Windows 10: Macrium Reflect v.8 rescue media trashes boot sectors and I'm stuck

Panasonic Toughbook SX2 running Windows 10 Pro (probably last updated a couple of months ago, but I can't tell now) I recently upgraded from Macrium Reflect (backup program) v.7 to v.8. I immediately created a new rescue media on a USB stick. It uses a Win/PE version. Naturally I wanted to test it, I rebooted into the Bios (F2 on startup) to make the USB stick the first boot source. I restarted up the machine and it booted in the rescue environment. That worked. Then I rebooted back into the Bios with the rescue USB stick still plugged. No reason, I just didn't think to pull it. I meant to reset the Bios to boot first from the hard drive but accidentally put optical drive into the boot sequence. This didnt work, of course. Then I pulled the Rescue USB stick. When I tried to reboot and reset the bios for the internal SSD drive, I got a blank screen from the get-go. I couldn't even get into the Bios with F2 any more. UPDATE TODAY (8/12/21): Today I can get into the bios with F2 and without having the USB stick inserted, though its still listed as the only boot device. When I reinserted the Rescue USB stick with the hard drive still selected as the first or second in boot order, I'd get a blue screen (don't remember which color) with a message that Windows\System32\winload.exe was defective or missing. It said to run the recovery disk, which I don't have. If I did not have the Rescue USB stick plugged, Id just get a totally blank screen, not even into the Bios if I pounded on F2. Then I removed the hard drive from the boot choices and was able to startup, hit F2, and get back to the bios. I was also able to boot into the Macrium Rescue environment. I tried the option to fix Windows boot problems. It didn't make any difference. Eventually I tried restoring the C: partition from a year old image file. Made no difference. If the Rescue USB stick isnt inserted, I get a blank screen on startup. If it is inserted but the hard drive is listed anywhere in the boot order, I get an error screen. Its been corrupt/missing file or just a generic error. So the question is, what to do now? It appears that all the files on C: (system and programs) and D: (data) are still there. I can see them from a command prompt in the Rescue environment. It seems like there should be some way to rebuild the MBR or whatever else is bad. When I search for a solution, there are hundreds. But Im not clear which if any I could even get to run in the first place. It would have to be a program I could copy to the Rescue media and run from a command prompt. Or it could be a program that would create a new, bootable USB stick on a different machine. One of those costs $150! Then Id still have to see if my laptop would boot from this USB stick. There is also a hidden partition that according to the bios can be used to wipe the hard drive and restore to the factory setup. I guess that could be a possible last resort #1. It would leave me with a four year old version of Win 10 and nothing else. If it did actually restore the boot sectors as well, then I might be able to restore the one year old C: and D; partitions from the backup. But what if it left the boot sectors still trashed. (Rhetorical question) As a last resort #2, Id be willing to just do a clean Windows install and lose all the other programs on my C: drive, if theres a way to do it given the mess my ssd drive is and my not knowing how to get a clean install onto a USB stick. I assume there are other threads on the board that could get me started with this. Help, please !

:)

 

Macrium Reflect /rescue media

Creating rescue media - KnowledgeBase - Macrium Reflect Knowledgebase

 

Use Macrium Reflect Rescue Media to Fix Windows Boot Issues  

A really good question deserving a bit more in-depth answer. A short answer is it makes restoring boot menu on a dual / multi boot system a piece of cake, one simple command to restore it as it was instead of manually adding / changing everything.

Let's use my actual boot menu as an example:




The easy way to restore my boot menu when I have been forced to reset boot records with Macrium Reflect is to restore a boot menu backup as told in tutorial (Part 1. to export / backup boot menu, Part 3. to restore it). One command to restore it fully:

In Command Prompt:

bcdedit /import X:\BootMenuBackup

Or in PowerShell:

cmd /c 'bcdedit /import X:\BootMenuBackup'

If I hadn't exported boot menu, I had to restore it manually:



(Click screenshot to enlarge.)

1. Add Windows 10 Education on physical drive W: to boot menu
2. Change its name (as shown in boot menu) to W10 EDU
   
3. Add Windows 10 PRO on a mounted virtual hard disk file (drive I: when mounted) to boot menu
4. Change its name to W10 PRO (VHD)
   
5. Change current OS boot menu entry name to W10 PRO (Hyper-V)
   
6. Copy the current OS boot menu entry to new entry W10 PRO (VMware)
   
7. Disable hypervisor in the copied new entry to allow running VMware on same machine and installation already running Hyper-V
8. Make current OS (my main OS, W10 PRO with hypervisor) default entry in boot menu, the one booted if user selects no OS within given time (by default 30 seconds)
9. Set boot menu display order. To do that I open another PowerShell / Command Prompt to list all boot menu entries with simple bcdedit command to get and copy identifiers of all added operating systems. Last OS added is by default always {default}, current OS you are using is {current}, all other entries are identified with their hexadecimal GUID

Not shown in screenshot: between steps 8. and 9. I launched Macrium Reflect to add Macrium Rescue environment as fifth entry to boot menu.

Notice that in steps 2. and 4. I used the same identifier {default} for two different operating systems when changing entry name. This is possible because by default the last OS added to boot menu gets identifier {default}; adding W:\Windows in step 1. made it default, then adding I:\Windows in step 3. made it default.

Exporting boot menu when it is as you prefer, then importing it with one command when need arises is much faster and easier.

I hope the above answers your question.

 

Use Macrium Reflect Rescue Media to Fix Windows Boot Issues  

Thanks, @Kari! Yes, it does, and very nicely laid out. For me, would save the hassle of the renaming of the OS names. Otherwise, you need a cheat sheet to know what "Windows 10 (on partition 6)" means.

Slightly OT....how did you get such a nice pic of your Boot Manager screen without a camera?

my ugly one: