Windows 7 to Windows 11 upgrade - Data Hard Drive issues

[SgtWilson]

Hi All,

As I am getting more and more emails informing me that X software will no longer work on Windows 7 at the end of 2023, I have started to look at upgrading to Windows 11 slowly whilst still running Windows 7 until im finally ready to switch across.

I have installed Windows 11 on a new separate OS hard drive, whilst keeping my existing Data hard drive attached to the system.

All seems to have gone well. HOWEVER, the biggest issue I am having is that when going between the two OS's, each Windows version attempts to do a CHKDSK, finds inconsistencies, repairs them, and then the system loads with no issues. BUT when this happens I end up losing data on my DATA drives and most recently lost about a whole months work.

Does anyone know why this should happen, as as far as I am aware the file system for both OS's are the same (NTFS - healthy primary partitions), and I have never had this issue before when moving a Data hard drive to another system.

Sorry if this is in the wrong Topic, but would be very grateful of your insights.

PS. There isnt anything wrong with the hard drive itself, as it has been working fine for the past couple of years without data lose under the Windows 7 environment.

 

[Megahertz07]

Hi All,

As I am getting more and more emails informing me that X software will no longer work on Windows 7 at the end of 2023, I have started to look at upgrading to Windows 11 slowly whilst still running Windows 7 until im finally ready to switch across.

In fact some new versions of some software won't work under Win 7.
Win 7 itself will work as usual

HOWEVER, the biggest issue I am having is that when going between the two OS's, each Windows version attempts to do a CHKDSK, finds inconsistencies, repairs them, and then the system loads with no issues. BUT when this happens I end up losing data on my DATA drives and most recently lost about a whole months work.

The main problem is that Win 7 uses a different version of NTFS.
The problem can be dealt by disabling Hybrid Boot. (disable fast start on win 11)

Check disk on Win 10 SSD Solved - Page 2 - Windows 10 Forums

 

[SgtWilson]

Hi Megahertz07

Many thanks for your reply, and your answer.

Thanks also for the links.

I think that I will have to make a good backup of my Data Drive, before then uninstalling the hard drive each time within Device Manager before then swapping it over into the new OS system and vice-versa, as well as disabling the Fast Boot option in Windows 11.

Its really quite annoying that this happens, but hey, I suppose versions change (and improve) with time.

 

[Megahertz07]

You can run Win 10 / 11 chkdsk on a Win 7 drive but you can't run Win 7 chkdsk on a Win 10 / 11 drive.
Also it's recommended to have Win 7 on it's own drive and Win 10 or 11 on its own drive.

 

[SgtWilson]

Yes, thats exactly what I have done.

Is there any known utility which will delete the Version2 $logfile data on the hard drive, so that Windows 7 will work fine with it, and it will not get corrupted when I move it to the Windows 11 system?

 

[Megahertz07]

Win 7 thinks that the Win 10 or Data is corrupted but it isn't. Just don't run chkdsk from win 7. If you want to repair or just check a drive, use chkdsk from win 10 on any partition as Win 10 chkdsk is compatible with Win 7 NTFS

 

[TechnoMage2016]

You've fallen prey to the old problem that the railroads had, when they only had one track but two trains that wanted to use the track to go different directions. The solution was what they called a 'Side Track', where one train could rest in peace, while another train passed on the main line.
"And never the trains shall meet!"

Obviously, the ideal situation would be two PC's, each one with a separate OS on it.
Second best, would be two hard drives, on the same PC, that could be kept separated, each one with a different OS on it. *
But, unfortunately, with two OS's on the same HD, there is nothing to keep them from messing with each other. Sort of like two Tom Cats in the same cage.
* I've done that, with several OS's on separate HD's on the same PC, by only plugging in the one drive that I want to work with. Whereas the other OS's are never aware of the other. To avoid problems, you must keep the two OS's separated, however you can.

Good Luck, Mate,
TM

 

[SgtWilson]

If only that was the case;

I have two separate NVme drives, one with Win 11 on and the other Win 7, which I switch out between the two. The issue is I have one SSD with my data files on, which remains in the system between OS swap-outs. This is what is causing the data loss issues, due to the NTFS versions differences between the two OS's.

If only there was a option to tick in Win 11, so that it just remained backward compatible.