Win 8 no longer boots - Drive Letter Issue/boot partition?

[spb]

This is all in the command prompt via the win 8 boot options "troubleshooting" menu.

I need not manually assign the Win 8 partition a drive letter here. The only time i ever did that,earlier in the thread, is in Win 7 because that hides the windows 8 partition. No need to do that manually anywhere else.

To answer your question, yes the directory structure is intact and sound. Seems to be no issue there, have run chkdsk and no errors too.

Here's what the bcdedit gives me. It does actually look correct here because if i browse the drives in the command prompt, D: is the Windows 7 partition and E: is the Win 8 partition. Again, slightly odd to me as thats not the configuration that i used to have in windows 8 when it worked and booted properly. But as far as this command prompt goes, what bcdedit tells me and how are the drives are configured DO match up.

Windows Boot Manager
--------------------
identifier {bootmgr}
device partition=C:
description Windows Boot Manager
locale en-US
inherit {globalsettings}
integrityservices Enable
default {default}
resumeobject {aa157ba3-5eab-11e2-9c83-82293678c432}
displayorder {default}
{6cfb7b1e-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a}
toolsdisplayorder {memdiag}
timeout 30

Windows Boot Loader
-------------------
identifier {6cfb7b1e-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a}
device partition=D:
path \Windows\system32\winload.exe
description Windows 7
locale en-US
inherit {bootloadersettings}
recoverysequence {6cfb7b1f-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a}
recoveryenabled Yes
osdevice partition=D:
systemroot \Windows
resumeobject {6cfb7b1d-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a}
nx OptIn

Windows Boot Loader
-------------------
identifier {6cfb7b1f-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a}
device ramdisk=[D:]\Recovery\6cfb7b1f-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a\Winre.wim,{6cfb7b20-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a}
path \windows\system32\winload.exe
description Windows Recovery Environment
inherit {bootloadersettings}
osdevice ramdisk=[D:]\Recovery\6cfb7b1f-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a\Winre.wim,{6cfb7b20-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a}
systemroot \windows
nx OptIn
winpe Yes

Windows Boot Loader
-------------------
identifier {current}
device ramdisk=[E:]\Recovery\6cfb7b23-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a\Winre.wim,{6cfb7b24-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a}
path \windows\system32\winload.exe
description Windows Recovery Environment
locale en-US
inherit {bootloadersettings}
displaymessage Recovery
osdevice ramdisk=[E:]\Recovery\6cfb7b23-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a\Winre.wim,{6cfb7b24-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a}
systemroot \windows
nx OptIn
bootmenupolicy Standard
winpe Yes

Windows Boot Loader
-------------------
identifier {default}
device partition=E:
path \Windows\system32\winload.exe
description Windows 8
locale en-US
inherit {bootloadersettings}
recoverysequence {current}
integrityservices Enable
recoveryenabled Yes
allowedinmemorysettings 0x15000075
osdevice partition=E:
systemroot \Windows
resumeobject {aa157ba3-5eab-11e2-9c83-82293678c432}
nx OptIn
bootmenupolicy Standard

Resume from Hibernate
---------------------
identifier {6cfb7b1d-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a}
device partition=D:
path \Windows\system32\winresume.exe
description Windows Resume Application
locale en-US
inherit {resumeloadersettings}
filedevice partition=D:
filepath \hiberfil.sys
pae Yes
debugoptionenabled No

Resume from Hibernate
---------------------
identifier {aa157ba3-5eab-11e2-9c83-82293678c432}
device partition=E:
path \Windows\system32\winresume.exe
description Windows Resume Application
locale en-US
inherit {resumeloadersettings}
recoverysequence {current}
recoveryenabled Yes
allowedinmemorysettings 0x15000075
filedevice partition=E:
filepath \hiberfil.sys
bootmenupolicy Standard
pae Yes
debugoptionenabled No

Windows Memory Tester
---------------------
identifier {memdiag}
device partition=C:
path \boot\memtest.exe
description Windows Memory Diagnostic
locale en-US
inherit {globalsettings}
badmemoryaccess Yes

EMS Settings
------------
identifier {emssettings}
bootems No

Debugger Settings
-----------------
identifier {dbgsettings}
debugtype Serial
debugport 1
baudrate 115200

RAM Defects
-----------
identifier {badmemory}

Global Settings
---------------
identifier {globalsettings}
inherit {dbgsettings}
{emssettings}
{badmemory}

Boot Loader Settings
--------------------
identifier {bootloadersettings}
inherit {globalsettings}
{hypervisorsettings}

Hypervisor Settings
-------------------
identifier {hypervisorsettings}
hypervisordebugtype Serial
hypervisordebugport 1
hypervisorbaudrate 115200

Resume Loader Settings
----------------------
identifier {resumeloadersettings}
inherit {globalsettings}

Device options
--------------
identifier {6cfb7b20-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a}
description Ramdisk Options
ramdisksdidevice partition=D:
ramdisksdipath \Recovery\6cfb7b1f-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a\boot.sdi

Device options
--------------
identifier {6cfb7b24-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a}
description Windows Recovery
ramdisksdidevice partition=E:
ramdisksdipath \Recovery\6cfb7b23-be64-11e1-8152-8e2dbccb549a\boot.sdi

 

[Saltgrass]

I agree, it appears to be correct... Now, if you could get the command to run from within Windows 7 I would feel better.

If selecting the Windows 8 boot option goes to a black screen, does it show any other indications. If there were to be a blinking cursor in the upper left, that might mean the boot is being directed to the wrong location. If it is just black, it might be trying to sort out some driver.

If the mouse cursor was still operational, it might be having a problem with the video output and has switched to another output or resolution.

I can't think of a reason putting the drive in a caddy might have cause any of these problems.

 

[spb]

No there's no other indications when it goes blank. No Blinking cursor, no mouse pointer. The hard drive light flickers a bit then the screen stays blank. If I leave it for a few minutes the backlight of the screen dims and lights up again when i press a button, so i guess its not completely frozen. Thing is this exact thing also happens if I try and boot into safe mode.

Thing is everything worked fine before i took the hard drive out of the laptop. Could just be a coincidence. The fact that it doesnt work in safe mode either makes me think its something other than a driver problem but i dont know.

Thinking now a reinstall of windows is the only option? But is there a way I can do this without losing my user files etc?

 

[Saltgrass]

A Windows 8 Refresh is supposed to restore the system while leaving your personal files intact. I am not sure of exactly what it does?

Were there any restore points available from the Windows Recovery Environment?

 

[spb]

A Windows 8 Refresh is supposed to restore the system while leaving your personal files intact. I am not sure of exactly what it does?

Were there any restore points available from the Windows Recovery Environment?

No actually. Which i find odd because it should automatically save restore points right? I have had this windows 8 install for at least 6 months, so a bit odd.