Solved Cannot boot from SSD after windows partition cloning

[dsperber]

I wonder if it's got to do with the fact that the original Win7 (on spinner) install was as a "logical" partition, and this wrote something into the Registry or boot files that influences its drive lettering.

Even though the physical partition has now been physically converted from "logical" to "primary" by Partition Wizard, and even though the cloned Win7_New on the SSD is also "primary", I wonder if that internal Windows information about its original installation format as "logical" is somehow coming into play?

 

[George300]

That suggests it actually is something in the Win7_New partition itself which seems to be the result of an odd Win7 install, where its drive letter was forced to be G!

Isn't that a reason for following the rescue media solution?

 

[dsperber]

That suggests it actually is something in the Win7_New partition itself which seems to be the result of an odd Win7 install, where its drive letter was forced to be G!

Isn't that a reason for following the rescue media solution?

Seems like a reasonable thought. But then so have all the other ideas we've tried.

But yes, using the standalone boot CD program to do the cloning would seem to eliminate any possibility that it is running the program under the real original Win7 on spinner which is the culprit. I'm certainly interested to hear the results, but at this point I'm less than cautiously optimistic.

 

[DavidE]

I don't know, i wonder if it isn't something to do with multiple active partitions.

My test box is a triple boot and i have changed partitions from primary to logical, moved things around, etc. when migrating to a new HD/SSD.
The OS that i boot always gets the C letter.
Worst case, i have to run a startup repair to fix the boot code from my screwing around.

Right now i have
Win 8.1 Primary Active partition
Win 7-64 Logical partition
Win 7-32 Logical partition

I can restore a Win 7-32 image when running Win 8 or Win 7-64, (or a rescue disc)
I can restore a Win 7-64 image when running Win 8 or Win 7-32, (or a rescue disc)
I can only restore the Win 8.1 partition ONLY when booted with the Macrium rescue disc.

I can create backup images for any and all the OS's no matter what OS is booted.

 

[George300]

Having booted from a Macrium Reflect cd, I cloned WIN7 to the SSD.
I booted from the HD to WIN7. WIN7_NEW was on H (Primary Partition).
Using EasyBCD I added an entry for WIN7_NEW.
I rebooted from the HD to WIN7_NEW.
WIN7_NEW is still G

 

[George300]

I left only the SSD connected and booted from it.
I got DISK BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER.
I rebooted from the HD to WIN7.
I used the "change boot drive" function and saw "EasyBCD has successfully made drive H: the new boot partition" (H is WIN7_NEW).
I will reboot from the SSD now.

 

[George300]

I left only the SSD connected and booted from it.
I again saw the non-gen screen and WIN7_NEW was still G.
What else can I do?

 

[George300]

To sum up (if I remember correctly):
-I cloned using EaseUS Todo Backup
-I cloned using Macrium Reflect
-I imaged using Macrium Reflect
-I cloned using Macrium Reflect rescue disk

 

[DavidE]

Right now i don't know what else you can try other than wait to see if dsperber hears anything from Macrium.

 

[George300]

Right now i don't know what else you can try other than wait to see if dsperber hears anything from Macrium.

Yes, we should wait to hear from Macrium.

Can I somehow change the source drive so as to make it more "normal"? Perhaps by deleting WINXP? Is that possible?

 

[DavidE]

I'm not sure, your setup is a lot different than anything i've had.
I'd wait till dsperber or gregrocker advises about that.

 

[George300]

At any rate, the boot drive letter can be changed:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/223188

 

[dsperber]

At any rate, the boot drive letter can be changed:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/223188

Have not yet heard back from Macrium yet. But they're 10 hours ahead of me, so it's the middle of the night still in England.

Anyway, sounds like this approach is definitely worth pursuing. It will only take you a minute to accomplish.

Reconnect all three drives again (since it's obvious having the second hard drive connected accomplished nothing, and since you have some system files located on it without which you have problems trying to run Win7). Put back the spinner in the BIOS as boot drive #1, so that you once again boot to "active" WinXP on the spinner.

Then reboot, and select Win7_New (on SSD). You should come up as G, as we know.

Then perform the MS method for changing the Registry DOSDEVICE entries for C to Z, G to C, and Z to G. Don't forget to change the permissions using REGEDIT32 before starting and after finishing as the article shows.

Still with spinner as boot drive #1 (we don't want to boot from the SSD) reboot and once again select Win7_New (on SSD). Does it boot? Or do you have a problem? If it boots, what is the drive letter?

If this is successful, I'd leave it just as it is... since you said you want to retain WinXP on the spinner anyway. So you need that drive connected anyway in order to occasionally boot to WinXP as Windows, so who cares if that's where you boot from for Boot Manager even when you're continuing on to the SSD for Windows itself. As long as you finally can achieve Win7_New lettering itself as C, that's the goal we've been chasing.

I'd certainly follow MS's article instructions. Can't do any harm at all, it seems to me (since you're not bothering the original Win7 partition on the spinner, but only tweaking Win7_New on the SSD), and can only solve the problem we've been unable to overcome until now... no matter what the actual explanation (which currently eludes us all!!) turns out to be.

Go for it!

(Hopefully I'll hear something from Macrium by tomorrow, although it does truly seem like something outside of either Macrium or EaseUS which is truly responsible for this mystery so I don't expect them to do much other than to possibly explain why we're seeing what we are seeing.)

 

[SIW2]

Here you go George.

Boot into WIN7, run as admin on nt6repair.exe,Where it says "Fix OS Drive Letter" select your win7_new drive letter and click fix.

View attachment nt6repair.zip

 

[George300]

I ran SIW2's NT6REPAIREx86.EXE and booted to WIN7_NEW. Now, WIN7_NEW is C. Thanks SIW2!

I'll wait and see if I'll have any problems and then mark it as solved (for example, a folder from my Data partition had been copied to WIN7_NEW for some reason and initially WIN+E to open Windows Explorer was giving the error "Server execution failed", but after some minutes the error stopped appearing).

Thanks to everyone (especially dsperber and gregrocker)

 

[George300]

1)I read that an SSD must have at least 25% free space (or 15% according to others). Does that refer to each partition on the SSD or to the entire SSD?
2)Is it safe now to extend WIN7_NEW and make it 160GB?

 

[dsperber]

I ran SIW2's NT6REPAIREx86.EXE and booted to WIN7_NEW. Now, WIN7_NEW is C. Thanks SIW2!

Fantastic!!! There's still the mystery of what exactly in the environment was responsible for the symptom, but as long as it's now been reversed and repaired... YOU HAVE EMERGED VICTORIOUS!

So, you're now once again running with all three drives connected? And you're still booting to the first hard drive where WinXP lives, with that drive #1 in the BIOS boot sequence? You're NOT booting from the SSD, right (even though Win7_New is marked "active" and is primary and contains a valid version of Boot Manager put there by EasyBCD)? There's no reason to boot to the SSD, given that you're retaining your first hard drive anyway and also still want to be able to boot to WinXP if you want to.

Can you please post final screenshots, from DISKMGMT, Partition Wizard, and EasyBCD... just for closure.

Persistence pays off, and there are lots of helpful experts on this forum anxious to be helpful.

 

[dsperber]

1)I read that an SSD must have at least 25% free space (or 15% according to others). Does that refer to each partition on the SSD or to the entire SSD?

I think you're talking about "over-provisioning", which is a function of Samsung Magician (software provided by Samsung if you buy one of their SSD's).

You leave just under 10% of the entire drive capacity unallocated to any partition (it's typically shown as unallocated on the right-side of any graphic of the drive's partitions).

Samsung Magician will automatically carve out that minimum space if you ask it to, but it will also inform you of how much it must be minimum and you can use Partition Wizard to shrink partitions if you have to in order to leave that much room unallocated. You can then enable "over-provisioning" in Samsung Magician and if the unallocated space is at least as large as required the feature will be activated.

This space is used by Samsung's software during normal Windows operation to improve overall efficiency and lifetime of the SSD.

Samsung Magician also provides a second tool named "rapid mode", which uses a portion of your main DRAM (assuming you have lots of extra memory that's just sitting around and not being used by Windows) as an additional "cache buffer" for operations when appropriate. This transparently avoids using the actual SSD itself when not absolutely necessary, and also runs at your DRAM speed. Very very worthwhile feature.

Of course you need to have a Samsung SSD to use this software.

2)Is it safe now to extend WIN7_NEW and make it 160GB?

Sure. Or, you can put a second "data" partition on that drive, if that's what you want to do.

 

[George300]

So, you're now once again running with all three drives connected?

Yes.

And you're still booting to the first hard drive where WinXP lives, with that drive #1 in the BIOS boot sequence?

I was able to boot from both drives.

I changed the letters of the other partitions:

 

[DavidE]

That's great, glad to hear you have it working !!!

I changed the letters of the other partitions:

Did you have to change WINXP from C to G before running the tool, or did the tool make this change when you changed WIN7_NEW from G to C?

This tool may be the best thing since sliced bread ... but some folks might want more understanding of what it does, how it works, etc.

fwiw
With multi-boots i don't assign a drive letter to "other OS partitions", i want them "hidden".
The only OS partition that has a drive letter is the current running OS, and that is always C.