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My laptop comes with 1TB spinning hard disk and 16 GB SSD for Caching. The SSD caching was not working after doing a clean install of Windows 10 Pro.

While trying to enable SSD caching, I decided to format/clean the M.2 SSD. I thought it won't cause any trouble to the Windows 10 installation since the OS is installed on the 1 TB spinning drive.

However, after cleaning the SSD in Diskpart, Windows doesn't boot anymore. I believe this is because Windows 10 stored the boot files on SSD (not sure). After some research online, I had a hunch that I deleted the EFI partition and that is causing the boot errors.

While going through many solutions, I came across Repair Windows 8.1 UEFI booting messed up by Easus Partition Manager? Error Code: 0xc0000225

Many websites mention the same method/steps to fix this problem. So I gave it a try. I was successful until the step of assigning a unique letter to the drive (G in my case) However, I am stuck at the next step. I am.unable to copy the boot files using the command:

cd /d G:\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\

When I try the above command, it says

The system cannot find the path specified

I tried multiple variation of the commands but none of them helped.

Any help please? Re-installation is not an option unless it's the only wayto fix this

Is there any other solution for the boot problems I am facing?

Pictures of command window:

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  • You say "after cleaning the SSD in Diskpart"... so what "cleaning" did you perform exactly? What did you change that created this problem—you should know this? Aug 9, 2017 at 1:39
  • I misunderstood some of the tutorials online about enabling SSD caching. I used diskpart clean command to delete all the partitions on the SSD Aug 9, 2017 at 1:44
  • @McDonald's Sorry, I accidentally submitted the previous comment even before I mentioned the details. I used diskpart clean command to wipe the SSD. The commands used were, list disk, select disk 1, list partition, clean Aug 9, 2017 at 1:49
  • @McDonald's Yes, I followed the steps you mentioned there. However the command for copying boot files is not working. (See the pics attached above) I am not sure if am doing something wrong or that command needs to be modified in someway for my setup? Aug 9, 2017 at 1:58
  • You mentioned you deleted your EFI system partition and I assume G: is a new one you just created? In that case why do you think there would be any files in it anyway? To reinstall Windows Boot Manager, bcdboot is the tool to use. bcdboot C:\Windows /s G: /f UEFI
    – Tom Yan
    Aug 9, 2017 at 2:17

1 Answer 1

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You should search for such a small ~ >250 MB Fat32 formatted drive (on Linux it is called sda 1) and clone it separately, in addition to the main drive. In your case, it is the 260 MB drive:

enter image description here

If that does not help:

  • You might also assign a new boot sector with a Windows 10 GPT UEFI (without CSM) ISO created with Windows Media Creation Center. The boot stick gerated from that ISO offers bootsect in /Boot/bootsect.exe. I tried this when everything was lost anyway, do not try this if you still have other options. You then need to search for the drive letter that is your Windows drive, e.g. d:, and assign the starting boot sector. I got it reassigned, but having a completely destroyed UEFI drive with lost files, it still did not help me. It might still help you. Very dangerous and not recommended of course.

enter image description here

Thus, your following comment is probably right:

I believe this is because Windows 10 stored the boot files on SSD (not sure). After some research online, I had a hunch that I deleted the EFI partition and that is causing the boot errors.

Here is how I found out about it (optional read)

I had a similar issue, I had damaged the UEFI (without CSM) boot drive.

  • I did not know that Windows drive was scattered into so many partitions, thus I expected every available drive on one screen. This is of course wrong, you need to switch to an external drive on the upper right, but this is not a Linux GParted tutorial. This made me think that only the small one in the list could be the card, but instead I only saw the Windows "Basic data partition" of 236,5 GB. Please understand that it was my first time using Linux GParted:

enter image description here

Summing it up, I split a 261 MB drive (sda1) into 220 MB for Linux (sda1) and 41 MB for Data (sda5) and destroyed the UEFI Bios with that and which would not make any sense at MB level anyway.

I tried to get the UEFI (without CSM) files back with a Linux undelete software. Getting those UEFI files back from the now-split 261 MB drive should be possible. I tried it with testdisk and also found something, but it was a bit fiddly and I just had a new laptop, thus I decided to format and re-install everything from a "UEFI (without CSM) + GPT Windows 10 boot stick" from scratch instead.

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