Urgent! Someone please help with windows 8 issue!

TechiGamer

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Aug 3, 2013
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I was editing some features in my bios and when I was rebooting the blue screen of death came up with a big sad face saying "Bad system config info". I thought this was not a big issue since I dealt with the same error phrase in windows 7 just by deleting the numproc and the truncatememory. Well that did not work for widnows 8 and through my research I found out that basically I can only refresh or restore my system. I cannot restore as I cannot lose any of my documents since I did not back them up lately. Fortunately, refresh does not delete everything but when I select the option is says "the drive where windows is installed is locked. unlock the drive and try again."My OS is installed on a 128gb M4 crucial ssd and I also have a 1tb WD hdd. I quickly installed W8 onto my hdd and thought that I could recover documents that way but that did not work either. So, somehow I believe the best way to go is to refresh and somehow unlock that ssd ,unless if any of you have a better solution. But the main reason why I am here is, HOW DO I UNLOCK MY SSD SO THAT I CAN REFRESH IT?
 

Yup that is what I did first : I phoned Microsoft. They refused to answer any of my questions until I would pay $100 for a 30-day tech support warranty. That is too much for that short of a warranty. Even with this overpriced package they do not guarantee a fix :O
 
I did find this on the Crucial site, might help
"One thing you guys could so is take a disk tool that can "wake" locked hard drives. I use Parted Magic. Boot into your repair USB or CD with Parted Magic (or whatever utility). As it loads itself it will wake your drive. When you get into the program, simply reboot and your SSD will be good to go." here http://forum.crucial.com/t5/Solid-State-Drives-SSD/How-I-fixed-my-M4-that-wouldn-t-detect-in-the-BIOS/td-p/110964/page/2

Something to try. It seems the SSD has a protect feature that locks the SSD to prevent overvoltage damage - one reported way to unlock it is to let it run in BIOS for about 10-20 minutes but the above method is suppose to be faster.
good luck
 
Hi there,

You can try going to computer acc/parts shop and get yourself an adapter that will connect your hdd to another working computer using usb port. The set will connect one cable to power and the other to your data of your hdd. Using this set you can connect to the working pc just like any usb. Then you can click open the drive and locate your work data and copy to another disk or another pendrive. Hope this will help.

 
to me it looks like the uefi settings might have been changed , do you have two hdd's , i mean (msata(ssd) + hdd). if thats the scenario then you might have to change the sata mode and the boot mode and also ensure if the raid config is proper or not. Help me with the bios settings and also you system specs as well
 


Thank you for the reply! I have a i5 4670k with a Z87 D3HP motherboard, 7970 OC windforce, Antec 750W 1TB HDD, 128gb SSD. I use the ssd as a boot drive for windows 8 and other small programs like itunes and Word that I want to be quick and responsive. On the TB I have my games! ATM I installed W8 onto my TB so that I can continue doing work and other things and I thought I could recover my documents and pictures but I cannot find them in my 128gb 🙁 . I tried reseting the CMOS. I tried deleting the truncatememory and numproc. But from my research, people who ended up with this problem ended up restoring or refreshing their PC. It would be that simple just a click of a button ,but when I do so it says your disk (SSD) is locked . Try again later. So I think Friedman idea of idling in the bios will unlock it ,but the only problem is if I go out of the bios my pc reboots and then I assume the whole surge protecting process restarts. Now I think I should hook up another psu maybe to the ssd and so idle it in bios and then it will not turn off when it reboots. When I had this exact same issue with Windows 7 (Bad system config info) I could just delete the truncatememory and numproc values and it would boot up regularly.
 
since u've installed os on the ssd drive, disconnect the 1tb hdd and then go into bios and check the sata mode and the boot mode, ideally based on the specs that you've mentioned, the sata mode should be AHCI and the boot mode should be UEFI and the first boot device has to be "windows boot manager"
-if you dont find the settings in the manner i mentioned, then before you make any changes , first make a note of it on a piece of paper and then make the changes . accordingly, keep posting when you face further changes
-if nothing works out, try doing load defaults by tapping f9
 


Thanks for the info, I'll try it out! But is that going to fix "Bad system config info"?
 


I tried it out and I could not find the boot mode but I did find Sata mode which was in AHCI. I did try loading defaults but that did not work either. 🙁
 
you should find the boot mode in the boot page of the bios where you have the boot device priority options
Also did u check by disconnecting the 1tb hdd and what happens when you try to boot with only the ssd connected
 


Ya so I disconnected the HDD and I did find the boot mode. When I selected UEFI and booted an error message saying "no bootable device is detected"came up. Then I tried UEFI and Legacy and the same thing happened : Bad System config info. ATM I have it on Uefi and legacy
 
Usually when installing win8, the following should be the configuration:
1. the sata mode should be either ahci or RAID or intel SMART , depending on the mobo configuration,
and the boot mode should be UEFI- with the secure boot option as enabled and the load legacy option rom to be disabled and the first boot device should be windows boot manager(ssd)

or

2. the sata mode should be AHCI/RAID/ Intel SMART depending on the mobo configuration and the boot mode should be Legacy , with the ssd drive should be the 1st boot device

So it should be either of the two settings, and also try to remember what settings u had set when you first installed win8 on the ssd drive and also if you have os disc , go to the repair options and then open up cmd prompt and check if your able to access the c: partition, if your able to then you should be able to copy all the contents from the ssd to external storage
 


ok I set it onto AHCI for Sata mode (first did raid but did not boot in that configuration) and Boot mode is Legacy. Still did not work 🙁 🙁 🙁
 
try these combinations
1. sata mode= raid
2. boot mode= uefi
3. secure boot mode= disabled
4. first boot device= windows boot manager

else

1.sata mode=AHCI
2.boot mode= UEFI
3.Secure boot=disabled

press f10 to save and exit after you make any of the above changes, when the secure boot is disabled the ssd drive should unlocked
 


Ok so I did everything you told me but boot mode can only be uefi and legacy OR legacy only otherwise on UEFI it will not boot. Secure boot was disabled but still when I go to refresh it still says drive is locked!
 
ideally when you disable secure boot, that should unlock the drive and also if you by any chance had raid established, then break the acceleration only and then check if your able to access, else try doing a dirty install of the os and one more thing , is the drive bit locker enabled,??
 


What is the drive bit locker?
 
Hey guys!

So I was just thinking of how to recover those pics and documents off my ssd and I don't know if it is possible .but could I not just back up the data on the ssd using a back up software and then transfer to my external hdd. Just a thought. Let me know what you guys think. Oh ya, if you think it could work, than what back up software could I download? Thanks