Question BCD automatically deleted (hoping yes :) ) during clean install Windows 11?

[andrepartthree]

Hi guys .. I wanted to start out by thanking the person who's username I can't remember for the life of me on here .. said person suggested this

EasyBCD

EasyBCD is a software utility for Windows that lets you control and configure the BCD/BOOTMGR bootloader for Windows 7, Windows 10, and Windows 11 for dual-boots.

neosmart.net

which let me make my Win 10 hard drive bootable like I wanted it to be when I got rid of Windows 8 from my dual boot setup (more on that below but having Win 8 and Win 10 on two different hard drives sadly did not save me 🙁 .. but don't need Win 8 anymore anyways )

One area of concern though is that EasyBCD created an "I " system reserved partition drive that shows up along with all the other drives when you click on "this PC" . and the " I " partition is still living on the Windows 8 drive (not the drive I want to boot from which is the Win 10 drive) .. but since I'm able to boot from the Win 10 drive like I want to I figured I'd just leave well enough alone and deal with it when I upgrade to Win 11.

I do have some concerns however when I upgrade to Win 11 even if it's a while from now (I've read and understood the ominous warnings from some source online to wait until say summer of 2025 , give Microsoft as much time as possible to work the bugs out)

I'd very much like for the current BCD to be wiped completely from the hard drive I'll be installing Win 11 on .. the same hard drive I've got Win 10 on right now.. and I plan on doing a clean install of Win 11.

What I was hoping to do is while I still have Windows 10 installed (before the Win 11 upgrade) do this

PC Settings > Update & Security > Recovery and under the “Advanced startup” section on the right, click the Restart now button to boot into Recovery Mode
Once in Recovery mode, select Troubleshooting > Advanced options > Command Prompt.
From the command prompt option type the following

diskpart

listdisk

select disk 2

(yep I know, you need to select the correct disk .. fortunately all the disks plugged into my PC are all different sizes from each other.. my Win 8 drive is the only one that's 240 GB and my Win 10 drive is the only one that's 1 TB so that helps as far as identifying them and the three other drives are 80 GB, 2 TB and 4 TB .. in my case it's disk 4 for the Win 10 drive, disk 2 for the Win 8 drive)

clean

convert GPT

select disk 4

clean

convert GPT

exit

exit

I am hoping this will delete the BCD from both drives and that when I reinstall Win 11 onto the former Win 10 drive (or to put it another way after exiting the above mentioned command prompt, afterwards boot from Win 11 install media for a clean install) , Windows 11 will create it's own BCD for the one single operating system, Windows 11, that I will be using on my PC.

If someone could confirm that this will work as far as removing the BCD from both drives that would be fantastic

I did have a second question.. I've had rotten luck in the past with command prompts that for whatever reason don't work for me even when I triple check and know I'm typing them exactly the way I'm supposed to be ... if the above commands simply don't work for me , I know that when I'm running the Windows 11 installation media it will display a list of drives and ask which one you want to install Win 11 on and I'm pretty sure (I could be wrong?) that it gives an option to delete partitions on the drives that show up ... would simply targeting the two drives with operating systems (windows 8, 240 GB drive and Windows 10, 1 TB drive) for deletion and then installing Win 11 on the 1 TB drive work as far as removing the BCD? And would Windows 11 automatically format the 1 TB drive in GPT format during the process?

I'm not sure if anyone needs to know the history of how the problem-causing BCD was created but if this helps any.. originally I had just Windows 8 on my desktop PC.. then I added Windows 10 onto a second drive but I'm guessing the BCD continued to live on the Win 8 drive since the Win 8 operating system was the first one to be installed.. this created a boot menu where I could chose Win 8 or Win 10 .. I used easyBCD to remove Win 8 from the list of operating systems but didn't bother to delete Windows 8 itself from the hard drive Win 8 lives on, in case that messed up my PC's ability to start up knowing that BCD was living on and associated with the Win 8 drive. I set the Win 10 (1 TB ) drive as the boot drive, instead of the Win 8 drive that used to be the boot drive, and got the old "operating system cannot be found" error message. I booted into recovery mode using a Win 10 install usb drive and tried using these commands

BOOTREC /SCANOS
BOOTREC /FIXMBR
BOOTREC /FIXBOOT
BOOTREC /REBUILDBCD

but I noticed fixboot gave me an "access denied" error message.. scanos listed the two Windows installation drives but only added one to the list of operating system it would in theory make Windows boot from stating the other one could not be found I think or something like that .. and even after that it resulted in the same black screen "operating system cannot be found" error message.. I set the Win 8 drive back as the drive to boot from in BIOS, which in turn let me boot into Windows 10, from Win 10 I used easyBCD to change the boot drive in the BCD Backup/Repair options, made the C drive in Windows 10 the new boot drive and thereafter was able to set the 1 TB drive as the new boot drive.. although I'm now afraid to wipe the Win 8 drive in case that messes things up (I can live with that until the Win 11 upgrade I have plenty of storage space in my other drives )

Sorry for yet another long wall of text guys 🙁 .. and thanks so much to anyone who reads this and responds

 

[TerryLaze]

If you are trying all of this so that the new BCD will be written on the same disk as the OS then that's not how it works.
BCD will always be written to the disk that is first in the list of bootable drives that the bios has stored.

When booting up windows 11 installation media it will write the BCD wherever it needs to be for the system to be bootable.
And yes, if you do the custom/advanced install there will be options to delete partitions.

 

[andrepartthree]

If you are trying all of this so that the new BCD will be written on the same disk as the OS then that's not how it works.
BCD will always be written to the disk that is first in the list of bootable drives that the bios has stored.

When booting up windows 11 installation media it will write the BCD wherever it needs to be for the system to be bootable.
And yes, if you do the custom/advanced install there will be options to delete partitions.

Thanks so much for your reply TerryLaze I really appreciate it ... forgive me I'm stupid and slow 😛 but if I understand correctly ... the BCD overwrites itself to a new disk if you change that disk to be the first one in the boot order in BIOS even if that disk did not have a BCD on it before? I'm a bit confused because when I changed the win 10 drive to be the new bootable drive it kept giving a no system found error message until I copied (I think that's what EasyBCD does? Or moves it maybe I don't know ) the BCD over to the Win 10 drive (which is different than the win 8 drive the BCD was formerly living on ) then the Win 10 drive was able to boot up into Win 10

It's good to know the Win 11 installation media will write the BCD to wherever it needs to be (the drive I currently have Win 10 on which is where I plan to install Win 11 during a clean install) ... it sounds like you are suggesting (again bear with me dumb stupid person here so I have to ask 😛 ) that to be on the safe side I just go ahead and delete the Win 8 and Win 10 partitions from their respective drives and then install Win 11?

Also in your opinion do I need to run those command prompts to convert at least the drive Win 11 will be installed onto such that the drive is formatted as GPT before the Win 11 install? Or will a clean install of Win 11 automatically format the drive it's being installed onto as a GPT drive in the process of the Win 11 install?