Update messed up my start files

OK so I was on my laptop last night. Little bit of info on that laptop. For long time now I have had blue screen crashes at startup that I have not been able to resolve so just been dealing with it. Lately the crashes have been foci8ng me to restart for anywhere between 30-60 minutes before the system would start up.

Now NOT asking for support about that issue.

But anyways last night I had a large forced update for windows 11. Had no way to postpone it so I just went ahead and shut down letting it do it's think. When the system got to a certain point it then restarted for the update and started to run through that crash issue I mentioned above. It crashed for a bit and then I got the below screen pop up claiming

\windows\system32\winload.efi

was missing or corrupted and said I needed to restore my system. Because of the crashing issue restore has never worked on my system and when I tried pressing F1 to get into the restore area hoping maybe it might just fix the start issue but when I click that the system restarts gets to the alienware logo then crashes and when it then restarts it then returns me back to the same screen pictured below.

So my question is this. Being I can not get into the system restore area on that laptop, IF I get a USB Flash Drive and make a Windows Boot Disk will that let me repair the start up for the laptop or not? Will it let me replace this missing or corrupted winload.efi file and then get booted back into that system. Don't want to waste money on a disk even if cheap if it's not going to work as if it's not going to work then I need to talk my wife into getting a new laptop.

If you are considering getting a new laptop anyway, why not just reinstall windows 11? Get a new SSD to clean install Windows 11. Then access your files from the old drive using any method you have to read an old hard drive.

badrobot said:

If you are considering getting a new laptop anyway, why not just reinstall windows 11? Get a new SSD to clean install Windows 11. Then access your files from the old drive using any method you have to read an old hard drive.

Click to expand...

well problem is money $$$ if I am getting a new computer it's got to pass the wifes approval and I know she's already not happy that I have to replace this so just hoping I can simply repair the windows start files on that laptop and get back in. I have most the stuff backed up but some things still need backing up. I was sort of mid process when this happened last night

TheLastFrontier said:

So my question is this. Being I can not get into the system restore area on that laptop, IF I get a USB Flash Drive and make a Windows Boot Disk will that let me repair the start up for the laptop or not? Will it let me replace this missing or corrupted winload.efi file and then get booted back into that system. Don't want to waste money on a disk even if cheap if it's not going to work as if it's not going to work then I need to talk my wife into getting a new laptop.

Click to expand...

yes. heres a pretty simplified breakdown of how to

TheLastFrontier said:

well problem is money $$$ if I am getting a new computer it's got to pass the wifes approval and I know she's already not happy that I have to replace this so just hoping I can simply repair the windows start files on that laptop and get back in. I have most the stuff backed up but some things still need backing up. I was sort of mid process when this happened last night

Click to expand...

What i meant was, since you are considering replacing your old laptop, it's as good as abandoning your old Windows OS. Your cheaper alternative is just to buy a new SSD instead of a new laptop and do a clean install. I am suggesting to replace the drive in case you have files that you need to recover from it. Otherwise, just wipe it off and do a clean install.

badrobot said:

What i meant was, since you are considering replacing your old laptop, it's as good as abandoning your old Windows OS. Your cheaper alternative is just to buy a new SSD instead of a new laptop and do a clean install. I am suggesting to replace the drive in case you have files that you need to recover from it. Otherwise, just wipe it off and do a clean install.

Click to expand...

Problem is though going back to the initial issue I was having these crashes the error messages they give are random each time and very confusing if it's hard or software issue. If it's a software issue then all cool the restore should resolve that issue but if it's a hardware issue then it might just mean I am tossing $100 down the drain on a system that's going bad anyways. Not really sure what to make of the crashes as I had this issue like 9 months after buying the laptop, Dell claimed it was either motherboard or memory and changed both under warranty and it seemed to fix the issue but then about 8-9 months later same things started to occur. Oddly enough my prior laptop an HP was having the same issues after X amount of time crashing and same errors. Find it hard to believe that both Dell and HP are selling such bad computers that they cause the same issues which makes me think it might be a Win11 issue as I have seen others with same issues over the time I have been hunting a solution.

But yeah hard to consider replacing just the drive it the entire issues going to remain and from what Dacrone said it seems like it might be able to be fixed from a USB boot drive which I can get under $20 off Amazon and if that works then it would also let me keep backing up files without having to find alternate ways to access that laptops current SSD Drive

dacrone said:

yes. heres a pretty simplified breakdown of how to

How to Boot or Repair Windows computer using the Installation Media

Guide to repair Windows 11/10 installation in-place using the bootable Installation USB or DVD without losing data. Repair UEFI or BIOS bootloader.

www.thewindowsclub.com

Click to expand...

2 other questions. With the crash issues I have been having I have NOT been able to run system restore or start up repair they always return a NO ISSUES FOUND type message. With that in mind will the USB drive find issues that perhaps the laptops hard drive might miss should say some files have been corrupted.

second question before I go an buy a USB Drive is there a way to access the laptops repair page during start up like pressing F1 or F2 to access BIOS is there a key combo that would let me get into the trouble shooting area? I know F8 brings up a menu that have safe mode option (Didn't let me in!!) I thought I remember seeing one some time back but can't find it now.

I would suggest using Rufus to create a bootable USB drive with Hirens BootCD on it. Boot from the drive and run Macrium Reflect. It can fix boot errors on a Windows installation. It also contains many more tools for diagnosing issues with hardware, such as disk scanners e.g. HDDScan, HDTune, AOMEI Partition Assistant.



On the Hirens BootCD page, there will be a link at the top describing how to create a bootable USB drive containing the boot CD using Rufus.

TheLastFrontier said:

second question before I go an buy a USB Drive is there a way to access the laptops repair page during start up like pressing F1 or F2 to access BIOS is there a key combo that would let me get into the trouble shooting area? I know F8 brings up a menu that have safe mode option (Didn't let me in!!) I thought I remember seeing one some time back but can't find it now.

Click to expand...

Most computers have a hotkey one can press during bootup to access the BIOS/UEFI and a one-time boot menu. Without knowing your specific computer model, it would be hard to tell you which key exactly, but it could be F1, F2, F8, F10, or F12. My Dell has an F12 key for the one-time boot menu, for example. It allows you to boot from an external bootable drive and gives the option to enter the BIOS/UEFI as well.

ArazelEternal said:

Most computers have a hotkey one can press during bootup to access the BIOS/UEFI and a one-time boot menu. Without knowing your specific computer model, it would be hard to tell you which key exactly, but it could be F1, F2, F8, F10, or F12. My Dell has an F12 key for the one-time boot menu, for example. It allows you to boot from an external bootable drive and gives the option to enter the BIOS/UEFI as well.

Click to expand...

Oh not talking about a 1 time boot in this case am referring to the blue screen pages that have the restore/repair options.


scroll down to the section Apply restore point from Advanced startup and you will see several screen shots from the trouble shooting pages you can access from start up. Am just wondering if now that the start up is officially broken maybe the repair start up area might actually work this time so was hoping to access this during start up so I can try it and see if it helps at all cause if I order the USB drives it's gonna be a few days stuck like this as not going to over night a $10 item the S&Hing would be ore then the item. So was just hoping there might be a key stroke to access this trouble shooting area during start up that might still hopefully work.

ArazelEternal said:

I would suggest using Rufus to create a bootable USB drive with Hirens BootCD on it. Boot from the drive and run Macrium Reflect. It can fix boot errors on a Windows installation. It also contains many more tools for diagnosing issues with hardware, such as disk scanners e.g. HDDScan, HDTune, AOMEI Partition Assistant.

Rufus - Create bootable USB drives the easy way

Rufus: Create bootable USB drives the easy way

rufus.ie

Hiren's BootCD PE

On the Hirens BootCD page, there will be a link at the top describing how to create a bootable USB drive containing the boot CD using Rufus.

Most computers have a hotkey one can press during bootup to access the BIOS/UEFI and a one-time boot menu. Without knowing your specific computer model, it would be hard to tell you which key exactly, but it could be F1, F2, F8, F10, or F12. My Dell has an F12 key for the one-time boot menu, for example. It allows you to boot from an external bootable drive and gives the option to enter the BIOS/UEFI as well.

Click to expand...

Some good news I found the recovery under F12 but is difficult to get into due to the issues at hand but will give it a try and see if it repairs the start up or not.

ArazelEternal said:

I would suggest using Rufus to create a bootable USB drive with Hirens BootCD on it. Boot from the drive and run Macrium Reflect. It can fix boot errors on a Windows installation. It also contains many more tools for diagnosing issues with hardware, such as disk scanners e.g. HDDScan, HDTune, AOMEI Partition Assistant.

Rufus - Create bootable USB drives the easy way

Rufus: Create bootable USB drives the easy way

rufus.ie

Hiren's BootCD PE

On the Hirens BootCD page, there will be a link at the top describing how to create a bootable USB drive containing the boot CD using Rufus.

Most computers have a hotkey one can press during bootup to access the BIOS/UEFI and a one-time boot menu. Without knowing your specific computer model, it would be hard to tell you which key exactly, but it could be F1, F2, F8, F10, or F12. My Dell has an F12 key for the one-time boot menu, for example. It allows you to boot from an external bootable drive and gives the option to enter the BIOS/UEFI as well.

Click to expand...

OK so I managed to get the repair done but didn't help. At first it said there was a partition issue, but it claimed there was no boot issue or and windows health passed fine it then seemed to indicate that it repair the partition issue then rebooted only to return to the screen in my opening post.

I then said heck with it and tried doing a system restore but it keeps giving me blue screen crashes during the restore process. It will get just so far and crash.

At this point not sure if a USB Boot Disk will be of help or not if the systems going to keep crashing mid process.

TheLastFrontier said:

OK so I managed to get the repair done but didn't help. At first it said there was a partition issue, but it claimed there was no boot issue or and windows health passed fine it then seemed to indicate that it repair the partition issue then rebooted only to return to the screen in my opening post.

I then said heck with it and tried doing a system restore but it keeps giving me blue screen crashes during the restore process. It will get just so far and crash.

At this point not sure if a USB Boot Disk will be of help or not if the systems going to keep crashing mid process.

Click to expand...

Did you run the HDD diagnostics? Those wouldn't tell you if the partition was bad; those would tell you if the disk itself was bad.

So, the system crashed while running from the USB boot disk? That would indicate a more serious issue like RAM, CPU, or motherboard.

ArazelEternal said:

Did you run the HDD diagnostics? Those wouldn't tell you if the partition was bad; those would tell you if the disk itself was bad.

So, the system crashed while running from the USB boot disk? That would indicate a more serious issue like RAM, CPU, or motherboard.

Click to expand...

not the USB I have to order a USB disk if I try that route. This was when I booted up normally but at Alienware logo I was pressing F12 repeatedly and this brought up the boot menu which gave me an open for system recovery. That is where I tried the repairs and system restore and it was crashing during this. So guessing this is all on the laptop hard drive

TheLastFrontier said:

not the USB I have to order a USB disk if I try that route. This was when I booted up normally but at Alienware logo I was pressing F12 repeatedly and this brought up the boot menu which gave me an open for system recovery. That is where I tried the repairs and system restore and it was crashing during this. So guessing this is all on the laptop hard drive

Click to expand...

Okay. I would suggest buying a cheap USB drive. One with 16GB of space should be more than enough and go for $10 on Amazon. You can have it next day if you have prime.