Solved Just Will Not Boot

[blr13]

system specs as per profile... for years, i had it hooked up with a crossover cable to my old machine used as a file server. both machines used a KVM switch for keyboard and video. (no mouse, that's usb.)

i detached the old machine from the crossover cable, and the KVM. this made my system think it did not have a monitor or keyboard, apparently. so i plugged those in directly. it just Will Not Boot.


it will not boot to the new (6T hdd) where i have Win7 on uefi. it gets to 'starting windows' and hangs.
it will not boot to the old (1T hdd) where i had Win7 originally, on legacy. it gets to a blank screen with a blinking underscore in the upper left and hangs.

i tried making a WinPE following instructions on this site: Creating Bootable WinPE Media - Windows 7 Tutorial

i tried making a WinRE from a laptop with win7 pro installed, and told it to create a rescue disc. i then used instructions from the above site to make it uefi compatible.

i tried downloading the official (or semi official) win7 iso files from digital river or whatever their name is. and updating it with siw2's "Update your Win7 installation media" files, and making THOSE uefi.

i tried using WintoUSB as A: win7 installed on the usb, and B: win7 NOT installed on the USB, just trying to use the installer to get to the repair.

i found a super easy Universal USB Installer creator from here: Universal USB Installer - Easy As 1 2 3 | Pen Drive Linux

i tried using that with my win7 iso files, and i tried it with the Boot Repair Disk from: boot-repair-disk download | SourceForge.net


for some of the UUI uefi isos, i was able to get the system to start up, recognize it hadn't started up, and to try to start in safe mode.

it is currently stuck on disk.sys


previous errors included the USB's bcd file being wrong -- but how could it be wrong if the USB had never even BEEN booted before? how can a USB install crash with a disk.sys that is somehow unhappy with my hard drives?


as for the bios... omg, the bios. it is currently set to NOT use secure boot, NOT use fast boot, but to have CSM ON.
as such, it recognizes all my drives (2 hdd, 1 cd/dvd, 1 usb). but any legacy device gets the blank screen/blinking cursor hang. the uefi get the 'starting windows'/disk.sys hang.


i DID, in one of my experiments, change the hdd controllers from AHCI to IDE. that didn't work, obviously, so i changed them back. i did read somewhere if you do that, win7 Will Not Boot. is there a fix for THAT? omg!



i am starting to think it's not just a simple problem. could it be some hardware? could it be the bios? if i need to flash the bios... what, exactly will i lose? i have the 'secure boot' keys backed up from before i turned off secure boot. i don't know if i need those? ever?

i haven't done any hardware voodoo techniques i've read here and there. like taking out the memory and putting them back one by one. or unplugging the cd/dvd drive.

i did do the one trick where you disable all the sata, save the bios, then enable them back again. no help.



it's going on 3 weeks of me being without a workable computer. my brain is degenerating! i'm about to try creating a linux boot usb, if i can find the linux commands to fix/check the hard drives. i have instructions for creating an ubuntu boot usb, but it requires me to boot from the usb to install the boot-repair-tool thing. and the laptops i have don't have uefi, and the ubuntu usb is uefi, because my main machine needs uefi....


any clues? did i mention, i'm desperate?

 

[Megahertz07]

You wrote:
The old drive (1T) is Legacy-MBR
The new drive (6T) is UEFI-GPT

The old drive should be booting. You probably changed something on BIOS that prevent it from booting.

How did you get the new drive (6T) UEFI-GPT installed?
Did you changed BIOS settings to be able to boot as UEFI-GPT?


First thing to do is to make the old drive to boot.

As the computer is Custom built, I suppose you have a Win 7 pro SP1 x64 installation disk or iso. Do you have it?

 

[blr13]

heyas, thanks megahertz!

my win7 installation disc is missing (it was from 2015). :/ i have an win7 pro iso i downloaded. that is one of the boot CDs that is not working.

the 1T old drive was from 2015. the new 6T drive is from last year. i actually copied the system from the old drive to the new one, then spent 3-4 weeks manually brute-forcing it to become a GPT/UEFI drive. (no, i can't remember all the steps. :X)

i set the bios to use UEFI, and was able to boot from the 6T for the past year.

i have it set up to use boot manager. boot manager offers two systems to start: win7 pro 64 bit and win7 pro 64 bit. the top one is the new one, and the bottom one is the old one. (yes, i tested ;D)



the legacy devices might not be booting because the uefi is turned on? i had csm turned off, during some phases of my attempts to get ANYTHING to boot, but it is now turned back on. i will try turning off uefi in the bios and see what happens.


i dont think i want to boot from the old drive, because it is legacy... won't that make it so i can't see the >2T partition of my larger drive?

- - - Updated - - -

OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!! IT WORKED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i booted the old drive into safe mode!!!!!!!!!!!!

...there's no 'run' option in the start menu so i can get to regedit, but.... (don't tell me it's win+r; i don't have a windows key.)


OMFG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

IT SEES ALL THE DRIVES! ALL THE TERRABYTES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


IT WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

...

but why? ;D


ETA:

who cares? IT WORKS!!! i was able to boot from the 6T, in standard mode, and... it's all back again!!! and it all works!? it's... the opposite of what makes sense, BUT IT WORKS!

::running around the house, screaming with joy::