Windows 10: Can't boot after install from recovery USB key

Hi,

I have an ASUS Zenbook UX501J in which I've just installed a new 960GB SSD Corsair MP510 NVMe PCIe Gen3 x4 M.2 SSD. I'd like to start fresh, so before I replaced the old SSD I created a Windows recovery USB key and used it to install a clean Windows installation on the new SSD. After removing the USB key and restarting the laptop I was immediately directed to the bios where no bootable media were shown. Bios is American Megatrends version 211.


In the Bios, CSM is enabled, and secure boot protocol is disabled. No boot options are given.


In booted from the USB recovery key again and I tried repairing the installation which gave an error and pointed to C:\Windows\System32\LogFiles\srt\SrtTrail.txt. That file says "A recently serviced boot binary is corrupt."


Here are the disks and volumes, listed by going to the command line and typing

diskpart

list disk

sel disk 0

list vol





Is it bad that the system volume is hidden? Is that why the Bios can't see any boot options after the USB key is removed?


I selected the system volume and assigned a random drive letter to it, and exited the disk part utility.

sel vol 2

assign letter k:

exit


Here's what I get if I run

bcedit /store k:\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\BCD





Any ideas on how to get this to boot?


Cheers,
Lars

:)

 

How does Windows boot to advanced recovery option e.g. command prompt?

- that gives me a 454 'Unexpected error' This tells me that the BCD is partially corrupted.

The commands: shutdown.exe /r /o /f /t 00
or: %SystemRoot%\System32\Cmd.exe /c reagentc /boottore&shutdown /r /f /t 00
should boot into Recovery if everything is configured correctly.
FYI, If Windows is configured correctly:

1. If Reagentc is disabled, you still can get into Recovery but with limited options.
2. If Reagentc is enabled, you'll get all options.
3. If you boot Windows using Recovery USB stick, You'll get into Recovery with couple of options missing.

Here's my suggestion if you want to try:
OPTION 1: Will save the trouble of re-install Windows.

1. Download the image of my first 3 partitions (450MB Recovery, 100 MB EFI partition, and 16MB unformatted primary)
   EFI_Boot-00-00.7z - Google Drive
2. Run Macrium and restore the image from step 1, overwriting your existing 1st three partitions, leaving C alone.
3. Delete the 490MB Recovery partition.
4. From Macrium, run fix boot problems.
5. Reboot. Open Admin command prompt then run Reagentc /info to make sure that it is enabled. If not, enable it.
   if failed to enable, reboot and try again.

OPTION 2: Assuming you've already had Windows backup with Macrium.

1. Wipe out the first 5 parttiions. (450MB, 100MB, 16MB, C Drive, 480MB)
2. Fresh install Windows 10
3. Restore C drive from backup image, run fix boot problems
4. repeat step 5 from OPTION 1 above.

 

Installing windows off of a USB stick

Step By Step from vista:
From admin cmd prompt

1. diskpart
1a. list disk
2. select disk 1 (replace 1 with your usb drive)
3. clean
4. create partition primary
5. select partition 1 (replace 1 with your usb drive)
6. active
7. format fs=fat32
8. assign
9. exit

Copy Windows Vista's DVD ROM content to the Flash Drive

xcopy d:\*.* /s/e/f e:\ (d being your vista cd and e being your usb stick)

And that's it, boot off your usb disk

 

Data recovery software

The Big Useful List Of Free Useful Programs To Use Usually For Free

click the top spoiler and then look down to recovery.

All of the suggestions in the old threads were consolidated into that one.