[TechSupportNC]

I've been a computer tech for right around 30 years now and was excited when Windows 10 came out and I saw it had built-in startup troubleshooting tools. However, out of the hundreds of computers that have been unable to startup and all you can reach is that blue screen with the options, not once have any of the options worked.

Every time it says it failed with an error box. Startup repair always comes back and says it was unable to fix anything. System restore points always fail. I can open up the command prompt but commands like SFC /scannow will always come back with an error message stating the command could not be performed. Uninstall Windows updates I must admit did work one time and boy was I shocked, but only ever once would it actually make it anywhere (not that it fixed the issue). Reset my PC? If it even gets past the "getting things ready" (usually hours later), it will stay at 1% for hours and then eventually say it failed.

Every computer, including the laptop I'm working on right now, that is stuck in this "diagnosing PC..." and then to the troubleshooting tools blue screen loop, has to be formatted and have Windows 10/11 reinstalled to get it working again.

I have never had it be successful at doing any of the startup troubleshooting commands.

Is there some trick to this? Is there something I need to do in order to get it to work?

One thing I'm thinking about is at this point you have an X: and a C: drive, both with Windows on it. The X: is just this startup repair environment and C: is where the real windows is located.

Is the troubleshooter trying to execute these commands on the X: drive instead of the C: drive? Do I need to somehow change the target to C: in a command prompt somehow? I do remember that being an option in SFC and other commands where you can specify which drive contains the windows you are trying to fix.... so is this why it never works for me? Or is it something else? Or is this what most of you also experience?

Thank you for taking the time to read this and hopefully you can help me get some use out of the startup troubleshooting for Windows 10/11.

- TechGuyNC

 

[spunk.funk]

It depends on the health of the Windows drive. If it has bad sectors and starting to fail, then nothing will work until the drive is replaced.
Other than that, Startup Repair works sometimes and so does System Restore, you can restore to a previous image. You can also do the Advanced Startup, where you can load Low Resolution for Video issues, or Safe Mode with and without Networking among others.

if running the Command Prompt in the RE, you must first change the drive letter before you run any commands. X:\ is a Virtual Drive used for troubleshooting. Also, Drive letters change in the RE. The Windows drive may have another drive letter. All commands should be run from the Windows drive.
At command prompt (x:\sources) type this exactly as written:
bcdedit |find “osdevice” (Must inc ” and the |), the | before Find is the Upper case \ key) press enter. This will tell you what drive letter the OS is on. It may not be on the C: drive.

Once you have determined the drive letter, then at the X:\.sources directory, type the drive letter (C: or whatever) and press enter. At that prompt type the various commands like chkdsk /R for one and press Enter

 

[coldiron]

Does Windows Startup Recovery Options Ever Work?
So far not for me as well!

 

[Gary R]

Depends on what the problem is.

Don't go confusing ... "doesn't fix the problems I've tried it on" ... with ... "doesn't fix any problems whatsoever".

Like most "auto fix" tools it is limited in it's capabilities. It's better than nothing, but a good deal short of ideal.

Windows is different for everyone, since everyone configures it differently, and runs different apps and programs to everyone else. These can and do affect the types of problems you'll experience, and the likelihood (or not) of you being able to resolve them with a simple "one click" tool.

 

[jonnyb]

It depends on the health of the Windows drive. If it has bad sectors and starting to fail, then nothing will work until the drive is replaced.
Other than that, Startup Repair works sometimes and so does System Restore, you can restore to a previous image. You can also do the Advanced Startup, where you can load Low Resolution for Video issues, or Safe Mode with and without Networking among others.

if running the Command Prompt in the RE, you must first change the drive letter before you run any commands. X:\ is a Virtual Drive used for troubleshooting. Also, Drive letters change in the RE. The Windows drive may have another drive letter. All commands should be run from the Windows drive.
At command prompt (x:\sources) type this exactly as written:
bcdedit |find “osdevice” (Must inc ” and the |), the | before Find is the Upper case \ key) press enter. This will tell you what drive letter the OS is on. It may not be on the C: drive.

Once you have determined the drive letter, then at the X:\.sources directory, type the drive letter (C: or whatever) and press enter. At that prompt type the various commands like chkdsk /R for one and press Enter

I am also confused about the X:\ So, should we type in CD: C:\ or CD:/ or just type in C: ??? When I am in this command prompt and I see the X:\ I just type Chkdsk C: /f /r and hope for the best.

 

[spunk.funk]

at the X:\.sources directory, type the drive letter (C: or whatever) and press enter

As stated, Type C: and press Enter. If C: is the drive letter that Windows is on in the RE, many times the Windows drive letter changes in the RE. The Find "OSdevice" command in Post #2 is the easiest way to find out what drive letter Windows is on. Or you cam change to each drive letter and type DIR and press Enter. If that directory has Windows in it, you can type any of the commands.

At the C:\> prompt type chkdsk /R. Check Disk will usually ask to Reboot the computer to start Check Disk at bootup.

 

[SoCalBryan]

Rarely have the built-in startup tools worked for me. System Protection is and has been a joke since its initial release. I have never been able to use it to "RECOVER" my computer to an earlier state to fix start up issues, ever. Waste of drive space.

The multiple partitions that window 10 installs IMO is the main cause of Windows OS problems. If the Windows OS loses its link to the boot drive (e.g. startup drive), none of the startup or system tools can be used to fix startup issues, especially the BSOD's.

Just stupid to separate the boot files from the OS files (C:\Windows) on a home computer. Most, if not all, users will never need this type of security.

To fix this on my PC's I format the drive first to use all the available space, usually a small C: drive for the boot, OS files, and application files, then D: drive for storage, see pic, before installing Windows 10.

In the pic, you can clearly see that there is no more boot drive.

I don't want a separate boot partition. I want my Boot drive to be the same as my Windows drive, as in the earlier releases of Windows.

Formatting first has solved most all the Windows crashes that I was having since Windows 10 was released.

Before I started formatting first, Windows 10 would eventually crash itself to the point that none of "built-in startup troubleshooting tools" could fix it. Most crashes wouldn't even give me a BSOD the computer would just lock up.

Formatting the drive first solved these weird crashes.

Even after utilizing all the existing drive space by pre-formatting the drive before installing Windows 10, Windows will still install a recovery partition. Freaking chaps my behind that Microsoft does this.

So was able to get rid of boot partition but still Windows 10 will put a 518 MB recovery partition on a drive that had no available space during installation. It will unilaterally make this recovery partition.

 

[spunk.funk]

In the standard old Windows MBR Bios, you can do what you are doing, just have one partition, with the old MBR Initialized drive. .
If you are going to install Windows 10 or 11 to a UEFI Bios with a GPT Initialized drive, Windows will create a hidden FAT32 EFI partition that has the boot files on it. This explains it What Is the EFI Partition in Windows 10 and Should You Delete It?

The best way to do a Clean Install on a UEFI Bios with a GPT Initialized drive is in the Windows Installer, in Where would you like to install Windows, Delete ALL Partitions leaving the drive Unallocated Space, you can create a Data Drive partition if you like, Select the remainder of the Unallocated Space and press Next. Windows will create the required partitions, format them during the Install. This will create a Hidden Recovery partition in case you want to go back to the previous version of Windows. Of course, after install, you can delete this partition and Extend the C: drive into the small 500MB space, which is so small it isn't worth the effort and that partition will be recreated on the next big Windows Update.

With the low cost of HDD'/SSD's these days it really isn't worth it to create a Data Partition on the same drive as Windows is on, If that Disk fails, you loose Windows and the Data partition. But it's your computer, do it the way you like.

 

[TechSupportNC]

It depends on the health of the Windows drive. If it has bad sectors and starting to fail, then nothing will work until the drive is replaced.
Other than that, Startup Repair works sometimes and so does System Restore, you can restore to a previous image. You can also do the Advanced Startup, where you can load Low Resolution for Video issues, or Safe Mode with and without Networking among others.

if running the Command Prompt in the RE, you must first change the drive letter before you run any commands. X:\ is a Virtual Drive used for troubleshooting. Also, Drive letters change in the RE. The Windows drive may have another drive letter. All commands should be run from the Windows drive.
At command prompt (x:\sources) type this exactly as written:
bcdedit |find “osdevice” (Must inc ” and the |), the | before Find is the Upper case \ key) press enter. This will tell you what drive letter the OS is on. It may not be on the C: drive.

Once you have determined the drive letter, then at the X:\.sources directory, type the drive letter (C: or whatever) and press enter. At that prompt type the various commands like chkdsk /R for one and press Enter

Thanks for the reply.
What I usually do is try to change to every drive letter to see if there is more than just c: and x: and if there is look for windows directories on the various drive letters. If there are windows directories on more than just c: and x: I will run the sfc or chkdsk or whatever command on every drive letter containing a windows directory so thanks for that command so I can determine the correct drive. I didn't know there was a way to do that.
Still, I always get something along the lines of "Windows Recourse Protection was unable to process your command" (I wish I could remember the actual error), and that appears after the percentage gets to 100% but it seems to go to 100% much faster than when it is really working.

I've never been able to get SFC to work inside of startup repair troubleshooter. The startup repair tool always quickly tells me it was unable to find the problem, so fast that I can't imagine it did much of anything. All of this quick to error tells me that none of these commands are getting past one of the first steps and they act like they can't even find windows to attempt the repairs. The only exception to this is the "reset my PC" and it doesn't matter if you choose keep my files or not, it will sometimes immediately error like the others or more rarely it will say something like "preparing..." for quite awhile then get to the screen where it is resetting, never get past 1% and then finally error with no changes ever being made.

All of this has happened on 100% of the computers that I have had this issue with and the number is getting up there. I've seen computers stuck in this "diagnosing your pc..." then into startup troubleshooter loop going on around 100 times or so now and this is ALWAYS the result I get when trying to use any of the provided fixes with one exception... I did get it to undue a windows update one time... but it usually can't do that either. The restore points have never worked. Again, the error comes on pretty quickly when trying. Just some generic error like "System restore was unable to perform the, blah blah blah..." or sometimes it will say "System restore was unable to restore the registry (or some app like onedrive, whatever was first on it's list)" and it hits this error very quickly.

It just seems to me that there must be a way to make these tools work when they return these errors so fast. All of these different laptops and PCs can't all have bad sectors or the same issue that is causing this to happen. It really feels like the troubleshooter tools are looking in the wrong place, like x:\windows instead of c:\windows when executing these commands and the files they need are not on the x: drive so they error really quick. I could try "set windir=C:\Windows" from the command prompt next time and see if that changes anything but you would think there would be no way the troubleshooter could be that dumb. I'm not even sure if windows environment variables are usable during the startup troubleshooter.

I just wonder if there isn't some way to get these tools to work. Find out why I keep getting the same error messages no matter what the problem is and find a way to make them work.

 

[TechSupportNC]

Depends on what the problem is.

Don't go confusing ... "doesn't fix the problems I've tried it on" ... with ... "doesn't fix any problems whatsoever".

Like most "auto fix" tools it is limited in it's capabilities. It's better than nothing, but a good deal short of ideal.

Windows is different for everyone, since everyone configures it differently, and runs different apps and programs to everyone else. These can and do affect the types of problems you'll experience, and the likelihood (or not) of you being able to resolve them with a simple "one click" tool.

Thank you for the reply. Please read my reply to your reply like I'm just explaining some things and not trying to prove your statement wrong or like I'm being a jerk or something. Tone is hard to convey, ya know...

I've run into this "diagnosing your pc..." and then into startup repair troubleshooter loop roughly around 100 times in this past year on various laptops and PCs. It is a pretty common occurrence. I do not think all of these computers have had the same issue. The thing that caused this has been from Windows Update failure to uninstalling Norton 360, to corrupted system files to just out of the blue for no apparent reason. Out of such a sample size, you would think the tools would at the very least have different errors or be unsuccessful in differing ways (or sometimes actually work), but the errors are always the same... well 99% of the time, they come back quickly with the error as if they never tried anything, like they can't even find windows.

There must be something set wrong or missing or something that might be fixable to make these tools work when this happens. Had they ever even worked one time to fix a single computer for me I wouldn't be here posting this, but not a single one of the various options ever worked except for the one time it did undo a windows update for me (but didn't fix the startup issue). While it can find the restore points about 50% of the time, there have been times it can't but using the command prompt cmd "rstrui" with some parameters that I had found online but forget, caused it to pop up and find the restore points. I had to point it to the correct path I believe.. or run it from c: instead of x: I can't remember all it had me do but it made it work where the troubleshooter could not find any restore points. Although despite finding the restore points, it still was unable to restore to any of them, just like when the troubleshooter can actually find the restore points, it always quickly errors and comes back with something like "System restore was unable to find the registry files (or onedrive, or some other app)" or just a generic failed error message.

This makes me think that the troubleshooter can't find c:\windows or something dumb like that. System restore almost always works from inside of windows and I would be willing to bet these points would be restorable if windows was able to load. I think there might be a way to get startup troubleshooter to work right. Might be something as simple as setting windows environment variable to tell it where windows is located or copying some system files over to the x: drive or something. There is something silly going on that is making these tools pretty much useless. At the very least for me but I'm betting I'm not the only one having these results. At least that is what it feels like to me. I could be wrong but seems like something simple and silly is broken here. Clearly, you would think something like that would not go unnoticed and be fixed with an update and that is why I feel like I'm probably wrong.... unless everyone is just going along and thinking "well I'm sure these tools work sometimes" and everyone is sticking their head in the sand and I'm the only one in the whole world realizing this issue!

Okay, probably not, but it couldn't hurt to try some things to get these tools to work.

Ideas from you guys who are probably more knowledgeable than me about command prompt commands that might be able to set things right or maybe some other idea.

Why can't SFC /scannow ever run? Why does it always say "Windows resource protection cannot perform the requested operation." every time? When looking that up I see a multitude of possibilities.. but this one pops out at me.. "If the SFC command fails, it may be due to its lack of accessibility of the WinSxS folder. In that case, you have to change the security description of the folder manually." So it suggests typing "ICACLS C:\Windows\winsxscommand" but it says to reboot and I don't think that is going to stay... at any rate it seems like this issue might be related to all of the other tools.. "lack of accessibility" of certain folders...

I think I'm really onto something now. I will be the fixer of windows startup troubleshooter! I mean.. WE will be the fixer of windows startup troubleshooter cause I really need you guys to help me out here. I'll totally give you all credit in the movie they make about me.

If what I wrote about SFC and how to fix it gives you any ideas of why I might be having the issues with startup troubleshooter that I'm having on all these machines, well please let me know. Don't go and try to be the hero yourself now and take all the glory. Fame is really a burden, you don't want that.

Thank you and everyone for your time and lovely replies.

 

[spunk.funk]

The SFC /scannnow command only works when booted Into Windows. To run the SFC command in the RE type the following Bold Command

sfc/scannow /offbootdir=c:\ /offwindir=c:\windows press enter, (change the drive letter to the directory that \windows is in) However, Before doing that type the following Bold Command

DISM /Online /CLEANUP-IMAGE /RestoreHealth and press Enter. When that completes run the above SFC command.

 

[Gary R]

One of the main problems with Windows' repair tools, is the rather "cryptic" error messages they usually throw out, if they fail.

SFC /scannow does run on most people's machines, and does a pretty good job of repairing "corrupt" system files.

However, it can only repair a damaged file if it has a replacement for it available, and that is not always the case. In such a situation it will fail. Sadly, when it does, the message it gives is generally less than helpful.

If SFC does fail, then more useful information can usually be found in the CBS.log which is located at ... C:\Windows\Logs\CBS ... though really you've got to know your way around that log to properly understand what it's telling you. That only really comes with experience, since like most things to do with Windows, Microsoft are less than forthcoming in providing information about it.

Under no circumstances should you change the permissions or ownership of the WinSxS folder.

To do so will almost certainly cause future updating problems with Windows, and seriously compromise the security of your system.

Most of Windows system files are only accessible to "Trusted Installer" and it is by design that they are made difficult to edit. You will usually cause many more problems than you resolve if you attempt to change permissions or ownership in order to make changes.

 

[spunk.funk]

It depends on the health of the Windows drive. If it has bad sectors and starting to fail, then nothing will work until the drive is replaced.

The Main reason that the RE fails is because the drive has bad sectors and is in the process of Failing and needs to be replaced. Be sure to run SMART scan using Crystal Disk Info or DiskGenius in my signature before trying any Windows repairs

 

[TechSupportNC]

The SFC /scannnow command only works when booted Into Windows. To run the SFC command in the RE type the following Bold Command

sfc/scannow /offbootdir=c:\ /offwindir=c:\windows press enter, (change the drive letter to the directory that \windows is in) However, Before doing that type the following Bold Command

DISM /Online /CLEANUP-IMAGE /RestoreHealth and press Enter. When that completes run the above SFC command.

Thanks for the reply again! I remember one time finding that sfc /scannow /offbootdir=, etc.. command and I could never find it again so thank you for that. I couldn't remember what the command was. I had a feeling that was what I was missing to make that work. I have ran the DISM command a couple times before but not often so will try it more often. Now that I have the offline SFC command again maybe I can fix more startups so thank you again for that.

I can't remember if the one time I found that command if SFC helped or not. I remember it worked instead of giving that error though. So it might help sometimes. Adding it to my notes on my phone right now.

 

[TechSupportNC]

The Main reason that the RE fails is because the drive has bad sectors and is in the process of Failing and needs to be replaced. Be sure to run SMART scan using Crystal Disk Info or DiskGenius in my signature before trying any Windows repairs

Will do, thank you for all your help! Really appreciated.