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Hoping to keep my files, otherwise I woulda just full wiped and reinstalled by now.
Windows 8.1 64
i7-4790K (not overclocked, never was)
Z97-HD3 mobo
16BG RAM
One SSD is all I have and I never made a second partition or anything like that but it seems there is one (read later).
I lost internet which happens about once every 2 months, I usually replug the router from the wall and itās fixed in 3 minutes. This time it didnāt. Other PCs on the router have internet. I tried a bunch of basic things like unistall network adapter, reinstall, update driver etc, nothing worked. So I tried REFRESH YOUR PC WITHOUT AFFECTING YOUR FILES. Now I canāt get windows to open.
Iām unsure if it was after or right before losing internet, recently I ran disc cleanup (or defrag or something like that in Action Center toolbar icon, I think it may have been right after loosing internet that I checked action center which I normally donāt but maybe was looking for an internet solution, and noticed it said it wasnāt cleaned in a long time or ever.
I get either of the two titled errors. I tried many video and webpage tutorials but nothing worked.
I also paid $20 for neosmart easy recovery essentials (ERE) which has a whole big article for the LOCKED fix but ERE just gives me a frozen screen and their other cmd commands did nothing. I burned the ERE ISO twice to make sure, and did it on slowest speed, have burned ISOs before (DBAN) no problem but ERE is a frozen screen for me. Also with the ERE disc in, I canāt often turn the PC off (only way I have is to hold power for 3 seconds) and it always reboots itself too if the disc is in.
ERE has a VGA mode I can quickly select, otherwise is chooses the first option and gives a frozen solid grey screen. If I choose VGA it does quickly scroll through a bunch of stuff but then freezes at the end. I gave it about 10 mins frozen then hard OFFād the PC. VGA mode was scrolling a bunch of stuff I donāt understand like āmarker problem from config lineā ācurrent version of pixmanā āX.org X server 1.18.4 release dateāāX protocol version 11ā etc. Anyway, $20 ELE gets horrible reviews but I gave it a shot.
When I boot from the OEM 8.1 disc, I choose REPAIR, not INSTALL (would wipe files).
From there I can TROUBLESHOOT> REFRESH YOUR PC = error: āTHE DRIVE WHERE WINDOWS IS INSTALLED IS LOCKED. UNLOCK THE DRIVE AND TRY AGAIN.ā
TROUBLESHOOT > ADVANCED OPTIONS > SYSTEM RESTORE = error: āYOU MUST SPECIFY WHICH WINDOWS INSTALLATION TO RESTOREā.
TROUBLESHOOT > ADVANCED OPTIONS > SYSTEM IMAGE RECOVERY = error: āCOULDNāT FIND A SYSTEM IMAGEā (I donāt think Iāve made one actually).
TROUBLESHOOT > ADVANCED OPTIONS > STARTUP REPAIR = error: āCOULDNāT REPAIR YOUR PCā.
There also UEFI FIRMWARE SETTINGS but I know nothing about that and didnāt see it mentioned in tutorials.
I almost never had to mess with cmd either but I did a lot of tutorial commands in there but nothing fixes anything.
If I boot without the OEM disc or anything in tray, I get" error āSETTING UP A FEW MORE THINGSā and it freezes at 3% āCOULD NOT COMPLETE INSTALLATIONā.
Somehow a couple times I managed to get that part to go %100 but then it errors at like %95 when finishing up another step.
If I follow this 16:48 video for the DRIVE IS LOCKED error,
Drive Where Windows Is Installed Is Locked UEFI Mode FIX [Tutorial] by MDtech
[MEDIA=youtube]pL1cWjpbYiE[/MEDIA]
I get to about the 5:01 mark ^ but then afraid Iāll wipe something if I proceed farther. It shows I have
Partition 1 Primary 350MB 1024KB
Partition 2 Primary 223GB 351MB
By the way, I canāt ever get cmd to restart the PC, some tutorials say make it restart to complete the commands, but it wonāt restart if I try Shutdown /r, shutdown /r, Shutdown -r, Shutdown /r /f, shutdown /r /f, shutdown -r -f. \ or / etc.
Also, sometimes my cmd starts with C:> or X:\Sources>. I can toggle it by typing C: or X: but unsure if it matters. Some tutorials were showing something like c:\system32 though which I havenāt seen on mine.
This 6:07 vid from LotusGeek āthe drive where windows is installed is locked unlock the drive and try againā
[MEDIA=youtube]P0KvW3x4DIM[/MEDIA]
His cmd is showing system32, again, mine doesnāt.
If I follow his steps, at 2:27 after ābootrec /scanosā it shows I have TWO total identified windows installations. I never willing made a partition or know how, but maybe something recent caused this, if it matters. 1 is D:\Windows, 2 is D:\Windows.old\Windows
Then I do ābootrec /rebuildbcdā, it says ātotal identified windows installations" 1. [1] D:\Windows āadd installation to boot list? YES(Y) No(N) ALL(A)ā.
I tried A, it said ārequested system device can not be foundā. I tried Y, it then shows [2] .old\Windows I select Y again = "The requested system device can not be foundā.I then cmd āexitā as instructed but I donāt have his option to CONTINUE TO WINDOWS āand it should be fixedā.
I did chkdsk c:/f = āwindows scanned the system and found no problemsā.
I really have no idea how to fix this without wiping out all my un-backed up data, if itās even possible. I have my most important stuff backed up but a whole bunch I didnāt. For now Iām a) upgrading to windows 10 and b) backing up things to a cloud/external every week or two.
By the way, I run spybot and defender scans daily and only found one or two things in like 10 years and I havenāt had any malware or virus problems that I know of and hadnāt been downloading or clicking anything out of the ordinary before this happened. But possibly itās some sort of malware?
Please help if you can, thanks!!
Windows 8.1 64
i7-4790K (not overclocked, never was)
Z97-HD3 mobo
16BG RAM
One SSD is all I have and I never made a second partition or anything like that but it seems there is one (read later).
I lost internet which happens about once every 2 months, I usually replug the router from the wall and itās fixed in 3 minutes. This time it didnāt. Other PCs on the router have internet. I tried a bunch of basic things like unistall network adapter, reinstall, update driver etc, nothing worked. So I tried REFRESH YOUR PC WITHOUT AFFECTING YOUR FILES. Now I canāt get windows to open.
Iām unsure if it was after or right before losing internet, recently I ran disc cleanup (or defrag or something like that in Action Center toolbar icon, I think it may have been right after loosing internet that I checked action center which I normally donāt but maybe was looking for an internet solution, and noticed it said it wasnāt cleaned in a long time or ever.
I get either of the two titled errors. I tried many video and webpage tutorials but nothing worked.
I also paid $20 for neosmart easy recovery essentials (ERE) which has a whole big article for the LOCKED fix but ERE just gives me a frozen screen and their other cmd commands did nothing. I burned the ERE ISO twice to make sure, and did it on slowest speed, have burned ISOs before (DBAN) no problem but ERE is a frozen screen for me. Also with the ERE disc in, I canāt often turn the PC off (only way I have is to hold power for 3 seconds) and it always reboots itself too if the disc is in.
ERE has a VGA mode I can quickly select, otherwise is chooses the first option and gives a frozen solid grey screen. If I choose VGA it does quickly scroll through a bunch of stuff but then freezes at the end. I gave it about 10 mins frozen then hard OFFād the PC. VGA mode was scrolling a bunch of stuff I donāt understand like āmarker problem from config lineā ācurrent version of pixmanā āX.org X server 1.18.4 release dateāāX protocol version 11ā etc. Anyway, $20 ELE gets horrible reviews but I gave it a shot.
When I boot from the OEM 8.1 disc, I choose REPAIR, not INSTALL (would wipe files).
From there I can TROUBLESHOOT> REFRESH YOUR PC = error: āTHE DRIVE WHERE WINDOWS IS INSTALLED IS LOCKED. UNLOCK THE DRIVE AND TRY AGAIN.ā
TROUBLESHOOT > ADVANCED OPTIONS > SYSTEM RESTORE = error: āYOU MUST SPECIFY WHICH WINDOWS INSTALLATION TO RESTOREā.
TROUBLESHOOT > ADVANCED OPTIONS > SYSTEM IMAGE RECOVERY = error: āCOULDNāT FIND A SYSTEM IMAGEā (I donāt think Iāve made one actually).
TROUBLESHOOT > ADVANCED OPTIONS > STARTUP REPAIR = error: āCOULDNāT REPAIR YOUR PCā.
There also UEFI FIRMWARE SETTINGS but I know nothing about that and didnāt see it mentioned in tutorials.
I almost never had to mess with cmd either but I did a lot of tutorial commands in there but nothing fixes anything.
If I boot without the OEM disc or anything in tray, I get" error āSETTING UP A FEW MORE THINGSā and it freezes at 3% āCOULD NOT COMPLETE INSTALLATIONā.
Somehow a couple times I managed to get that part to go %100 but then it errors at like %95 when finishing up another step.
If I follow this 16:48 video for the DRIVE IS LOCKED error,
Drive Where Windows Is Installed Is Locked UEFI Mode FIX [Tutorial] by MDtech
[MEDIA=youtube]pL1cWjpbYiE[/MEDIA]
I get to about the 5:01 mark ^ but then afraid Iāll wipe something if I proceed farther. It shows I have
Code:
TYPE SIZE OFFSET
Partition 2 Primary 223GB 351MB
By the way, I canāt ever get cmd to restart the PC, some tutorials say make it restart to complete the commands, but it wonāt restart if I try Shutdown /r, shutdown /r, Shutdown -r, Shutdown /r /f, shutdown /r /f, shutdown -r -f. \ or / etc.
Also, sometimes my cmd starts with C:> or X:\Sources>. I can toggle it by typing C: or X: but unsure if it matters. Some tutorials were showing something like c:\system32 though which I havenāt seen on mine.
This 6:07 vid from LotusGeek āthe drive where windows is installed is locked unlock the drive and try againā
[MEDIA=youtube]P0KvW3x4DIM[/MEDIA]
His cmd is showing system32, again, mine doesnāt.
If I follow his steps, at 2:27 after ābootrec /scanosā it shows I have TWO total identified windows installations. I never willing made a partition or know how, but maybe something recent caused this, if it matters. 1 is D:\Windows, 2 is D:\Windows.old\Windows
Then I do ābootrec /rebuildbcdā, it says ātotal identified windows installations" 1. [1] D:\Windows āadd installation to boot list? YES(Y) No(N) ALL(A)ā.
I tried A, it said ārequested system device can not be foundā. I tried Y, it then shows [2] .old\Windows I select Y again = "The requested system device can not be foundā.I then cmd āexitā as instructed but I donāt have his option to CONTINUE TO WINDOWS āand it should be fixedā.
I did chkdsk c:/f = āwindows scanned the system and found no problemsā.
I really have no idea how to fix this without wiping out all my un-backed up data, if itās even possible. I have my most important stuff backed up but a whole bunch I didnāt. For now Iām a) upgrading to windows 10 and b) backing up things to a cloud/external every week or two.
By the way, I run spybot and defender scans daily and only found one or two things in like 10 years and I havenāt had any malware or virus problems that I know of and hadnāt been downloading or clicking anything out of the ordinary before this happened. But possibly itās some sort of malware?
Please help if you can, thanks!!
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