Can't boot after using DBAN on non-boot hard drive

RavinRivie

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Dec 4, 2009
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Ok, so I've had a third hard drive in my PC which I've left alone in case I needed any information from it after switching to my SSD. I finally realized I don't need to keep it as a backup anymore, and wanted to wipe it and then use it for extra storage for my SSD. So I popped in DBAN and selected just the hard drive I used as a backup for wipe. I selected quick erase and told it to verify. After it finished, I took the disk out and hit reset and then my PC was acting like it didn't know what to boot from.

The SSD has been the boot device all along and was set to boot after the disc drive. I tried switching the boot order but nothing seemed to matter. It wouldn't even boot off the DBAN disc anymore. So I stuck the Win 7 installation disc I had and it booted. When I get to the install windows screen where I can choose the drive, I see the drive I just formatted with unallocated space which looks correct, and I see my SSD with Win 7 on it and my other storage drive which both have free space which indicate to me they were not wiped (thank god).

So now I want to know, first off why am I unable to boot off my SSD? DBAN was told only to wipe the other drive. One caveat possibly, the other drive had Windows 7 on it and I was able to dual boot. I don't see why this should have affected the SSD at all. Second, do I just need to install Win 7 on top of my old install for the SSD? I want to be ABSOLUTELY certain I don't lose any data as I have a large amount of documents which I cannot lose. Before anyone fusses at me about backups - I did back them up, on to the other drive...the second one which I didn't format that I've been using for storage. I just want to be sure if I need to hook these drives up to another PC, save all my vital data, and then install Win 7 on it or not.

I contemplated physically unhooking the drives except the one I wanted to wipe, but I thought it would be a bit excessive so I just verified many times that the drive I selected was the only one I wanted formatted. Partitions are all fully intact on the other drives. Any ideas what I should do here??

I just checked the repair option, no OS shows up when I try it. I really feel like what happened is the MBR for my SSD got wiped, so Windows is probably fine under there. I don't guess there would be any way to fix that? Also my documents and such that are important are not on the SSD they are on the storage hard drive (The one I didn't wipe). That drive had nothing special done to it, as I use it purely as storage for all the stuff that I don't want clogging my SSD up.
 
chances are windows added a hidden boot partition to the hdd you wiped for boot purposes - when you wiped the drive you killed the windows boot side of things

if this is correct all you have to do (and may have to do it twice from what iv seen) is boot from a windows install disc and on the first screen in windows setup select repair - it may automatically detect the issue and resolve it (do it a few times)

post back with results
 

RavinRivie

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Tried that about 6 times now with no positive result. When I go into the repair option, as I said there is no valid install of Windows that appears. When I run the startup repair and look at the diagnosis and repair details, it says for root cause "The partition table does not have a valid System Partition" and then it tries to do Partition table repair, which it says it completes successfully. Agh, why can't startup repair just work?

Ah, that I didn't try. Trying it now and hoping for the best...
 

RavinRivie

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Didn't do a thing. Just attempts to repair, says it was successful, boots into the Windows disc every time after it doesn't boot onto my SSD. Why the $*@# did Microsoft make Windows install something VITAL for running the OS on a NON-PRIMARY drive? That is the most daft thing I have ever heard of. I could remove a storage drive on a whim, so I didn't think me doing anything to it would have affected the operation of the main SSD drive.

If only Windows format would have worked. I would have just done that and left it be. I just wanted to format that drive so it was blank.

EDIT: So I've been trying to repair it manually with the command prompt, following this guide:
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/win7-windows-7-mbr,10036.html

When I run bootrec.exe /RebuildBcd it finds the valid installation of Windows, but as soon as I tell it to add it to the boot list it says "Element not found." I am really starting to hate Windows. Why, why does this happen? It sounds to me like Windows is literally 100% fine, but the ignorant boot process is too stupid to see it.

EDIT 2: This sounds just like me, and this might work for me - but how do I get to diskpart to set the active partition?
http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-system/bootrec-error-element-not-found/cac41df1-0590-4ea3-b7cd-134256e84c8f
 

RavinRivie

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Dec 4, 2009
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Fixed it! That link on the Microsoft community thing combined with the Tom's Hardware guide got me through it. Needed to set the active partition to the drive with Windows on it, then had to reboot and open the command prompt again and run "bcdboot C:\windows /l en-us" and that did it. I'm sitting at my desktop right now. So glad I didn't lose anything, thanks for the helpful tips nonetheless guys - we were definitely on the right track!
 

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