lost access to w7 drives

Update,
The one drive at a time didn't do too well. Without the w7 primary plugged in the only response I got was bootmgr missing reboot
pulled the CMOS battery, waited a minute, replaced it, applied power and tried to boot to the w7 test drive. After a CHKDSK of all drives it loaded
rebooted to the w7 primary and got the BSOD, rebooted to the w8 drive and that's where I am now.

Question,
Would it dfo any good to visit the malware forum when I can't boot the drive? I'm at a loss as to what to do next

Thanks
Dick

sorry can't think of what else to try and really don't know why at the moment you can't boot at least the test win 7 os along with the win 8 os, the main win 7 os could be corrupted and that would explain why it won't boot and you get a bsd but that shouldn't stop you from being able to boot into the other win 7 os. just to clarify because you seem to have stopped as soon as you got an error message when you try the one drive at a time and get the bootmgr missing, use the cd to fix it so they boot to the os on that particular drive (from command line using the commands in earlier links.) i'd use the win 8 cd to fix the bootmgr for the win 8 drive and the win 7 cd to fix the test win 7 os drive. for your main win 7 os drive i think your going to have to do a repair install to fix the bsd your getting when you boot to that os. only after each drive boots to the os on it when it's the only drive connected to the pc then reconnect them all at once. this time it will boot to the first hard drive in the boot order of your bios, and shouldn't offer you the choice of booting any of the other os, so now you can use easybcd to add the other 2 to the bootmgr. another thing i wanted to clarify is when you boot up the pc it always boots to the first hard drive and it's from there it reads the bootmgr and offers you the list of your os choices, this then starts the os you've chosen from wherever it is located, now when you use the F12 key or whatever key it might be to change boot order, what you're doing is stopping it from booting the first hard drive and going directly to whichever drive you've told it to boot first. once each drive will boot on it's own you could use this method to choose which os you wanted to start up without having the list of all your os on one bootmgr.

did the bootrec / commands on the "F:" drive - that's the one identified as W7 Main
fixmbr - successful
fixboot - successful
scanos - total identified windows installations 0 [zero] - successful
rebuildbcd - same as above

looks like time to go for the one drive at a time and play with it until I get it to boot
may be a long night - glad it's Friday

Thanks
Dick

do that again but follow instructions below because of "scanos - total identified windows installations 0 [zero] - successful"

Since the BCD store exists and lists a Windows installation, you'll first have to "remove" it manually and then try to rebuild it again.

At the prompt, execute the bcdedit command as shown and then press Enter:

bcdedit /export c:\bcdbackup

The bcdedit command is used here to export the BCD store as a file: bcdbackup. There's no need to specify a file extension.

The command should return the following on screen:

The operation completed successfully.

meaning the BCD export worked as expected.

At this point, you need to adjust several file attributes for the BCD store so you can manipulate it.

At the prompt, execute the attrib command exactly like this:

attrib c:\boot\bcd -h -r -s

What you just did with the attrib command was remove the hidden, read-only, and system attributes from the file bcd. Those attributes restricted the actions you could take on the file. Now that they're gone, you can manipulate the file more freely - specifically, rename it.

To rename the BCD store, execute the ren command as shown:

ren c:\boot\bcd bcd.old

Now that the BCD store is renamed, you should now be able to successfully rebuild it, as you tried to do in Step 3.

Note: You could delete the BCD file entirely since you're about to create a new one. However, renaming the existing BCD accomplishes the same thing since it's now unavailable to Windows, plus provides you yet another layer of backup, in addition to the export you did in Step 5, if you decide to undo your actions.

read and follow the full instructions here at this link :- http://pcsupport.about.com/od/fixtheproble…ore-windows.htm
fingers crossed that will fix your problems, but still not sure about the main win 7 os tho. think that may need more work to fix the bsd.

Terry, I've printed off both sets of instructions and will read them before I try to do anything. Thanks for hanging in there and continuing to help Dick

update, I think I followed your instructions to the letter but no joy, still unable to boot to the w7 main drive Thanks Dick

just to clarify are the other 2 drives booting ok tho? did you try a repair install when just the main win 7 drive was connected. can you give us any and all error codes / warnings you receive when you've tried each step. i can understand why the main win 7 os might not boot up, but not why the other two won't work and it's only the win 8 that boots. going to ask and see if any of the other techs have any ideas, can help.

Terry, Current conditions: W7 main still doing the BSOD with the following message problem detected. . . . . check for viruses have any new hhds or controllers been added check hhd configuration and termination then restart STOP: 0X0000007B (0XFFFFF880009A9928, 0XFFFFFFFFC0000034, 0X0000000000000000, 0X0000000000000000) The repair install was done with all drives connected I can now boot to the w8 drive and the test w7 drive Thanks for your continued assistance. I'll keep trying, I really need to get that drive back online Dick

ok so there's no boot problem now with 2 of the os and it does actually boot to your main win 7 os too.
it's just that for some reason your main win 7 os is broken.

i'm not a windows expert but this link seems to cover everything that might fix the STOP: 0X0000007B error.
http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows…f4-9d890e172029
just work through each link given in the answer post methodically.
with any luck at least one of them will cure the bsd and allow you to boot into win 7 again.

sorry i can't be more specific, it's just i don't think i've ever come across your problem before so have no idea what is the most likely cause or the best route to take to fix it.



this link may help you also :- http://pcsupport.about.com/od/findbyerrorm…p0x0000007b.htm

Terry, Thanks for the additional information. It will be tomorrow evening before I can get started with this. It's after 2100 now and my day starts at 0530. Quick added comment; noticed that it is taking a full minute for the memory test/check to complete on the initial screen before the rest of the information loads Again, thanks Dick

To all who have helped - Thank you very much I've decided to format the drive and start from scratch. The loss of over a week's time has been enough. I was able to make a one time backup of the drive so I can do some recovery of things as I rebuild. If I ever discover what happened I'll try to post it so others can learn and maybe IF it ever happens again the collected wisdom will be able to solve the problem. Again, thanks to all Dick

Update Got a suggestion to try one more time to restore the drive. Used an older [4/14/2013] full backup and it worked ! ! ! ! I now have access and am going about updating and checking to be sure all is well. Till have about a one minute delay during the memory check at boot up and a quick disconnect message when the OS moves from the motherboard video to the graphics card. I'll look into those problems after I confirm that the basics are stable. Again, thanks to all for your help.

great.

here's a link explain how to run win 7's memory check to see if there is a problem :- http://windows.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows…n-your-computer

it might just be you've turned on a setting in your bios tho that checks the memory before booting that now causes the delay, also check for a setting in bios to make sure your graphics card is set as first video option.



once everything is up and running correctly, i'd suggest you pop into our malware forum and get your pc checked for any malware just to be safe, explain you have 3 os so might need to do all 3 separately if the tools used can't check all 3 drives at once from inside just the booted os.

Terry, I'll run the memory check just as soon as I'm sure I can reboot and reaccess the OS I'll do the BIOS check just as soon as I get hoome this evening same with graphisc card Agreed, a visit to a malware removal forum is in order. It may be a day or two before I can get that done. Again, thanks and stay well and surf safe