[SOLVED] Windows won't boot from cloned NVME drive, Source disk is Sata SSD. Source disk boots fine

[dhruv990]

Hi,

I used acronis true image that came with my kingston a2000 nvme drive.
I used it to clone, using the automatic mode, my crucial mx500 boot drive.
The clone operation was successful and my computer shutdown.
I took out all the drives except the nvme but it says "no bootable device found"
Why is this happening?
Is there anyway to fix it?
I'm able to boot fine using my original source disk,
The nvme drive is visible in disk management, as is in boot options in the uefi but it wont boot
https://ibb.co/QC90XbQ
https://ibb.co/JFPRcPz
Any help would be greatly appreciated
Thank you

 

[Lutfij]

You're advised to reinstall the OS a new when using a new SSD. Bakcup all data from the OS drive(if there's a need to) and then reinstall the OS after creating the bootable installer using Windows Media Creation Tools.

Make and model of your motherboard and the BIOS version it's on?

 

[USAFRet]

Prior to the clone operation, did you install the relevant NVMe driver for your new SSD?
Did you include the boot partition in the clone process?
What tool did you use for this cloning?

 

[dhruv990]

Hi, i used acronis true image. Just went through its automatic mode (saw various videos on youtube where it was succesfully done, in a similar situation i.e. sata ssd to nvme ssd)
I'm using an asrock x370 gaming k4 bios version p2.3
Processor is ryzen 7 1700x

 

[USAFRet]

Hi, i used acronis true image. Just went through its automatic mode (saw various videos on youtube where it was succesfully done, in a similar situation i.e. sata ssd to nvme ssd)
I'm using an asrock x370 gaming k4 bios version p2.3
Processor is ryzen 7 1700x

Going from SATA to NVMe, you need to install the relevant NVMe driver, before the clone operation.


-----------------------------
Specific steps for a successful clone operation:
-----------------------------
Verify the actual used space on the current drive is significantly below the size of the new SSD
Download and install Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration, if a Samsung SSD)
If you are cloning from a SATA drive to PCIe/NVMe, install the relevant driver for this new NVMe/PCIe drive.
Power off
Disconnect ALL drives except the current C and the new SSD
Power up
Run the Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration)
Select ALL the partitions on the existing C drive

If you are going from a smaller drive to a larger, by default, the target partition size will be the same as the Source. You probably don't want that
You can manipulate the size of the partitions on the target (larger)drive
Click on "Cloned Partition Properties", and you can specifiy the resulting partition size, to even include the whole thing

Click the 'Clone' button
Wait until it is done
When it finishes, power off
Disconnect ALL drives except for the new SSD
This is to allow the system to try to boot from ONLY the SSD
Swap the SATA cables around so that the new drive is connected to the same SATA port as the old drive
Power up, and verify the BIOS boot order
If good, continue the power up

It should boot from the new drive, just like the old drive.
Maybe reboot a time or two, just to make sure.

If it works, and it should, all is good.

Later, reconnect the old drive and wipe all partitions on it.
This will probably require the commandline diskpart function, and the clean command.

Ask questions if anything is unclear.
-----------------------------

 

[dhruv990]

Going from SATA to NVMe, you need to install the relevant NVMe driver, before the clone operation.


-----------------------------
Specific steps for a successful clone operation:
-----------------------------
Verify the actual used space on the current drive is significantly below the size of the new SSD
Download and install Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration, if a Samsung SSD)
If you are cloning from a SATA drive to PCIe/NVMe, install the relevant driver for this new NVMe/PCIe drive.
Power off
Disconnect ALL drives except the current C and the new SSD
Power up
Run the Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration)
Select ALL the partitions on the existing C drive

If you are going from a smaller drive to a larger, by default, the target partition size will be the same as the Source. You probably don't want that
You can manipulate the size of the partitions on the target (larger)drive
Click on "Cloned Partition Properties", and you can specifiy the resulting partition size, to even include the whole thing

Click the 'Clone' button
Wait until it is done
When it finishes, power off
Disconnect ALL drives except for the new SSD
This is to allow the system to try to boot from ONLY the SSD
Swap the SATA cables around so that the new drive is connected to the same SATA port as the old drive
Power up, and verify the BIOS boot order
If good, continue the power up

It should boot from the new drive, just like the old drive.
Maybe reboot a time or two, just to make sure.

If it works, and it should, all is good.

Later, reconnect the old drive and wipe all partitions on it.
This will probably require the commandline diskpart function, and the clean command.

Ask questions if anything is unclear.
-----------------------------

I just checked the nvme drivers are installed, but I'm still having the same issue

 

[USAFRet]

With the original drive in, and the new NVMe both connected, does it boot from the old drive?
If so, please post a screencap of the Disk Management window.

 

[dhruv990]

With the original drive in, and the new NVMe both connected, does it boot from the old drive?
If so, please post a screencap of the Disk Management window.

Yes it does, infact i'm chatting here on the system in question with both drives plugged in

https://imgur.com/PBQa2fO

disk 2 is the destination drive

 

[USAFRet]

Yes it does, infact i'm chatting here on the system in question with both drives plugged in

https://imgur.com/PBQa2fO

disk 2 is the destination drive

The boot partition was never applied to the Disk 2.

Possibly, because it resides on the 2TB Disk 1. The 99MB EFI.
If you physically disconnect that drive, does the system boot up?

 

[dhruv990]

The boot partition was never applied to the Disk 2.

Possibly, because it resides on the 2TB Disk 1. The 99MB EFI.
If you physically disconnect that drive, does the system boot up?

no, it doesnt.
I actually did another clone, and the resulting disk in disk manager was exactly like my source disk (same partitions), but it still did not boot. I have removed the ssd for now

 

[USAFRet]

no, it doesnt.
I actually did another clone, and the resulting disk in disk manager was exactly like my source disk (same partitions), but it still did not boot. I have removed the ssd for now

And there, you need to also clone the 99MB EFI partition from Disk 1.
That is what is preventing this from working.

 

[dhruv990]

And there, you need to also clone the 99MB EFI partition from Disk 1.
That is what is preventing this from working.

the 99 MB EFI partition is on my additional data drive, not my main drive

 

[USAFRet]

the 99 MB EFI partition is on my additional data drive, not my main drive

Correct.
That IS the boot partition.

When this OS was installed, both those drives were connected.
Windows has a stupid habit of putting that boot partition on a second drive.

Disconnect that drive, and no boot for you.

 

[dhruv990]

Correct.
That IS the boot partition.

When this OS was installed, both those drives were connected.
Windows has a stupid habit of putting that boot partition on a second drive.

Disconnect that drive, and no boot for you.

No, when I installed only the 500 gb ssd that is disk 0 was installed, I installed this data drive 2 years after as 500 gb was obviously not sufficient internally anymore (prior to it I was using an external 1 tb hdd to move stuff out of my main drive)

 

[SkyNetRising]

the 99 MB EFI partition is on my additional data drive, not my main drive

You'll have to create bootloader partition on cloned drive manually.
Execute from elevated command prompt. Regular command prompt will give error on last command.
If you get any errors, then stop immediately.

diskpart​

list disk​

select disk 2​

list partition​

select partition x​

(select 442GB partition, x=2 or x=3)​

delete partition override​

select partition y​

(select 488GB partition, y=1 or y=2)​

extend​

shrink desired=500​

create partition efi​

format fs=fat32 quick​

assign letter=H​

exit​

bcdboot D:\windows /s H:​

Shutdown, disconnect all drives except new nvme drive and try to boot into windows.
After successful boot into windows, you can reconnect old drives and delete efi system partition from 2TB drive.

This is, how you get to elevated command prompt:

How to Open the Command Prompt as Administrator in Windows 10

Much of the time, opening the Command Prompt as a regular user is all you need. Sometimes, though, you’ll need to open the Command Prompt as an administrator so that you can run commands that require administrative privileges.

www.howtogeek.com

 

[dhruv990]

You'll have to create bootloader partition on cloned drive manually.
Execute from elevated command prompt. Regular command prompt will give error on last command.
If you get any errors, then stop immediately.

diskpart​

list disk​

select disk 2​

list partition​

select partition x​

(select 442GB partition, x=2 or x=3)​

delete partition override​

select partition y​

(select 488GB partition, y=1 or y=2)​

extend​

shrink desired=500​

create partition efi​

format fs=fat32 quick​

assign letter=H​

exit​

bcdboot D:\windows /s H:​

Shutdown, disconnect all drives except new nvme drive and try to boot into windows.
After successful boot into windows, you can reconnect old drives and delete efi system partition from 2TB drive.

This is, how you get to elevated command prompt:

How to Open the Command Prompt as Administrator in Windows 10

Much of the time, opening the Command Prompt as a regular user is all you need. Sometimes, though, you’ll need to open the Command Prompt as an administrator so that you can run commands that require administrative privileges.

www.howtogeek.com

this is helpfull, i'll try this.
Just one thing, i redid the cloning with a different software and then I used disk part to list the partitions
It shows me 3 partitions (first two have an offset of between 200 to 300 mb)
partition 1 reserved 100 mb
partition 2 primary 482 mb (or something like that)
partition 3 primary 931 gb

In the above scenario do I leave partition 1 and 2 alone and work on creating efi on the third?

 

[SkyNetRising]

I used disk part to list the partitions
It shows me 3 partitions (first two have an offset of between 200 to 300 mb)
partition 1 reserved 100 mb
partition 2 primary 482 mb (or something like that)
partition 3 primary 931 gb

In the above scenario do I leave partition 1 and 2 alone and work on creating efi on the third?

That doesn't correspond to your Disk Management screenshot.
Show current (updated) Disk Management screenshot or Diskpart screenshot.

 

[dhruv990]

Correct.
That IS the boot partition.

When this OS was installed, both those drives were connected.
Windows has a stupid habit of putting that boot partition on a second drive.

Disconnect that drive, and no boot for you.

ohhhh.... I get what you're saying. When I first built this machine I had a 2 TB additional hdd installed along with my ssd (this is before I installed windows for the first time), which was failing, so I bought a new 2 TB hdd (early this year) and replaced it, now the question is how did the EFI partition move from the original failing HDD to this?!

 

[dhruv990]

You'll have to create bootloader partition on cloned drive manually.
Execute from elevated command prompt. Regular command prompt will give error on last command.
If you get any errors, then stop immediately.

diskpart​

list disk​

select disk 2​

list partition​

select partition x​

(select 442GB partition, x=2 or x=3)​

delete partition override​

select partition y​

(select 488GB partition, y=1 or y=2)​

extend​

shrink desired=500​

create partition efi​

format fs=fat32 quick​

assign letter=H​

exit​

bcdboot D:\windows /s H:​

Shutdown, disconnect all drives except new nvme drive and try to boot into windows.
After successful boot into windows, you can reconnect old drives and delete efi system partition from 2TB drive.

This is, how you get to elevated command prompt:

How to Open the Command Prompt as Administrator in Windows 10

Much of the time, opening the Command Prompt as a regular user is all you need. Sometimes, though, you’ll need to open the Command Prompt as an administrator so that you can run commands that require administrative privileges.

www.howtogeek.com

And I again just formatted the drive and starting a fresh, I hope I dont cause much problem.
Anyways the following Macrium Reflect Screenshot (sorry I have to use media links for some reason i cant post pictures directly) shows the exact way my SSD got partitioned (the only difference being that instead of 488 gb drive, i had a 932 gb drive with around 450 gb free) I used macrium only that time and I'm doing the same thing again, so I will have the same layout.

One more question I had was that I have created a windows media USB using the media creation tool.
How do I modify the above Bootloader Creation process using it? I dont want to do it with my main drive connected as I cant risk having two unbootable drives in case something goes wrong ( i have alot of work to finish :/)

https://imgur.com/5uAN4Rl

screenshot on disk part

https://imgur.com/0EnqkML

 

[USAFRet]

If you're going to redo the clone instead of the above commandline procedure:

In Macrium, you can clone from multiple drives at once.
From the 2TB, drag that 99MB partition to the target first.
Then, the other partitions from your current C drive.
Also, you can manipulate the size of the target partition, to include all that otherwise blank space.

By default, the target partition is the same size as the source. No matter what the actual drive size is. THis will leave a large blank unallocated partition.

On the Target, click on "Cloned Partition Properties". The will allow you to stretch the C on the Target to use the whole remainder of the drive.

 

[dhruv990]

If you're going to redo the clone instead of the above commandline procedure:

In Macrium, you can clone from multiple drives at once.
From the 2TB, drag that 99MB partition to the target first.
Then, the other partitions from your current C drive.
Also, you can manipulate the size of the target partition, to include all that otherwise blank space.

By default, the target partition is the same size as the source. No matter what the actual drive size is. THis will leave a large blank unallocated partition.

On the Target, click on "Cloned Partition Properties". The will allow you to stretch the C on the Target to use the whole remainder of the drive.

Oh this is cool, I'll try it out! is there any problem if I redo the clone process multiple times on an SSD?

 

[SkyNetRising]

is there any problem if I redo the clone process multiple times on an SSD?

Just exhausting write cycles on your SSD.

 

[dhruv990]

If you're going to redo the clone instead of the above commandline procedure:

In Macrium, you can clone from multiple drives at once.
From the 2TB, drag that 99MB partition to the target first.
Then, the other partitions from your current C drive.
Also, you can manipulate the size of the target partition, to include all that otherwise blank space.

By default, the target partition is the same size as the source. No matter what the actual drive size is. THis will leave a large blank unallocated partition.

On the Target, click on "Cloned Partition Properties". The will allow you to stretch the C on the Target to use the whole remainder of the drive.

So this worked, kind of. Now the windows spinning wheel does come, but the computer keeps restarting. The drive letter of the clone is D:, so do i have to change that?

 

[USAFRet]

So this worked, kind of. Now the windows spinning wheel does come, but the computer keeps restarting. The drive letter of the clone is D:, so do i have to change that?

If the drive letter is D, you did something wrong.

At the end of the clone process, did you physically disconnect all other drives before powering up the first time?
This is not optional.

 

[dhruv990]

If the drive letter is D, you did something wrong.

At the end of the clone process, did you physically disconnect all other drives before powering up the first time?
This is not optional.

Sorry, i just checked the details of the partition and the assigned letter is in fact C: but its stuck in a bootloop. The spinning wheel comes and then the computer restarts.
EDIT:- I removed all the usb devices connected to it and started it again and voila, it booted up. However despite the drive being nvme its still booting up in the same time as my previous ssd, thats a shame, oh well atleast i have more storage now thank you for the help!