[SOLVED] Re-install Win 10 Boot Loader/Manager

[clueless_guy]

EFI based. Went through whole disaster with Win 10 being stuck in safe mode/safe boot. Couldn't login because wasn't safe mode with networking, which is dumb. Reinstalled Win 10, but. Right now my hard drive just has a single NTFS partition. I'm having to use USB flash drive to boot up, I set up the flash drive using EasyBCD. Trying to start Win without the USB just leaves me with the expected, no bootable OS or drive, something like that. Is there a way I can manually build and install the default Win 10 boot partition, so I don't have to use the USB boot drive?

 

[USAFRet]

If you reinstalled Windows 10, what is not working?

You did this with ONLY the one drive connected, right?

 

[clueless_guy]

If you reinstalled Windows 10, what is not working?

You did this with ONLY the one drive connected, right?

no, was waiting for someone to reply, so I could tell the entire situation. Off topic, I see you're USAF, do you do any combat flight simulation, i.e. DCS World?
Anyway, here's the SA. I had another drive connected, where win10 was originally installed. I had used a full OS bootable Windows USB, and I wiped Windows off of the internal HDD. Well something went wrong and I didn't even see the partition that held the bootloader or MBR. So I installed windows on my clean formatted 2nd internal drive (a new SSD) so I used the opportunity to put Windows on the new SSD. Well apparently, when I installed it, I guess it used the BOOT structure that was left on the original HDD, that I had overlooked. I didn't want to use a bootloader on another hard drive, to boot into my Windows install. I want to have it all installed on the SSD. So now I'm using the bootloader on a USB that I created with EasyBCD. I've rewrote boot information before, when I've dual booted Win and a Linux based OS, but. That was with Win 7, I just want to place Windows boot loader on my new SSD with the Windows install. Without having to completely format it and redo the entire install. I know I could reinstall Win, but I would like to take the opportunity to learn how to restore a working bootloader in a bad situation like this.

 

[Colif]

No USAFRet, he had 2 drives in. The usual problem.

Easybcd should have been able to create the boot partition on the ssd. you shouldn't need to boot off the USB at all.

i think you boot off easybcd with just the ssd installed and it should be able to create the boot details on ssd. Then once it boots, plug the hdd back in and make sure the hdd isn't added to boot order

 

[SkyNetRising]

I just want to place Windows boot loader on my new SSD with the Windows install. Without having to completely format it and redo the entire install.

You have to make enough free space for new bootloader partition by shrinking existing partition on the drive. 500MB is enough.
Then create a new partition.

For UEFI system (GPT disk) create Efi system, fat32 formatted partition.​

For legacy boot system (MBR disk) create primary, active, NTFS formatted partition.​

Then use bcdboot comand to create bootloader files on the partition.
Easy.

BTW EasyBCD is not advanced enough to do this. It can not create a new partition and works only on MBR partitioned disk by altering existing partition.

 

[clueless_guy]

@SkyNetRising , thanks for the info. I thought I needed to shrink the Win part and create a new boot part. But, I wasn't sure what specs to use for EFI. Thank you for clearing that up for me!

 

[clueless_guy]

Thanks to everyone that offered help, now I can do away with this jerry rigged boot setup I have.