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#21
I think Roland may already know this and post #19 was just a simple faux pas, but for the benefit of other readers, what Microsoft calls a "Boot" partition and what us humans might logically conclude is a boot partition are not the same thing. It's logical to think the boot process begins with the boot partition, but in Microsoft-speak it starts with the "System" partition, which then chains to what Microsoft calls the real "Boot" partition, which is where the Windows OS is installed.
Obviously, then, if the Boot partition (as MS defines it) is where Windows resides, it will always have a drive letter -- typically C:. Windows can't function if the Boot partition doesn't have a drive letter.
(FWIW, to avoid confusion I often refer to them as "Startup" and "OS" rather than System and Boot. It's too easy for careless readers to misinterpret "Boot" as the startup partition and "System" as where the Windows Operating System is installed.)
As for the startup partition (aka, "System" or "System Reserved"), it's a primary NTFS partition with the drive letter simply removed. There's no reason it can't have a drive letter, and one could add/remove a drive letter via Disk Management if you really want to. Having the drive letter removed is beneficial to preventing clueless users from tampering with it.
Since it has to be a bootable primary partition, that means it should be unhidden and marked "Active" (assuming a Legacy/MBR disk, and barring multi-boot scenarios). It's no surprise DLisak's attempt (in post #1) to change the partition type to 0x17 failed.
I did not see this thread back in Jan-Feb, but looking at post #11 it shouldn't have been difficult to resolve.
Per the screenshot in post #11, Disk2/part.1 is marked "Active", while Disk2/part.2 is "System, Boot". I don't know how it got that way (DLisak seems to have done a lot of tinkering trying to solve the problem), but you want it be either:
(In the second scenario, Disk2/part.1 would be redundant and unused.)
- Disk2/part.1 as "Active, System" and Disk2/part.2 as "Boot", or
- Disk2/part.2 as "Active, System, Boot"
In either case, the solution is to simply set the desired partition "Active", then boot from the Macrium rescue media and invoke its "Fix Windows Boot Problems" function.
For best results, before using the Macrium repair tool remove all extraneous disks, connect the boot disk to the desired SATA port, and configure the BIOS with that port highest in the boot priority order (or at least higher than any other hard disk). Then boot from the Macrium rescue media and select "Fix Windows Boot Problems". The tool will find the (one and only) Windows partition, then ask you to confirm which partition the computer should start from. Select the partition you made "Active", and click "Finish".
It's as simple as that. The Macrium tool will repair the boot files if necessary, and rebuild the BCD. Reattach the rest of the disks and take it from there.
In the first scenario above, the BCD would be built on part.1, while in the second scenario it would be built on part.2. It's evident from DLisak's repair attempts that things got switched back and forth, which is why he later discovered (post #17) two BCDs. That's not a problem; the unused one is simply ignored.
And finally, FTR, the EFI partition on Disk4 is also not a problem. Disk4 is evidently a GPT disk, and in order for it to be bootable it would need an EFI partition. If it's not meant to be bootable, the EFI partition is superfluous and can be deleted, but it's not a problem if it's there.
The fact it got initialized as a GPT disk with an EFI suggests to me that torchwood may have been onto something (post #10) in hinting DLisak wasn't paying attention to whether his BIOS was in Legacy mode or UEFI mode, and inadvertently switched it back and forth.
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