not "upgrade" at the appropriate stage), answer the questions, and all will be well.

Immediately after the install completes, go to "settings->Update & security->Windows Update->Check for updates" and get all the latest stuff downloaded and installed. Once that’s done, install the latest driver for your discreet GPU (if you have one). Then you can start installing your applications.

 

[slizardwizard]

while booted up go to the search bar and type "msconfig" the second tab is labeled "boot"

select the OS you are using which is conveniently labeled as "current os". under that box set that OS as primary by clicking the middle box that says "set as default". then select the other non working windows entry and delete it. now you only have one boot option and it's the working one.

now go to my computer and change the name of the working c: to something easy to remember. maybe "working win 10" or something obvious like that. then go to disk management. again type that into the search bar. when this opens look to see if there is a partition with the old win 10 on it. there may not be one but this is a good first check to see what's up.

you can post a screenshot of disk management to make it easy for me to see what may be going on.

This worked, thank you. I just need to do some hard drive cleaning up now

Could you recommend either an app that will do a good job of clearing out some of these old file or a good resource to learn how to do it manually?

Cheers to everyone who pitched in

 

[Math Geek]

i tend to do things like this manually so never really looked for apps to handle it for me.

if the corrupted win 10 is in it's own partition then simply delete the partition and either merge the space into c: or create a new partition to hold data.

if it is not in its own partition but somehow mixed in with your working win 10 install, then it's gonna take some time to go through the folders and see what is needed and what is not. i'm not sure how i would describe to someone on how to do that. years of experience has kind of let me know what is good and what is not, though i could not really explain my logic as i went along

 

[slizardwizard]

i tend to do things like this manually so never really looked for apps to handle it for me.

if the corrupted win 10 is in it's own partition then simply delete the partition and either merge the space into c: or create a new partition to hold data.

if it is not in its own partition but somehow mixed in with your working win 10 install, then it's gonna take some time to go through the folders and see what is needed and what is not. i'm not sure how i would describe to someone on how to do that. years of experience has kind of let me know what is good and what is not, though i could not really explain my logic as i went along

Fair enough, something I really need to get ahold of now that I can deal with the hardware side of things is the internal windows configurations and whatnot, I'll just have to put the time in i guess

Cheers