Windows Boot failure

1) HP Pavilion g6-1b67 cl Notebook PC
2) Windows 7
3) "An error occurred while attempting to read the boot configuration data"
4) Stored all information on a USB Flashdrive before wiping computer.
5) Laptop experienced repeated crashes: Went to blue screen and restarted or the computer would simply stop responding and then restart itself. In the most recent instance of this, I was taken to an HP restart screen or something along those lines. I was given about 6 options for what to do. 3 were under immediate help. The first said something along the lines of "load from a previous date" and that had worked when this happened opnce before so I gave that a try again, but it said there were no previous dates to load from. So I backed up my files on a flashdrive and chose the third option which was to restore the computer to factory settings, thinking this would load everything how it was when I first got it. I was dismayed when I turned the PC back on after the process completed and saw the windows boot manager come up. It looks like this:
"Windows failed to start. A recent hardware or software change might be the cause. To fix the problem:
1. Insert your Windows installation disc and restart your computer.
2. Choose your language settings and then click next.
3. click "repair your computer"
If you do not have this disc, contact your system administrator or computer manufacturer for assistance.
File: \Boot\BCD
Status:0xc0000225
info: an error occurred while attempting to read the boot configuration data."
then it says i can press enter to continue or esc to exit, both of which take me back to this screen after the hp logo flashes and the option comes up for the startup menu.
Please help me out, i cant afford to lose another laptop, im a college student so this is vital to me right now.
Thank you,
Josh

please run sytem daignostics in start up menu to check if there are any Hardware problem.
it seems that you need to run system recovery to bring it back to its default settings
▬JM▬

Similar Messages

Windows 7 Ultimate x64 BOOT Failure on HP ProBook 450 G1...

Dear forum viewes and experts...
I hope you can provide me with your insights on this problem i am having...
I bought a new laptop HP ProBook 450 G1 (i5 4200M, 8GB RAM, 1TB HDD, 2GB ATI Graphics card). The laptop comes with DOS free operating system.
I installed Windows 7 Ultimate from ISO file on a USB stick, and then activated the Windows.
After updating all drivers and having a clean device manager with no hardware left as unknown, i figured out that the laptop fails to make a cold BOOT.
After several trials, and installations. the problem remained the same. I changed the installation to Windows 8.1 Pro and the problem remained the same.
On cold booting, the laptop after showing HP logo in start-up starts to show Windows Logo animation but in Super Slow Motion for about 6-8 minutes, then followed by strange sounds which force me to shut it down by pressing power button for long until it shuts down.
After huge number of trail and error, i found out that if I entered BIOS Setup (by pressing esc then F10) and then exiting it without doing any changes or even without saving, the Laptop boots Windows 7 very smoothly (in about 15-18 seconds) and works fine. it also can make endless number of smooth restarts without any problem.
If it is shut down then turned on, the boot failure is the outcome.
The only way to make a successful cold BOOT (i.e after a shut down) is to enter BIOS setup mode (by pressing esc then F10), then exiting it within seconds without changing anything or saving, then it boots smoothly.
I tried MBR fixes through command prompt in Recovery Mode, I tried to change booting to make it boot as LEGACY or UEFI Hybrid. The BIOS is updated to the latest frimware on HP website verion 1.2 dated 15 July 2014.
NO HELP.....All lead to the same disappointing result.
Any idea whether this is a hardware issue/software issue/BIOS issue?
Your insights will be highly appreciated

Hello,
I'd ask in the
Windows 7 forum on Microsoft Community.
As the Microsoft Community is on a different platform, we cannot move the question for you.
Once there, click on Participate near the top of the screen, and select 'Ask a Question' or 'Start a Discussion':
Karl
When you see answers and helpful posts, please click Vote As Helpful, Propose As Answer, and/or Mark As Answer.
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Boot failure following Windows 8.1 update. shows reason: irql_not_less_or_equal

Hi,
I have the dreaded BSOD with irql_not_less_or_equal boot failure.
The PC was running Vista when bought, which was subsequently upgraded to Windows 8. This was done via an online purchase & download of the Windows 8 Upgrade, so I do not have any installation media. I have also updated (again online, so no physical media)
to Windows 8.1
I have recently had to shut the PC down (it usually stays on all the time), but now it refuses to boot, going straight to the new style BSOD, showing 'irql_not_less_or_equal', which then restarts in to the system restore menu.
I have tried to remove some peripherals - removing the video card (now using the display adapter on the MoBo), a USB 3 card & a USB head-set dongle - which has improved the situation a little - it now boots to the log-in page (sometimes), but will
BSOD after about 10 seconds, regardless of whether I am fast enough to log-in, or not.
I have tried (from the System Restore menu) to do a restore to a previous state, but it doesn't seem to be able to find the restore points.
Note, the BSOD occurs if I boot into 'Safe' Mode, or do a normal boot.
The bottom line is:...
I can't boot to Safe Mode, get to any system maintenance tools, so I can't disable/uninstall any drivers.
Windows 8 & the 8.1 update were purchased online & downloaded, so no boot disk(s).
The recovery points I have made do not seem to be accessible.
Any advise on how to proceed?
cheers
Paul

now boots to the log-in page (sometimes), but will BSOD after about 10 seconds, regardless of whether I am fast enough to log-in, or not.
That should be enough time to get to the Shift-Restart option. <eg>
Since you can see what you're doing you don't even have to do the backwards method that I was long proposing so that users who were trying to do this in the dark would be able to bypass their password field. But maybe using a set of Backtab (Shift-Tab)
Shift-Space would be more efficient anyway?
Here is an example of an explanation of the technique:
http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/37eff8a6-74a3-4775-90d7-e0aa86c68424/windows-8-black-screen-at-boot?forum=w8itprogeneral#0dc40edd-4e3b-466b-b4af-37c532eb844a
<quote>
In order to try to avoid hitting the Password field in this uncertain state I suggested using Backtab (e.g. Shift-Tab) to do the navigation. Fortunately, the pressing of Shift- would solve the problem of whether you were on the Lock screen or already on
the Login screen. So the iteration would be Shift-Tab, Shift-Space (Fortunately, the Restart item is at the bottom of the Shutdown menu.)
</quote>
HTH
Robert Aldwinckle

HP Probook 450 G1 Boot Failure....!!

Dear forum viewes and experts...
I hope you can provide me with your insights on this problem i am having...
I bought a new laptop HP ProBook 450 G1 (i5 4200M, 8GB RAM, 1TB HDD, 2GB ATI Graphics card). The laptop comes with DOS free operating system.
I installed Windows 7 Ultimate from ISO file on a USB stick, and then activated the Windows.
After updating all drivers and having a clean device manager with no hardware left as unknown, i figured out that the laptop fails to make a cold BOOT.
After several trials, and installations. the problem remained the same. I changed the installation to Windows 8.1 Pro and the problem remained the same.
On cold booting, the laptop after showing HP logo in start-up starts to show Windows Logo animation but in Super Slow Motion for about 6-8 minutes, then followed by strange sounds which force me to shut it down by pressing power button for long until it shuts down.
After huge number of trail and error, i found out that if I entered BIOS Setup (by pressing esc then F10) and then exiting it without doing any changes or even without saving, the Laptop boots Windows 7 very smoothly (in about 15-18 seconds) and works fine. it also can make endless number of smooth restarts without any problem.
If it is shut down then turned on, the boot failure is the outcome.
The only way to make a successful cold BOOT (i.e after a shut down) is to enter BIOS setup mode (by pressing esc then F10), then exiting it within seconds without changing anything or saving, then it boots smoothly.
I tried MBR fixes through command prompt in Recovery Mode, I tried to change booting to make it boot as LEGACY or UEFI Hybrid. The BIOS is updated to the latest frimware on HP website verion 1.2 dated 15 July 2014.
NO HELP.....All lead to the same disappointing result.
Any idea whether this is a hardware issue/software issue/BIOS issue?
Your insights will be highly appreciated

Can you post a screenshot with the PCI\VEN hardware ids of the bluetooth device? The image below shows an example of what we need to identify the device properly.
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HELP! How can i restore/recover files from Bootcamp with Boot Failure - Missing operating system error?

Hi,
I am having a few problems with bootcamp on my imac. When i tried to move the bootcamp partition on windows 7 into free space, it crashed and turned off. Ever since i have had the error 'Missing operating system' and it fails to boot. I have some very important files on the bootcamp partition. Is it possible to recover these files or even to restore the bootcamp partition to it's original state? I do not have a backup of my bootcamp partition. Another problem i have is that ever since i tried to expand my macintosh HD partition into free space, when i hold alt while booting up (to choose which partition to boot like i normally do), the bootcamp partition has stopped appearing. This means that i cannot even boot the windows 7 bootcamp partition anymore!
So basically here are my 2 questions:
How can i restore/recover files from Bootcamp with Boot Failure - Missing operating system error?
How can i make the Bootcamp partition appear in Startup Disk and when i hold the option key while starting up my computer to allow me to boot windows 7?
Any solutions are very much apreciated!
Thanks!
I know that bootcamp (disk0s4) hasn't been fully deleted since it appears in disk utility (i cant do anything to it though)
And here is the error i see when i try to launch bootcamp (back when i was actually able to boot up bootcamp to the error screen)

WinClone 3 is OS X and saves Windows image it makes for restore - that should work but you will have to try and you would need to make a new image unless it also works with a native Windows system restore image. It is now supported and has come a long way.
http://www.twocanoes.com/
Paragon Clone OS works and does disk-to-disk clone just like CCC you end up with two bootable drives. But does not work with your setup. It would let you clone and move your Windows install to an SSD or another disk drive though and be bootable.
During its clone process it checks for errors which is very helpful and lets you know - something CCC and others should adopt more of.
http://www.paragon-software.com/downloads/demo.html
I wish for our/my sake you had re-read and rewritten the long 'story' and broken it into a brief list of facts we needed.
OS X
Windows
Backup (though external is much safer) and you want bootable OS X clones as well as TimeMachine
https://support.apple.com/kb/HT1427
https://support.apple.com/kb/HT1553
There are a number of things to do like chkdsk and others as well as Windows DVD to do automatic system repairs and find out why.
AppleHFS - the abilty to mount and read HFS volumes can be notorious.
I would rearrange and redo your storage setup and how you use the 4-5 internal hard drive bays.

Windows install failure

Hello
Im on a Imac 27" 3.5Ghz i7 with 1TB Fusiondrive.
Im trying to install Windows with bootcamp but after restart of partition and d/l of the windows latest windows 7 stuff it fails to install
Says that the partition is in wrong format.
Windows cant install on gpt is one error to.
Tried everything been following alot of guides on youtube and the manual to bootcamp.
But i see this is a pretty common failure, sadly i need windows also for a few programs i´ve got Parallels but not all of them are working on that...
Any suggestions ?
Any help is apriciated!
Thanks alot
Steven

I was able to install Windows 7 Home on my 1TB Fusion Drive. I do remember running into a problem or two though. You might want to ask TekServe how they're going about it. Are they creating a Windows boot disk on a USB Flash drive or trying to do it from a USB CD drive? I'm not sure if it absolutely has to be done one way or another. I did it with a USB flash drive, but I got errors at first until I unplugged all of the USB devices attached to the computer except for the USB boot drive.

Disk Boot Failure, Insert System Disk and Press Enter

I have been experiencing an intermittent disk boot failure for the last few months on my HP Pavilion Slimline PC. At first, it would occur once every week or two, typically when the computer would boot up after being in hibernation. After turning off the computer and turning it back on, everything worked normally. Within the last month, the failure began occurring with more regularity.
This week, I started receiving the error every time the computer would boot from hibernation. I went into the BIOS and saw that the system was not recognizing the hard drive. I tried changing the boot priority to boot from the HDD first, but to no avail. Today, the system worked as usual until I performed a restart, and it has yet to work again. Additionally, the performance has taken a nose dive over the last week (slow processing, programs not responding, etc.).
System Specs:
HP Pavilion Slimline s3710t PC
250 GB SATA Western Digital HDD (Caviar Blue)
Intel Pentium Dual-Core Processor
Windows Vista Home Premium (32-bit)
3GB DR2-800 MHz SDRAM
I have read through many technical forums, including HP’s, and followed all of the advice. I have again changed the boot priority to HDD first, restored the default settings, etc. The only drive I can find listed is the DVD drive on the unit, which is listed as the second drive. There is no first drive listed in the main tab of the BIOS CMOS Setup Utility.
I attempted to run a system recovery, but it is not even possible. Upon running the diagnostics, it of course mentions that there is no hard drive connected. Upon entering the boot menu, it also only lists the DVD drive.
My next course of action was to remove the side panel and reseat the connections on the hard drive, as well as the connection to the motherboard. This was also unsuccessful, and I have not been able to boot up the computer again today.
The computer itself is 1.5 years old and this is the original hard drive that shipped with it. I have never opened the computer, prior to today. The symptoms started a few months ago, just outside of the warranty period.
Based on the forums I have read, it all signs are pointing to a bad hard drive. This is hard for me to believe, as the computer is relatively new and does not get much use. The use it does get revolves around email and Internet access, as well as use of Microsoft Office.
As you can imagine, I am not happy about the prospect of having to buy a new hard drive, as well as pay for the data recovery on the original drive. I hope that someone at HP can come up with a better solution, as a 1-year life on a hard drive is pretty pathetic.
Thanks,
JR

HI JR,
You situation does not sound good if the PC doesn't recognize your hard drive.
Boot into the bios and run some bios hardware diagnostics.
Try clearing the CMOS.
Try this procedure:
Unplug the PC and open it up. Clean out all the dust. Carefully remove and replace all the cables going to the motherboard one at a time. Do the same for the memory dimms and the video and sound cards if you have any. You might want to buy a can of compressed air to blow the dust out of the CPU heat sink. Plug your PC back in and give it a go.
HP DV9700, t9300, Nvidia 8600, 4GB, Crucial C300 128GB SSD
HP Photosmart Premium C309G, HP Photosmart 6520
HP Touchpad, HP Chromebook 11
Custom i7-4770k,Z-87, 8GB, Vertex 3 SSD, Samsung EVO SSD, Corsair HX650,GTX 760
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Windows 7/8 UEFI/Legacy mode, MBR/GPT

Windows boots up then just a black display toshiba satellite L455-S5009 laptop

Windows boots up then just a black display toshiba satellite L455-S5009 laptop Serial #XXXXXXXXX cant get any help fro holding down FN key while hitting F5 key only can see little white circles, I am using my HP laptop to submit this, please help this Toshiba only lasted 6 months!!!
[Moderator edit to remove serial number.]

NO help. They would not or could not assist me in diagnosing the issue . they were wanting me to send it in for diagnosis >$200. The forum shows many laptop experience this issue. I needed help to diagnosis the failure a common one in the forum NO display but turns on, no hdd. light only ac indicator power indicator and charge indicator. neither cap.lock nor number lock leds will toggle.
Just needed to know if processor, video processor or main mother bd.
I get same symptom with hdd. disconnected . I get same symptom with ram removed and with just the primary in , I also swapped rams into the primary receptacle one at a time with same symptoms also tried external monitor with no signal From the computer stepped Fn F5 & Fn F1. could not price a mother board .nether . Basically, I'd say technical help was no help!

Disk Boot Failure [solved]

I'm installing arch on a rebuilt system, but I cannot get it to boot. I have pared the system down to a a SCSI card, a video card, a single hard drive, an IDE CD, a SCSI tape drive, and a floppy. I have tried my standard installation partitioning scheme, and the automatic version.
No matter what I do, while the system seems to install correctly, when I reboot I get a Disk Boot Failure.
I've zeroed the drive, I've tried an fdisk /mbr, I've run a Maxtor burn-in test which came back fine. I'm convinced it isn't the drive. The standard menu.lst uses root (0,0) and the kernel in /dev/discs/disc0/part3 after an automatic installation. I mounted the /boot partition set up by the auto install, and the grub directory and files are there.
What am I missing?
Last edited by timm (2009-05-04 22:11:42)

I think it's solved.
Everybody who was mentioning the BIOS got me looking in there, but I found nothing out of the ordinary. I decided to try to install Windows 2K to see if that would boot, which it did flawlessly. I reinstalled arch, and go the disk failure. Back to the BIOS.
This is an IDE hard drive; the only thing SCSI is the tape drive.
What I found was that the access on the hard drive was set to Auto, which I had seen before but didn't think to be a problem. I tried changing that to LBA (which is what I thought Auto would do on a drive like this), and suddenly arch comes up just fine.
I have a couple of RocketRaid cards that I'm installing, and will be playing around with the SCSI as well. I'm going to play with things a bit more, but unless I can make it fail with some other tweaking, that BIOS setting appears to have been the problem.
Thanks to everyone for their help!

Partitioning ruined windows booting

I have installed windows using Bootcamp, but then I created more partitions using Mac OS X.
Now I cannot boot into windows again. The partition is there, but it won't show up when I hold (Options). Only the Mac OS shows up.
I went to System Preferences->Startup Disk and selected Windows to boot, and still won't work.
How can this be fixed ?
Macbook Pro
Mac OS X Snow Leopard
Windows 7 Ultimate.

Happens all the time.
There is a limit to where a Windows boot partition can reside and all the side effects of making changes. ... because you assumed it would work and went "outside the draw by the dots" lines in the Boot Camp Guide.
http:www.apple.com/support/bootcamp has link to PDF guide and support articles.
this is one case where the results are almost always failure. And plan on what to do, when it doesn't work so you can restore - something that even using Mac OS should be seen as mandatory and not to be taken lightly.
"I created more partitions" doesn't help or tell anyone how (shrink, split, expand, used commercial program, used gpart, used a linux tool), as well as created HFS volumes? more Windows NtFS volume? Apple will only say that Boot Camp Assistant is the only supported method to create a Windows partiton (Paragon CampTune can also) doesn't change anything.
Did you use iPartition? I wonder if CampTune can redo/undo.
Clone Mac HFS and undo those changes. Use OS X DVD and Disk Utility as well as any of the programs to clone Mac.
How To clone
Using Cloning as a Backup Strategy
Windows OS has to be on #4 or less partition number (and GPT and HFS as well as EFI partitions have to be accounted for as well, and Windows 7 will normally create its own 100MB "System Reserved" (which is the active boot partition for Windows).
Backup beforehand. Then you can restore and recover.

Boot Failure Issues

Thanks for any help that may come of this question. I'm not very fluent in the technical nitt gritty of computer hardware/software, but I've been using computers for years and I catch on quick. This goes for the "boot" problem I am getting.
My sytem crashed the other day after the northbridge cooling fan failed. I just finished replacing my northbridge cooling fan with a Vantec Iceberg and I tried to start up the computer. I did have to partially remove the motherboard to do this, so I had to disconnect several cables include the hard drive. I do believe, however, that all cbale s have been properly reconnected. When I power up, I see the color MSI logo pop up, it then appears to start "booting up", or whatever the next process is called. In doing so it gets to a point where it says:
Client Mac Add 00 0C 7615 4C E6
No Boot filename received
Disk boot failure, insert system disk and press enter
Not knowing what to do, I found a floppy MSI Bios Update Disk that I had made at some point and inserted this ( a mistake perhaps?) It flashed the bios, finished its work, and the problem still persisted. At one point I was able to get into a screen that appeared to show a boot order, and it had the CD ROM, another drive (forget which one), and LAN. But I did not see the hard drive listed. Am I correct in assuming that the issue is that the motherboard is trying to boot up the sytem, which it would normally do from the hard drive, however it cannot locate it?
I have started the process of searching these forums, and I found one that seemed to have the same issue but I had a little trouble understanding what they were getting at. Any help that can be offered would be greatly appreciated.

Quote from: swat148 on 19-October-06, 06:10:38
BOS, thanks for the help. The corrective action wasn't quite what you outlined, so hopefully you'll read this and just confirm that my actions were okay. I entered into a screen (forgot how I got there, F8?) that dealt with arrays. What is an arrary and what is the significance? One of the boot messages had mentioned that there was no array defined. So in this screen I defined the 1 array as my hard drive. And that was it. After that the system would load into windows? Was this a correct action to take? Because the BIOS had my HDD0 as the first boot source, but the error still persisted till I defined an array.
Also you asked me what the temp was. I don't know how to locate a temp specific to the northbridge chip. My PCAlert 4 shows a CPU temp of 50C and the system temp is 39C.
Also, in the manual for the motherboard, I noticed a FAQ that said you shouldn't connect a Vantec fan directly to motherboard because it draws to much power. So I connected right the PSU. This however, prevents PCAlert4 from being able to monitor its speed. Is this a problem? Is there a way around it?
Last thing, regarding my post to the fan thread, do you see a problem with the fan only set up on the chip?
Again, thanks for all the help.
"BOS, thanks for the help. The corrective action wasn't quite what you outlined, so hopefully you'll read this and just confirm that my actions were okay. I entered into a screen (forgot how I got there, F8?) that dealt with arrays. What is an arrary and what is the significance? One of the boot messages had mentioned that there was no array defined."
yep thats other possiblities, for some reason your fastrack was lost array and need to be reconfigured. after seening the message: "No array defined" you should press "CTRL+F" to entire in a utility and to re-setuped like you already do. you have done correct.as boot priority HDD0 or SCSI.
"What is an arrary and what is the significance?"
SATA disk on your mainboard will be recognised only when its defined in array via Onboard Promise Controller.
"Also you asked me what the temp was. I don't know how to locate a temp specific to the northbridge chip. My PCAlert 4 shows a CPU temp of 50C and the system temp is 39C."
you can use Everest to observe it: (https://forum-en.msi.com/index.php?topic=100852.0) Example:
"Also, in the manual for the motherboard, I noticed a FAQ that said you shouldn't connect a Vantec fan directly to motherboard because it draws to much power. So I connected right the PSU. This however, prevents PCAlert4 from being able to monitor its speed. Is this a problem? Is there a way around it?"
that is the correct way. no FAN RPM monitoring is not problem. you have done best.
"Last thing, regarding my post to the fan thread, do you see a problem with the fan only set up on the chip?
Again, thanks for all the help."
nope should be fine if NB temp remain acceptable, if temeperature is normal. but with other copper vantec base should be lowest. basicly if your NB temp is good/low there is nothink to worry.
you are welcome mate.

DISK BOOT FAILURE: PLEASE INSERT SYSTEM DISK....

Hi
I have exhausted two full days on the following problem so I would greatly appreciate some help. The problem I am experiencing is that the disk will not boot on its own. I receive the "DISK BOOT FAILURE: PLEASE INSERT SYSTEM DISK...." error when starting up. I have run chkdsk, i have run Western Digital Diagnostics for Dos (quick test) and no problems come up with the drive. I have also jumpered pins 5 and 6 to force the drive to run at SATA-I speeds. Now here's the curious part: The disk boots up and functions absolutely perfectly IF and ONLY IF, the bios is set to boot from my IDE drive. Now on the IDE drive I have a boot.ini file set up to allow me to boot the SATA drive instead. Using this work around (i.e. boot from IDE, select SATA drive from boot menu) the drive seems to work just fine. However if i change the bios back to boot from the SATA drive (and therefore use its own boot.ini) I receive the error again and the boot will not continue.
Here is my set up:
MSI K8T Neo2-F v2.0 motherboard (with latest BIOS).
Athlon 64 X2 4200+ dual core CPU
1024GB DDR 400 RAM
1 Western Digital 120GB IDE HD running on primary master.
1 Pioneer DVD-108 DVD-RW running on secondary master.
1 Western Digital 250GB (WD2500KS) running on SATA1.
Nividia GeForce 6800 running on AGP.
M-Audio Audiophile 2496 PCI
Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS PCI
Originally the system was as above without the new WD2500KS drive. I then bought the new SATA drive and installed windows to it with the intention of clearing windows from the original IDE and making it a storage drive. The above workaround is how I completed installation of Windows XP and installed my other programs, otherwise when rebooting during installation the disk would fail again.
Another issue is that Windows will NOT designate the SATA as drive C. When disconnecting the IDE, the SATA will become "c:" but as soon as the IDE is plugged back in, it immediately claims "c:" again and the SATA becomes "d:". This is ascertained from running the Recovery Console and using 'map' for example. It is important that I get this to "c:" as I have programs which appear to look for files by an absolute path and will not find them on "d:".
I have also tried to 'fixmbr' and this is the only time I have seen any curious message. Using the workaround the disk works fine. But when I tried to 'fixmbr', the system warned that the disk had a non-standard boot record (or something to that effect). But in any case, boot seems fine so long as we're not booting it directly.
Finally, I should confirm that the BIOS is set to run the SATA in IDE mode and not SATA (although as a sanity check I have run it in RAID and the result is the same).
I have no idea at this stage whether the problem lies with the SATA drive or the motherboard. I have sent a copy of this to WD "for further troubleshooting", and am posting a copy here for any advice on the mobo side of things.
Many thanks

Thank you for your reply. You are right, I've just resolved the problem today and discovered that this was the case.
To close the topic and leave advice for anyone else facing similar difficulties I will sum up the progress since the initial post.
Having tried absolutely everything else, I thought "what happens if i make this sata c:?" so I decided to edit the registry and force a drive letter change to ensure that my SATA was "c:". After having done this the SATA for the first time successfully booted to the boot menu! However when loading up into Windows it kept hanging. So next I thought all I need to do is a repair install now, I disconnected the IDE to leave the SATA only and attempted this. Unfortunatley the repair install also kept hanging. The Microsoft support page detailing how to force the drive letter change does warn that doing so can mess everything up unless the problem occurred in some specific circumstances.
So a new install was in order. I hooked up the IDE again and booted from it, backed up all my files to the IDE, and then disconnected it again. Then booted from a Western Digital diagnostics disk and zero filled the SATA - this was more for my own sanity so as not to worry about dodgy MBR's and what not. Then booted from WINXP CD and formatted and reinstalled fresh.
Install was successful.
Hooked up IDE externally to dump back my backed up files. Then deleted the IDE's partition and formatted it. Powered down, connected the IDE internally again - booted from SATA successfully (now on c:)... the IDE was no longer recognised as a "system" disk in Disk Manager, so I gave it a drive letter and hey presto we're business again!! One SATA system disk on drive c: and one IDE storage drive!
SHORT VERSION: If you are adding an SATA drive to an IDE set up, and want the SATA to be your OS disk, unhook all the IDE's first... if the target drive is not in isolation when installing Windows, all kinds of problems can ensue which are very difficult to correct after the install.

Boot Failure. SMART Hard Disk Error. Imminnent failure detected. Hard Disk 301.

Hi,
Have a boot failure as above. Laptop purchased 02/23/11. Bios date 02/14/11 Verson F.26. Product ID XZ298UA#ABA. Serial{Removed for privacy}. Need to replace hard drive?
Thanks.

Hi,
You could try removing and then re-seating the Hard Drive, but it does appear to have failed and will need to be replaced.
Your best option is to contact HP and arrange to have the Hard Drive under warranty.
If you live in the US, contact HP Here.
If you are in another part of the world, start Here.
Regards,
DP-K
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System boot failure after upgrade from linux3.13.8-1 to linux3.14.6-1

I have tried to update the kernel again from 3.13 to 3.14 again, but no luck.
My arch system boot failure with black screen, tried [ctrl]+[alt]+[F1-6] and nothing happen, no any recure shell prompt out.
Then I boot with kernel debug parameters
systemd.log_level=debug systemd.log_target=kmsg log_buf_len=1M
althrough the screen was black, when I reboot and chroot into my system,
I entered the following to find any error messages, please see the link below:
journalctl -b -0 >> ~/3.13_no_problem.log
journalctl -b -1 >> ~/3.14-6_nodebug.log
journalctl -b -2 >> ~/3.14-6_debug.log
3.13_no_problem.log: http://pastebin.com/EQ2Mucq8
3.14-6_nodebug.log: http://pastebin.com/18TRZVRp
3.14-6_debug.log: http://pastebin.com/0QZJBPnf
In both 3.14 journal messages, I found some similar error message:
Jun 15 14:37:47 arch-desktop kernel: [drm:atom_op_jump] *ERROR* atombios stuck in loop for more than 5secs aborting
Jun 15 14:37:47 arch-desktop kernel: [drm:atom_execute_table_locked] *ERROR* atombios stuck executing D218 (len 62, WS 0, PS 0) @ 0xD234
Jun 15 14:37:55 arch-desktop kernel: [drm:atom_op_jump] *ERROR* atombios stuck in loop for more than 5secs aborting
Jun 15 14:37:55 arch-desktop kernel: [drm:atom_execute_table_locked] *ERROR* atombios stuck executing D218 (len 62, WS 0, PS 0) @ 0xD234
Jun 15 14:38:00 arch-desktop kernel: [drm:cypress_dpm_set_power_state] *ERROR* rv770_restrict_performance_levels_before_switch failed
Jun 15 14:38:01 arch-desktop kernel: [drm:atom_op_jump] *ERROR* atombios stuck in loop for more than 5secs aborting
Jun 15 14:38:01 arch-desktop kernel: [drm:atom_execute_table_locked] *ERROR* atombios stuck executing D218 (len 62, WS 0, PS 0) @ 0xD234
Jun 15 14:38:07 arch-desktop kernel: [drm:atom_op_jump] *ERROR* atombios stuck in loop for more than 5secs aborting
Jun 15 14:38:07 arch-desktop kernel: [drm:atom_execute_table_locked] *ERROR* atombios stuck executing D218 (len 62, WS 0, PS 0) @ 0xD234
Jun 15 14:38:13 arch-desktop kernel: [drm:atom_op_jump] *ERROR* atombios stuck in loop for more than 5secs aborting
Jun 15 14:38:13 arch-desktop kernel: [drm:atom_execute_table_locked] *ERROR* atombios stuck executing D218 (len 62, WS 0, PS 0) @ 0xD234
I searched on internet, I think this is caused by my graphic card(ATI 5750), but I have no idea to solve it
I don't know my system boot failure due to these error or another things.
my PC specs:
motherbroad - gigabyte GA-P55A-UD3 (bios ver - F11)
cpu - i5-750
display - ati 5750
os - arch 64bit
Currently, I have downgraded back to 3.13.
I hope someone can give me some idea,
Thanks
Last edited by samtai (2014-06-17 12:17:02)

As there are errors associated with ntpd, I would temporarily disable the ntpd service and also ipv6.
If they are not the only problem, at least your logs would be easier to examine for other problems.

Efibootmgr & gummiboot replaced UEFI entry for Windows Boot Manager

TLDR
I am now in Windows 7 and dual boot with Arch is working fine.
But before I update Arch, I would like to understand what happened, as in why adding an efibootmgr entry for Arch replaced/deleted the Windows Boot Manager entry although I followed the BG.
The status of my UEFI boot menu was, before the installation of Arch:
Windows Boot Manager
AHCI HDJ... (hard drive 1)
AHCI ST... (hard drive 2)
While working through the BG, I decided to use gummiboot=> https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Be … #Gummiboot. So:
pacman -S gummiboot
gummiboot install
pacman -S efibootmgr
gummiboot install
[some error ocurred, as mentioned in red box]
efibootmgr -c -L "Gummiboot" -l /EFI/gummiboot/gummibootx64.efi
nano /boot/loader/entries/arch.conf
title Arch Linux
linux /vmlinuz-linux
initrd /initramfs-linux.img
options root=/dev/sdb3 ro
[CTRL + X, Y, Enter]
exit
umount /mnt/{boot,home,}
reboot
I then saw a new list of the UEFI boot order:
Gummiboot
AHCI HDJ... (hard drive 1)
AHCI ST... (hard drive 2)
Chose Gummiboot and it brought up a gummiboot menu with entries
Arch Linux
Windows Boot Manager
EFI Shell something
Selected Arch Linux and it went to a message something along "boot device ' ' not found" and I was in a shell which was, I think, rootfs.
I rebooted via the button on my desktop and out the Arch Linux USB drive back. After mounting the partitions:
gummiboot remove
efibootmgr
[0000: Windows Boot Manager
[0001: Arch Linux
[0002: AHCI HDJ...
[0003: AHCI ST...
exit
umount /mnt/{boot,home,}
reboot
Now I booted into a black screen with white text which said something "Reboot and select proper Boot device"
=> Inserted Win 7 64-bit DVD, repaired the boot sector. Rebooted, saw I had these entries again:
Windows Boot Manager
AHCI HDJ... (hard drive 1)
AHCI ST... (hard drive 2)
The boot into Windows worked fine. Rebooted, chrooted into my install again and:
efibootmgr
[0000: Arch Linux
[0001: Windows Boot Manager
[0003: AHCI HDJ...
[0003: AHCI ST...
efibootmogr -b 0 -B
Then I used the EFISTUB method:
efibootmgr -c -L "Arch Linux" -l /vmlinuz-linux -u "root=/dev/sdb3 ro initrd=/initramfs-linux.img"
efibootmgr
[0000: Windows Boot Manager
[0001: Arch Linux
[0002: AHCI HDJ...
[0003: AHCI ST...
exit
umount /mnt/{boot,home,}
reboot
On reboot, 'Windows Boot Manager' was again replaced by 'Arch Linux'.
=> Inserted Win 7 64-bit DVD, repaired the boot sector.
Rebooted, I have now Windows Boot Manager + Arch Linux and dual boot works now.
My questions:
What is going on with efibootmgr replacing/deleting the Windows entry? Is there something wrong with my UEFI menu?
In connection with 1., I would like to sync the EFISTUB Kernel (wiki entry) before I run pacman -Syu. Can I do that now?
Can I uninstall gummiboot now?
Last edited by jones (2013-07-11 12:30:55)

henrik wrote:So in light of your post, I decided to ditch EFISTUB + gummiboot and try out GRUB. Thanks for clearing it up a bit. Which is what confuses me a great deal more, as GRUB/gummiboot obviously do not meddle with Microsoft's EFI files. Right?
EFI relies on two things to boot:
Boot loader program files on the ESP (or occasionally elsewhere).
NVRAM entries pointing to the boot loader files.
Your own problems seem to be with the NVRAM entries, not with the boot loader files themselves. Unfortunately, managing those NVRAM entries has proven to be problematic because of bugs in specific EFI implementations, bugs in efibootmgr and other tools that manipulate the NVRAM entries, poor documentation, and other factors.
To answer your question, though, no boot loader should mess with another's files. Such things can happen, though. The number of bugs that cause Microsoft's boot loader (EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi) to be treated deferentially have provoked some tools to use it as a target location for other boot loaders. (Ubuntu's Boot Repair tool does this in a rather overzealous way. So does my own rEFInd installer script, but only under certain narrow circumstances.) Also, the EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi file is a special case; it's the fallback bootloader that's used when NVRAM entries are missing or don't work, and various boot loader installation procedures place copies in that location, so it can be overwritten and could contain just about anything.
However, the whole thing happened again with GRUB. So I did the whole "repairing Boot problems" with the Windows DVD rescue thingy again and deleted all non-Microsoft files from the EFI partition, /dev/sda1.
Then I formatted / (root) and installed arch again and followed the Beginners' Guide which suggest mounting /dev/sda1/ to /mnt/boot (in contrast to the GRUB entry where the ESP should be mounted to /mnt/boot/efi).
I strongly advise against doing a complete re-installation just to overcome a boot loader problem. Instead, figure out what the problem is and fix it. Doing a complete re-installation is not likely to fix anything, and depending on precisely how you do it, you could end up with a more complex problem. The reason is that the re-installation is not likely to erase the NVRAM entries from the old installation, so you could find that you've got additional stray NVRAM entries. If you do happen to fix the problem by re-installing (say, because you selected a different installation option), you're not likely to know what changed to fix the problem, so you could end up in the same boat should you need to re-install again in the future.
But it did not show this line
Found Windows 7 (loader) on /dev/sda1
... how come??
I've given up trying to understand GRUB's configuration scripts. You could try creating an entry manually by editing /etc/grub.d/40_custom; or you could forget about using the GRUB scripts and create a hand-crafted grub.cfg; or you could forget about using GRUB at all. I'm not a fan of GRUB, so my personal choice is the final one.
So for all the headache and time ... should I delete the EFI partition and recreate it maybe? I think it's possible using the Windows 7 DVD.
But somehow using efibootmgr on my UEFI list somehow invalidated the Windows entry.
Reviewing your posts, it seems that you want to use the EFI stub loader directly, but you're having problems with that because when you add it to the NVRAM entries, Windows drops off your boot manager's boot options. The obvious solution to this problem is to forget about adding the EFI stub loader directly to the NVRAM entries, and instead add a boot manager that can handle either a Linux kernel or the Windows boot loader. (IMHO, this is the superior solution anyhow; I disagree with the Arch wiki's emphasis on using the EFI stub loader "raw.") It seems you were trying to do this with GRUB but had problems booting Windows. Earlier you tried gummiboot but had problems booting Linux. My suggestion is to either go back to gummiboot and fix its problem or try rEFInd. The "device not found" error you reported with gummiboot is usually caused by either a missing (or incorrectly-specified) initrd file or by an incorrectly-specified "root=" option passed to the kernel. Check those possitilities, and if you need help, report what happens in more detail. If necessary, take a digital photo of the screen and post it here. (Make sure it's legible, though!)
You can try rEFInd with minimal disk by using a CD-R or USB flash drive image. Boot with that and your NVRAM and ESP won't be affected at all. If you can get rEFInd working from the flash drive, you can then install it to your hard disk and it should continue working. Note that you probably won't be able to boot Linux directly from rEFInd with your current configuration without adding a "root=" specification to the kernel command line. You can do this by hitting F2 or Insert twice rather than launching Linux by pressing Enter. Alternatively, you can create a refind_linux.conf file in the directory that holds your kernel. That file's contents are described in the rEFInd documentation.

Windows Boot failure

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