Windows 10: Disk Partition Order for Windows10 Pro - UEFI Boot

Hi,


I had installed Windows 10Pro Ver 1903 on a MBR disk with Legacy Boot and Windows was working fine, but as I had 3 HDDs on my system, the Windows had got installed across 2 HDDs with Windows C: Drive on one HDD and the Boot loader on another HDD. But the PC was booting fine and I had no issues. As my Mobo BIOS had option of UEFI, too, I wanted to change it to UEFI boot without re-installing Windows. Then started a whole deal of reading on various forums and I learnt about using MBR2GPT on Windows platform.

MBR2GPT refused to work in my case as it could not find all of the Windows OS on the same HDD. Then I did more reading and learnt that a UEFI boot can be done on an MBR disk and so I created an EFI partition on the MBR disk and got the Windows to load on an UEFI Boot and was happily using the PC until one day, along came version Upgrade to 1909 with no issues.


My troubles started when MS released Cumulative and other updates after upgrade to Ver.1909. The Updates would automatically install and uninstall on endless loops each day. Back to more reading and I found that for some strange reason MS required the HDD of Windows to be a GPT for a UEFI booting system. The Windows updates were failing because of the GUID Type id of the EFI partition. Mine was an EFI partion on a MBR disk which had a different id and NOT the "c12a7328-f81f-11d2-ba4b-00a0c93ec93b" id that WU was searching for. A clean install was now not an option for me , as we had multiple users on this PC and no way that everything on the disks can be salvaged before a clean install.

So then I was forced to use Third party software to convert the HDD to GPT without Data loss and got the correct GUID id for my EFI system partition. All the Windows updates then got installed without any problems, but up came another problem in the form of Update KB 4535996. The system became so slow at Boot after this update that it took 10-11 Minutes to load to the functional Desktop. Back to more reading at various forums and trying all sorts of suggested fixes, I came to know about the MSR which is created automatically when Windows is installed on a GPT disk for UEFI boot. Since mine was a converted GPT disk it did not have the MSR, which someone suggested could cause issues for future Updates and Feature Upgrades.


Then after some more careful reading I created a 16MB MSR partition, but this has NOT solved my slow boot time issue.

Now I have the following queries.


1 The GPT Disk was NTFS formatted and I used Diskpart with the "create msr partition size=16" command line. I did not put the command for FAT32 partition for the MSR like I did when making the EFI partition - Will that be a problem ? What should be the Format of the MSR partition ?


2 Will the Partition order matter ?

Partition 1 Windows 125GB Crive- Partition 2 System 100MB EFI boot- Partition 3 MSR 16MB

I set the WinRE to use the Windows in C: Drive and did not create a separate Recovery Partition.


3 Due to slow boot issues, I even converted the other 2 Data HDDs to GPT - Should I create an MSR on these 2 Data HDDs too ?


My current system partition order is given below:


Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.18363.693]


c 2019 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.


C:\Windows\system32>diskpart


Microsoft DiskPart version 10.0.18362.1


Copyright C Microsoft Corporation.


On computer: PRATEEK-PC





DISKPART> lis dis





Disk ### Status Size Free Dyn Gpt


-------- ------------- ------- ------- --- ---


Disk 0 Online 149 GB 23 GB *


Disk 1 Online 465 GB 2048 KB *


Disk 2 Online 149 GB 1024 KB *






DISKPART> sel dis 0





Disk 0 is now the selected disk.





DISKPART> lis par





Partition ### Type Size Offset


------------- ---------------- ------- -------


Partition 1 Primary 124 GB 101 MB


Partition 2 System 100 MB 125 GB


Partition 3 Reserved 16 MB 125 GB




DISKPART> sel dis 1





Disk 1 is now the selected disk.





DISKPART> lis par





Partition ### Type Size Offset


------------- ---------------- ------- -------


Partition 1 Primary 243 GB 1024 KB


Partition 2 Primary 515 MB 243 GB


Partition 3 Primary 221 GB 244 GB



DISKPART> sel dis 2





Disk 2 is now the selected disk.





DISKPART> lis par





Partition ### Type Size Offset


------------- ---------------- ------- -------


Partition 1 Primary 79 GB 31 KB


Partition 2 Primary 69 GB 79 GB





DISKPART> lis vol





Volume ### Ltr Label Fs Type Size Status Info


---------- --- ----------- ----- ---------- ------- --------- --------


Volume 0 J DVD-ROM 0 B No Media


Volume 1 C NTFS Partition 124 GB Healthy Boot


Volume 2 FAT32 Partition 100 MB Healthy System


Volume 3 E New SATA NTFS Partition 243 GB Healthy


Volume 4 H New Volume NTFS Partition 515 MB Healthy


Volume 5 I New SATA NTFS Partition 221 GB Healthy


Volume 6 F DISK2_VOL7 NTFS Partition 79 GB Healthy


Volume 7 K DISK2_VOL8 NTFS Partition 69 GB Healthy





DISKPART> exit





Leaving DiskPart...





C:\Windows\system32>



Any Help in clarifying the above queries would be of immense help. The PC is booting and working well otherwise.


I now suspect that the problem is with the Update KB 4535996......but I have a separate thread ongoing on that issue

which seems to be going nowhere, at the moment

Thanks !

The Explorer Guy

:)

 

Disk boot order not correct in UEFI

UPDATE: (solved) solution below.

A little different but same problem.

Evo860 (Old W10 Home-1803)
Evo970 (New W10 Pro-1903)

I have no idea where the boot partition is located, but the Uefi is on the Evo860 instead of the new Evo970!
(W10 Pro on Evo960 was a fresh new install)

How to move that, so I can remove the Evo860 from this PC and use it in another?

Any idea out there ?

Alain









- - - Updated - - -

___________________________________________________________


_______________________________S O L U T I O N _______________
Require Minitool Partition (free) here & EasyUEFI (trial) here.

A)
Download, install and launch Minitool Partition (free)
On the drive you want to boot from:
. resize your Windows Partition making 600MEGA free room at the beginning of the disk
. create a 500 MEGA partition fat32 ( you can or not assign a temporary letter).
- remember to hit "APPLY". Changes are not real time and will require a temporary reboot.

B)
Download, install and launch EasyUEFI (trial)
. go to: "Manage EFI Partition" |THEN TO| "Rebuild EFI Partition"
. choose the Disk you want to boot from
. point to the Windows Partition THEN point to the NEW Partition you've just prepared

Hit rebuild .... you are done !!

C)
Now Reboot .... AND ..... In BIOS make your - NEW DISK EFI - the first boot choice
(not EVO970 but "Windows EFI on Evo970" - in my case)

Once in Windows again, using MinitoolPartition,
you can remove the Temporary letter you may had put on the EFI Partition.


......and enjoy!

Alain

 

No "Windows Boot Manager" entry of Boot Configuration of UEFI for Surface Pro 4

The only way I'm aware Windows Boot Manager will not set itself first to boot on a UEFI System is if it was installed in CSM or Legacy Mode. You can tell this in Disk Management by the presence of the legacy Active flag on System partition and lack of an
EFI System partition, or type msinfo in Start search to look in System Information at BIOS mode.

Sometimes the settings in the UEFI firmware are sparse and the only determinative for UEFI install is if the installation media is booted as a UEFI device and all partitions deleted down to Unallocated Space to reset if necessary the disk formatting from
MBR to GPT required for UEFI install.

The normal UEFI settings in BIOS are CSM, Legacy BIOS, UEFI, and under Boot Priority order. If you want to report back those settings choices we can help interpret them.

If the Windows Boot Manager was deleted from the list then you may need to Reset UEFI Firmware to Defaults using that choice wherever it appears - check all tabs.

 

Hard disk partition

You can use diskpart or Disk Management to shrink your Windows partition to make space for other partitions.

If your computer can switch to UEFI BIOS mode, you may want to do that. There is a new utility called MBR2GPT.EXE designed for this, but you have to enable UEFI to be able to boot from a GPT-initialized disk.

You might try running diskpart to check if your disk truly only has one partition or if you are only seeing one and others are hidden. In diskpart, use
list volume to display volumes, or select disk 0 and then
list partition to list partitions.