Question Winload.exe Problem

[UltraFusion]

Out of nowhere my win 10 Dell notebook crashed and came up with the BSOD showing the Recovery error “PC needs to be repaired” – Winload.exe issue…

So I used a USB drive with the Win 10 installation media, changed the boot order to boot from the USB, and was able to repair the PC and get the PC running again.

Everything seemed to be working perfectly – so I shut down, removed the USB and reset the boot sequence to run off the C drive – and to my surprise it came up with the BSOD winload.exe error.

I shut down, reinserted the USB drive, changed the boot order to boot from USB and the PC started right up as normal.

My problem therefore is that I can only use my PC if I have the USB installed and boot from it – how do I get it to run, as usual, from the C drive?

Even when booting/running from the USB the PC is completely functional as through it was normally booting/running from the C drive.

Also – when booting/running using USB if I try to eject it (it shows up as ESD-USB), it says the drive is in use.

It looks to me like the C drive has not been repaired (ie. Winload.exe…) and the USB drive is providing the necessary file support to allow the PC to run normally.

Thanks and regards.

 

[UltraFusion]

Thinking about this a bit more - my guess is that the bootloader is running from the USB, so how do I redirect it back to the C drive.
FYI, I am using Legacy boot.

 

[SkyNetRising]

my guess is that the bootloader is running from the USB, so how do I redirect it back to the C drive.
FYI, I am using Legacy boot.

Well - you have to repair bootloader on OS drive.
Your previous repair procedure obviously was improper.
We don't know, what you did there.

Can you show a screenshot from windows Disk Management?
(upload to imgur.com and post link)

 

[UltraFusion]

Ok - thanks - I agree the repair did not work. I booted from the USB that had the Win10 Installation Media and then Repair Your PC, then Diagnoses, then Start Up Repair and after (long) while my Windows started and everything seemed to working well, except I found out that it was booting only with USB installed. Not sure where I went wrong.

Here is the link for the Disk Mngt shot -

https://imgur.com/a/ZrWZpUe

View: https://imgur.com/a/ZrWZpUe


Cheers.

 

[SkyNetRising]

Here is the link for the Disk Mngt shot

So you have two 500GB drives and both of them have a bootloader partition.
Do both drives also have windows installed on?

To fix bootloader on Disk 1, execute following from elevated command prompt:

bcdboot C:\windows /s F: /f BIOS​

Resulting message should be:
Boot files created successfully.

 

[UltraFusion]

Ok - thanks -

Here is the link for the

https://imgur.com/a/ZrWZpUe

View: https://imgur.com/a/ZrWZpUe

 

[UltraFusion]

Yes I have to drives but the 2nd drive only has data files on it, only the 1st drive is bootable for Win10.
I'll try the bcdboot C:\windows /s F: /f BIOS cmd now, and reboot...

 

[UltraFusion]

Ok - thanks -

Here is the link for the

https://imgur.com/a/ZrWZpUe

View: https://imgur.com/a/ZrWZpUe

 

[UltraFusion]

Yes I have to drives but the 2nd drive only has data files on it, only the 1st drive is bootable for Win10.
I'll try the bcdboot C:\windows /s F: /f BIOS cmd now, and reboot...

The "bcdboot C:\windows /s F: /f BIOS" executed successfully (using elevated CMD). Rebooted (after changing the boot sequence to the C drive) and no luck, got the BSOD saying "A req'd device isn't connected or can't be accessed. Error code 0x0000225

Had to reinsert the USB drive and boot form it to get Windows working again.

 

[UltraFusion]

I should be clear when I say the "USB drive" the Windows Installation media is actually loaded on an SD card and it is plugged into the SD slot on my notebook. Not sure if this makes any difference on how everything should work.
Curiously instead of using the SD slot, I plugged the SD card into a USB adapter and plugged it into a USB socket on the PC, then set the PC to boot from the USB (rather than the SD) and all i got was "Invalid Partition Table" !!!???
Reinserting the SD chip back into the SD slot and booting from the SD gets Windows working again...

 

[SkyNetRising]

The "bcdboot C:\windows /s F: /f BIOS" executed successfully (using elevated CMD). Rebooted (after changing the boot sequence to the C drive) and no luck, got the BSOD saying "A req'd device isn't connected or can't be accessed. Error code 0x0000225

I think - two drives with bootloaders are causing a confusion there.
Delete partition D :
And adjust boot priority in BIOS, to boot from other 500GB drive.

 

[KingLoki]

You may need to run the "fixmbr" command or use this third party free software. It is powerful disk management software. Cheers.

Worth a read...Link below for 2 methods that may help...
Disk management software

Note: No endorsement or or perks are associated with me recommending this software.

 

[UltraFusion]

Got it working !!! Very strange.

This Dell 7240 has 2 slots for a SATA drive, one for the C drive with the OS and a 2nd that c/b used either for a SIM card adapter or a SATA drive, and I installed 2 512GB drives - one used for the OS and programs, the 2nd for a whole bunch of data/file storage.

About a yr ago I loaded win 10 on this PC and it seems that I loaded the OS on to the "2nd" drive slot, and everything worked and has been perfectly working simce then - until few days ago the BSOD popped up saying their was problem loading winload.exe.

So I loaded the Win10 installation media on a USB drive and booted the PC from that drive, selected Repair this PC and (with a blinking curse for more than 30 mins) Windows loaded and everything seemed to be fully working normally. Except the only way I could boot and use Windows was to have the Win Installation Media USB installed. Trying to boot only from the HD resulted in the BSOD and winload.exe error!

With nothing to loose I eventually pulled out (WHAT I THOUFGHT WAS) the 512GB "data/file" drive only to find out that in fact Win 10 was loaded on the 2nd slot - so I removed the data/file drive and made sure the OS drive was in the "primary" slot, made sure the boot order selected the C drive (and removed the USB drive) and lo and behold everything booted up.

Can't explain why everything worked for a yr in its original config and then suddenly it wasn't working - but am very happy all is working now and PROBLEM SOLVED.

Thanks for any and all advice and help.