Clean Install Windows 10 Not Booting

[Hrlyrdr22]

So Windows 10 has been buggy as hell for me and now it literally broke. Somehow. It keeps on giving me this /boot/bcd error which I've tried to fix but it gave me a ETA of 3 hours so I just decided to wipe the Windows partition clean and reinstall it. Now it won't boot? I installed it both to my SSD and to my old HDD and neither worked. Booting into HDD never got past the little POST screen if thats what you call it. My SSD has Mac OS X 10.10.1 Yosemite on it so I have a bootloader called Chameleon installed so when I boot Windows from Chameleon, it gives me the exact same /boot/bcd error despite it being a CLEAN install where I wiped the entire HDD! I tried both using the Microsoft install media creation tool and from YUMI but neither worked. Repair doesn't work for anything and chkdsk doesn't work even with /c /x. Any ideas? I can boot into Mac no problem

*Also loaded optimized defaults on motherboard.

Specs: AMD FX6300
Mobo: Gigabyte 78LMT-USB3
EVGA GTX750 2GB SC
8GB RAM

 

[jeremymau]

Sounds like your master boot record is corrupt. Try this:

http://www.thewindowsclub.com/repair-master-boot-record-mbr-windows

or this http://www.kapilarya.com/fix-windows-10-master-boot-record-corrupted

and or FDISK /MBR

 

[Hrlyrdr22]

Sounds like your master boot record is corrupt. Try this:

http://www.thewindowsclub.com/repair-master-boot-record-mbr-windows

or this http://www.kapilarya.com/fix-windows-10-master-boot-record-corrupted

and or FDISK /MBR

*about to test the links but wanted to give extra info cause why not

Right I also have to mention that my SSD is partitioned as GPT but my HDD is setup normally with MBR and NTFS.
At first I was going to make a post asking why Windows 10 would not install on my SSD saying it cant be installed on GPT partitioned drives despite Windows 10 already being installed but after clearing the Windows partition, it worked!
Just because I'm a little into tech, what's Master Boot Record? Isn't it just how a drive is partitioned? (I actually have no idea what MBR, GPT and APM do for Partition Scheme. fancy words in Mac)

But just a little more information, this is what really happened. My SSD has Windows 10, Mac 10.10 Yosemite and 2 other empty partitions. I install Mac 10.11 El Capitan but while doing so I got a bunch of minor errors which crashed and restarted my computer, giving me this weird screen that asked me if I wanted to load fail-safe options or whatever. Now I realize that actually reset my BIOS settings which was why Yosemite nor El Capitan would work because Mac requires AHCI and default is IDE. But nevermind that, when I ran chkdsk it actually showed a few lines and I saw "Mac-metadata" so this makes me believe that the El Capitan installer actually broke everything. I don't think the fact that all my OSes being on the same drive helped...

 

[Hrlyrdr22]

Sounds like your master boot record is corrupt. Try this:

http://www.thewindowsclub.com/repair-master-boot-record-mbr-windows

or this http://www.kapilarya.com/fix-windows-10-master-boot-record-corrupted

and or FDISK /MBR

Alright I've tried both now and neither work. I noticed that my CMD shows:
X: \Sources>
Instead of the /System3/ or whatever your link showed. The second link also doesn't work. It won't run disk checking on this volume because it is write protected. But thing is I remember seeing a post somewhere that had an extra few letters to unmount it first or something so it would run. Far as I remember it was /x but it's not working

 

[Hrlyrdr22]

Sounds like your master boot record is corrupt. Try this:

http://www.thewindowsclub.com/repair-master-boot-record-mbr-windows

or this http://www.kapilarya.com/fix-windows-10-master-boot-record-corrupted

and or FDISK /MBR

Ran all the boot / commands and they all worked except for /rebuildBCD
Also when I ran chkdsk /r it said Windows was read-only or something. Either that or it was locked. Then I tried chkdsk c: /R /X /F and it finally ran. "WIndows has scanned the file system and found no problems. No further action is required"
I also ran the sfc /scannow and it didn't fix anything. I doubt this has anything to do with Windows itself because I wiped the SSD partition and wiped my entire HDD and installed to both but no hope. I also plugged in just the HDD but no results, couldnt get past the motherboard beep sound. Probably my motherboard I'm guessing? I tried to load optimized defaults but nothing. Am I screwed? I'm thinking that maybe a bootloader would get Windows to boot?

 

[Colif]

MBR is Main Boot Record, its the way Windows HDD"s until Win 8 were formatted. Its the legacy boot method, and its reaching its end as it can only access partitions up to 2tb and can only have 4 partitions on a drive, and Storage is growing over that 8tb limit. MBR discs also only have one copy of the boot record on them meaning if they get corrupted you out of luck.

GPT or GUID Partition Table is the new Partition scheme that defeats the limitations of MBR. It can have partitions up to 256 TB in size and can have 128 of them on 1 drive (thats a lot of space). GPT Discs boot differently to MBR, there is no boot partition as such, the bios looks for a file name and follows its lead. There are also back up copies of this file in multiple locations on the disc.

UEFI boot method matches GPT
Legacy boot matches MBR

Win 7 32 bit can't read GPT discs (there is a dummy MBR partition on GPT discs to stop MBR pc's from thinking drive is blank and formatting them), win 7 64 bit can see them but cannot format onto them.
Win 10 can see MBR discs and will install on them if its an upgrade but if you fresh install on one using UEFI boot method it will insist on GPT

http://www.howtogeek.com/193669/whats-the-difference-between-gpt-and-mbr-when-partitioning-a-drive/

I don't know about APM

Locked drive: http://www.thewindowsclub.com/the-drive-where-windows-is-installed-is-locked

 

[Hrlyrdr22]

MBR is Main Boot Record, its the way Windows HDD"s until Win 8 were formatted. Its the legacy boot method, and its reaching its end as it can only access partitions up to 2tb and can only have 4 partitions on a drive, and Storage is growing over that 8tb limit. MBR discs also only have one copy of the boot record on them meaning if they get corrupted you out of luck.

GPT or GUID Partition Table is the new Partition scheme that defeats the limitations of MBR. It can have partitions up to 256 TB in size and can have 128 of them on 1 drive (thats a lot of space). GPT Discs boot differently to MBR, there is no boot partition as such, the bios looks for a file name and follows its lead. There are also back up copies of this file in multiple locations on the disc.

UEFI boot method matches GPT
Legacy boot matches MBR

Win 7 32 bit can't see GPT discs, win 7 64 bit can see them but cannot format onto them.
Win 10 can see MBR discs and will install on them if its an upgrade but if you fresh install on one using UEFI boot method it will insist on GPT

http://www.howtogeek.com/193669/whats-the-difference-between-gpt-and-mbr-when-partitioning-a-drive/

I don't know about APM

Locked drive: http://www.thewindowsclub.com/the-drive-where-windows-is-installed-is-locked

Ye I also remembered GPT had this feature where it could detect if something went corrupt and stop it before anything big happened.
So from what I know so far, this makes zero sense. My HDD is partitioned as MBR so sure I'll let it slide. But my SSD is partitioned as GPT so I don't see how Windows isn't booting if there are multiple Boot Records. I installed all my OSes on my SSD so I don't see how my second HDD got affected as well. The only other thing would be the motherboard so is the motherboard the problem?

 

[Colif]

If PC is booting the HDD then its boot method must be set to Legacy. Legacy cannot boot GPT discs as it is looking for a boot loader in the MBR. The MBR that is on GPT discs is only there to stop them being formatted, it doesn't include a boot loader

The multiple files backed up on GPT discs only helps if the Boot method is UEFI

What boot method have you got set in BIOS? Some can be set as auto meaning they look for an MBR and if they can't find one, switch to UEFI boot method and scan all the drives for that file.

What is the 1st thing in boot order? is it the ssd or is it something called Windows Boot Manager? It should be the WBM

 

[Hrlyrdr22]

Locked drive: http://www.thewindowsclub.com/the-drive-where-windows-is-installed-is-locked

I've tried them all. I ran chkdsk /r but it wouldnt work. So I had to use chkdsk c: /R /X /F in order to get it to run. Came back with no errors. I also ran sfc /scannow and came back with nothing. My HDD was reformatted from GPT with HFS+ to MBR with NTFS, then installed Windows 10 on it. The partitions shouldn't be messed up. But on the low off chance, I even booted into Chameleon bootloader (needed for Mac) and into Windows and it gives me this error about /boot/BCD. If i dont use Chameleon to boot into Windows, it doesnt give me the error. In fact it doesnt load anything at all, just acting as if no drive is plugged into my computer.

Also in one of the links it showed how to check of it's fixed and it matched my screen so apparently it is fixed but I still cannot boot into Windows even the only drives connected are my HDD and my Optical Drive.

 

[Colif]

when you install it, do you do a custom install or just run it? Win 10 when its created creates 4 partitions, its possible its not creating a Boot partition and only works because of the loader you are using.

Can you show us a screen shot of disc management?

 

[Hrlyrdr22]

when you install it, do you do a custom install or just run it? Win 10 when its created creates 4 partitions, its possible its not creating a Boot partition and only works because of the loader you are using.

Can you show us a screen shot of disc management?

hit custom install, not upgrade. It loaded, restarted and then I tried to boot into it but no luck. To clear things up, my SSD is the drive where my OSes are installed so Chameleon bootloader is installed there. I've always used Chameleon to boot into Windows.
I can't actually boot into Windows or anything. But I do remember using the list partitions command in CMD and it showed 8000MB for my USB and 230GB for my HDD. Nothing else. Not even my optical drive. But I can boot into Mac so maybe there's a Mac equivalent? Disk Utility doesnt show partitions other than the obvious ones you see in File Explorer / Finder.

 

[Hrlyrdr22]

when you install it, do you do a custom install or just run it? Win 10 when its created creates 4 partitions, its possible its not creating a Boot partition and only works because of the loader you are using.

Can you show us a screen shot of disc management?

Ey boss new info. I ran list volume command and it only shows my USB and 232GB partition. This tutorial im following has the USB, a "healthy boot" partition, the "Healthy Hidden" partition and "Healthy system" partition. The tutorial looks like it's renaming the boot file, then copying the one from the installer to the partition. Then rebuilds bcd store.
I think we're almost there, gimme that help please D: I wanna play some of that DOOM

 

[Colif]

which tutorial are you following?

http://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/1950-windows-10-clean-install.html

I don't know anything about Apple so I didn't answer that other question before. Maybe someone who does will answer.

 

[Hrlyrdr22]

which tutorial are you following?

http://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/1950-windows-10-clean-install.html

I don't know anything about Apple so I didn't answer that other question before. Maybe someone who does will answer.

http://www.thewindowsclub.com/the-drive-where-windows-is-installed-is-locked

The funny thing is that the tutorial isn't the tutorial itself, it's a comment. I noticed that the page mentioned a comment by Boozi.

 

[Colif]

for future reference:

uninformed post and comments,

most new pc's running win 8 are using efi(or UEFI) boot with gpt "partitioned" drives. (as opposed to the old bios+MBR) this method does not have or use an "active partition" function as a part of the boot process.

BIOS v EFI (still often referred to as "uefi bios")
MBR v GPT

the first comment is a case of a GPT drive: (MBR drives can only contain 4 partitions)

partition 1 "system"(300MB) is an efi partition which is the first on the boot process and it contains the bootmgr and BCD files(windows boot program)
all other partitions except 4 and 6 are repair and recovery tools both built in to windows and added by the vendor.

from a "superuser" post:
I've spent a lot of time trying to get my Windows 8 PC to boot again after cloning to a new SSD and try to summarise how I finally got it all working -

Firstly, boot from a UEFI Windows 8 recovery disk (CD/DVD/USB) - I found that the automated recovery process didn't find the correct Windows partition, nor when I managed to add it to BCD settings would it make it reliably bootable e.g. using BCDEDIT I got it to find and launch the Windows partition but it refused to cold boot or would not "keep" the settings after a 2nd reboot or power off.

Go into the Advanced options and run the Command Prompt.

Enter diskpart to use the DiskPart tool to ensure you have all the right partitions and to identify your EFI partition - the key thing here is that your EFI partition is formatted as FAT32:

DISKPART> sel disk 0

Disk 0 is now the selected disk.

DISKPART> list vol

Volume ### Ltr Label Fs Type Size Status Info
---------- --- ----------- ----- ---------- ------- --------- --------
Volume 0 E DVD-ROM 0 B No Media
Volume 1 C NTFS Partition 195 GB Healthy Boot
Volume 2 WINRE NTFS Partition 400 MB Healthy Hidden
Volume 3 FAT32 Partition 260 MB Healthy System

Then assign a drive letter to the EFI partition:

DISKPART> sel vol 3

Volume 3 is the selected volume.

DISKPART> assign letter=b:

DiskPart successfully assigned the drive letter or mount point.

Exit DiskPart tool by entering exit and at the command prompt run the following:

cd /d b:\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\

bootrec /fixboot

Delete or rename the BCD file:

ren BCD BCD.bak

Use bcdboot.exe to recreate BCD store:

bcdboot c:\Windows /l en-gb /s b: /f ALL

The /f ALL parameter updates the BIOS settings including UEFI firmware/NVRAM, /l en-gb is to localise for UK/GB locale. The localisation defaults to US English, or use en-US.

Reboot and cross your fingers.

This gave me headaches. I was going in circles for a long while. There isn't a lot of reliable info about fixing UEFI/Windows 8 at the time of writing.

[EDIT]

To re-enable Hyper-V, I also had to run the following from an Administrator Command Prompt within Windows after rebooting:

bcdedit /set {default} hypervisorlaunchtype Auto
bcdedit /set {default} nx OptIn

All the lines in bold italics are the lines you need to enter

 

[Hrlyrdr22]

for future reference:

uninformed post and comments,

most new pc's running win 8 are using efi(or UEFI) boot with gpt "partitioned" drives. (as opposed to the old bios+MBR) this method does not have or use an "active partition" function as a part of the boot process.

BIOS v EFI (still often referred to as "uefi bios")
MBR v GPT

the first comment is a case of a GPT drive: (MBR drives can only contain 4 partitions)

partition 1 "system"(300MB) is an efi partition which is the first on the boot process and it contains the bootmgr and BCD files(windows boot program)
all other partitions except 4 and 6 are repair and recovery tools both built in to windows and added by the vendor.

from a "superuser" post:
I've spent a lot of time trying to get my Windows 8 PC to boot again after cloning to a new SSD and try to summarise how I finally got it all working -

Firstly, boot from a UEFI Windows 8 recovery disk (CD/DVD/USB) - I found that the automated recovery process didn't find the correct Windows partition, nor when I managed to add it to BCD settings would it make it reliably bootable e.g. using BCDEDIT I got it to find and launch the Windows partition but it refused to cold boot or would not "keep" the settings after a 2nd reboot or power off.

Go into the Advanced options and run the Command Prompt.

Enter diskpart to use the DiskPart tool to ensure you have all the right partitions and to identify your EFI partition - the key thing here is that your EFI partition is formatted as FAT32:

DISKPART> sel disk 0

Disk 0 is now the selected disk.

DISKPART> list vol

Volume ### Ltr Label Fs Type Size Status Info
---------- --- ----------- ----- ---------- ------- --------- --------
Volume 0 E DVD-ROM 0 B No Media
Volume 1 C NTFS Partition 195 GB Healthy Boot
Volume 2 WINRE NTFS Partition 400 MB Healthy Hidden
Volume 3 FAT32 Partition 260 MB Healthy System

Then assign a drive letter to the EFI partition:

DISKPART> sel vol 3

Volume 3 is the selected volume.

DISKPART> assign letter=b:

DiskPart successfully assigned the drive letter or mount point.

Exit DiskPart tool by entering exit and at the command prompt run the following:

cd /d b:\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\

bootrec /fixboot

Delete or rename the BCD file:

ren BCD BCD.bak

Use bcdboot.exe to recreate BCD store:

bcdboot c:\Windows /l en-gb /s b: /f ALL

The /f ALL parameter updates the BIOS settings including UEFI firmware/NVRAM, /l en-gb is to localise for UK/GB locale. The localisation defaults to US English, or use en-US.

Reboot and cross your fingers.

This gave me headaches. I was going in circles for a long while. There isn't a lot of reliable info about fixing UEFI/Windows 8 at the time of writing.

[EDIT]

To re-enable Hyper-V, I also had to run the following from an Administrator Command Prompt within Windows after rebooting:

bcdedit /set {default} hypervisorlaunchtype Auto
bcdedit /set {default} nx OptIn

All the lines in bold italics are the lines you need to enter

Ey funny story right. I wiped my drive in Mac but not during the installer. I clicked the delete button on my HDD and it created 2 partitions, one was like 400MB so it finally loaded! That second last reply saved me! Thanks a bunch man!

 

[Hrlyrdr22]

Dammit this thing honestly pisses me off so damn much. So I messed up and redid what I did but this time it doesnt create those 4 partitions. Now it wont boot but guess what? After fiddling around it somehow boots TWICE from the USB. But now it wont do anything and absolutely bloody nothing works. Honestly Microsoft are just a bunch of geniuses. Sometimes creating the necessary partitions but 99% of the time it won't. So I try multiple times just restarting into this stupid installer to create those 4 partitions but no luck. Whoever coded this genuinely has a disability. I'm just pissed off. Is there a way to guarantee the creation of these 4 partitions?

Update: it ONLY CREATES THE NEEDED PARTITIONS WHEN THERE IS ONLY ONE DRIVE CONNECTED! Got 2 drives? Well Microsoft here told you to go piss off. Unplug everything except for the one you're installing Windows on.