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This is my daughter's Toshiba Satellite C855-1GR laptop and before we begin please note she does not have any recovery disks therefore I know our options are limited and don't need any lectures ;-) .. hindsight is a wonderful thing
The laptop originally came with Windows 7 Home Prem 64 bit but was upgraded to Windows 10 a while ago (I have copies of both Windows 7 and Windows 10 installation disks).
She said that the other day automatic system updates were running and then the Toshiba Recovery Wizard appeared with a warning screen to make sure that all existing data was backup up (not sure how accurate that comment is).
Afterwards, the system would not boot properly with the following message is "Reboot and select proper Boot device or Insert Boot Media in selected Boot device and press a key". I have changed the boot sequence to start from the HDD first, tried boot from DVD first, etc and no joy. I looked in the Setup menu however in the Security Tab there is no "Secure Boot" option and in the Advanced Tab there is no "Boot mode" option.
I have resigned to the fact that we may have to do a factory reset but cannot get to the option to perform this .. tried PF8, tried holding the "zero" key, etc.
I managed to use my other daughter's recovery disk for her Dell Laptop which runs on Windows 7 Home Prem which allows me to access the Advanced Options menu for System Restore, System Image Recovery, Startup Repair, Command Prompt, Go back to previous Build, etc.
I ran Startup Repair but gave that up after 2 days
System Restore says I "must specify which Windows Installation to restore, Restart computer etc." which I think would be OK if the laptop booted properly
System Image Recovery cannot find an image on my computer and asks that I insert a DVD with this which I don't have
Advanced Options suggests searching for an image on the Network which does exist, or
Install a driver ... I don't know which driver this refers to but have a copy of my Hard Drive driver which I have on a USB stick but a message appears "The specified location does not contain information about your hardware"
Windows Memory Diagnostic cannot check for memory problems
The command prompt is for X: drive when I try to change to the C: drive it says "The device is not ready". I have also tried a factory reset from the Command Prompt using the command: rstrui.exe without success
Go back to previous Build message says "We ran into a problem and won't be able to take you back to the previous build. Try resetting your build instead"
Finally I have tried Reset this PC with the messages "The drive where Windows is installed is locked. Unlock the drive and try again" and "Unable to reset your PC. A required drive partition is missing"
When I tried to reinstall Windows I can see Drive 0 unallocated Space 698.6GB but was told "Windows cannot be installed to this disk. This computer's hardware may not support booting to this disk. Ensure that the disk's controller is enabled in the Computers BIOS menu" which I resolved by updating the Sata from AHCI to compatibility mode. When I now try to reinstall Windows to Drive 0 it says "We couldn't create a new partition or locate an existing one. For more information, see the Setup log files" .. I don't know where these log files are.
So as you can see I have tried numerous attempts (and other not listed) but would welcome any others that anyone can think of.
As I said I am resigned to losing the data but would also appreciate any guidance on if it is possible to access or recreate the recovery partition in the Hard drive.
Does anyone anyone think that a new Hard Drive is required or whether you think the hard drive is still OK but if I should spend £43 on a Recovery USB from Toshiba?
My niece also has a Toshiba Satellite which is a different model L50-B-1DZ but has the same Hard drive ... would a copy of her recovery disks help access the hard drive or are the recovery disks unique to the serial on the Hard Drive?
Thank you in advance
Edited by r8r8r8r8, 22 February 2017 - 10:25 AM.
Solved
