New
#1
No Bootable device error, MBR messed or missing or a hibernation issue
This is my first Post here, I need some help! I have a Dell M90 with win7 64bit…installed two + years ago…SP1 and current updates as of a 2 months ago.
I have backed up my data consistently, typically once a week to an external drive + BU images, so no worries their but I am unable to restore the back up images, or use restore points. They both fail.
The computer has worked great until the other day…when I turned on and at boot after a long POST I get the Black Screen…with blinking cursor in upper left for about one or two min then the message with beep:
“No bootable devices—Strike F1 to retry boot, F2 for setup utility
Press F5 to run onboard diagnostics.”
FI returns the same message as above
F2 opens BIOS set up
F5 does nothing
I see that there is no hard drive detected by the BIOS.
This is where it gets fishy though.
I found that, through trial and error, if I scroll down in BIOS to “POST behavior” and enable or disable virtualization (doesn’t matter which) save and exit BIOS the machine boots “normally” but very slowly…hangs on Dell POST screen for about three minutes then runs "fine".
So for some reason switching on virtualization in BIOS causes to recognizes the hard drive all of the sudden…
I can "restart" the computer and it restarts. But if I shut down and restart I get the "No bootable device" error agian and have to go through same, (enable or disable virtualization in BIOS)
I can also F8 and boot into safe mode from POST.
I have reseated the drive, and I have two other older drives, from same Dell M90 that boot fine with Win XP Pro.
I have tried to restore using system restore point’s options and or with restoring images…but they have failed.
I would like to FIX to boot normally, instead of going into BIOS and switching off or on the POST behavior if possible and want to avoid rebuilding the system (clean install) as I have some software that I no longer have the discs for to restore.
When I boot from Win 7 DVD or repair disc the hard drive is not recognized, maybe I’m missing a step,
Fixmbr, fixboot, scanos, rebuildbcd ect. dont work as recommended elsewhere in this fourm.
I have combed the forum for MBR knowledge base articles and windows support didn’t help other than to say disable some updates from back in March but that didn’t help or work…
It seems like this is a Master Boot Record (MBR) issue but I havnt been able to resolve? Or could this be a hibernation sleep problem?
Is there a way to “FIX”?
See attached image-walk through
Thanks in advance for any help or advise or help that may come my way.
Last edited by renderman34; 19 Aug 2013 at 20:22. Reason: added attachment