[footprintsonmyceiling]

Partioned my hard disk to install Kali Linux beside my Windows 8.1 , cant boot 8 now?
Partioned my hard disk to install Kali Linux beside my Windows 8.1 , cant boot 8 now?

I deleted the partion after installing Kali, but now it doesnt want to run Win8... I dont have the disc to repair anything and the damned computer starts up to GRUB automatically...

What do I do? Tried refreshing and it said hard drive was locked.

My laptop is a dell latitude...

Edited by footprintsonmyceiling, 10 November 2014 - 05:56 PM.

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It sounds like you MBR (Master Boot Record) is messed up.

 

1. Make a recovery usb stick (http://windows.micro...-recovery-drive) on a working computer.

2. Plug it into the affected machine.

3. Start the computer and press the F2 button to access the bios.

4. Make sure you move the USB drive up to the top of the boot order and exit saving changes.

5. Let the computer boot to the USB and click "Repair your computer" in the bottom right hand corner.

6. Choose Troubleshoot.

7. Choose command prompt.

8. Run the following commands:

bootrec /FixMbr

bootrec /FixBoot

bootrec /ScanOs

bootrec /RebuildBcd

exit

9. Then reboot your computer, removing the usb drive once it has powered off and before it restarts.

 

If all is well again, follow step 3 again and move your hard drive back to the top of the boot order.

 

Let me know if that doesn't work. We may have to fix the EFI bootloader.

Edited by hazard209, 10 November 2014 - 07:31 PM.

[hazard209]

It sounds like you MBR (Master Boot Record) is messed up.

 

1. Make a recovery usb stick (http://windows.micro...-recovery-drive) on a working computer.

2. Plug it into the affected machine.

3. Start the computer and press the F2 button to access the bios.

4. Make sure you move the USB drive up to the top of the boot order and exit saving changes.

5. Let the computer boot to the USB and click "Repair your computer" in the bottom right hand corner.

6. Choose Troubleshoot.

7. Choose command prompt.

8. Run the following commands:

bootrec /FixMbr

bootrec /FixBoot

bootrec /ScanOs

bootrec /RebuildBcd

exit

9. Then reboot your computer, removing the usb drive once it has powered off and before it restarts.

 

If all is well again, follow step 3 again and move your hard drive back to the top of the boot order.

 

Let me know if that doesn't work. We may have to fix the EFI bootloader.

Edited by hazard209, 10 November 2014 - 07:31 PM.

[footprintsonmyceiling]

Ok so the comp went straight to "press any key to boot from disc" which I did because I wasnt given the option to enter the BIOS anymore... Then it gave me the usual optioned to repair my computer, set it to an earlier time, load disc image etc. I chose command prompt and entered everything you gave me, prompt answering me with each operation completed succsessfully... rebooted and was careful to remove disc, GRUB still appeared?

[footprintsonmyceiling]

Woah nevermind ... gave me the BIOS option, redoing everything at the moment ... o.O

[footprintsonmyceiling]

Oh yeah also forgot to mention I used a DVD instead.. had no empty flashdrives handy.. heh

[hazard209]

I should have said F2 repeatedly as soon as it powers on. That's a fault on my end. Sorry about that.

And a dvd is fine. No worries. Just instead of changing the boot order for the USB drive, make sure it's your ODD (optical drive).

Edited by hazard209, 10 November 2014 - 10:12 PM.

[footprintsonmyceiling]

WAIT WAT
so basically I DID do everything correctly... humm

[Ztruker]

If you need to get a Windows 8.1 ISO to reinstall with, see here: Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 ISO - Download or Create

The updated Option One shows you how to use a Microsoft provided tool (mediacreationtool.exe) to download any version of 8.1 for either 32 or 64 bit, regardless of what computer (bit wise) you are running from.

Must be run from a Windows 7, 8 or 8.1 computer.

[footprintsonmyceiling]

Hope! Finally decided to boot windows... attempting repairs has been on the screen for a while now.. humm..

Thank you ZTrucker, for the handy link and of course hazard209 for getting me this far.

[hazard209]

Ztruker is the tech and more than likely knows better than I do. If for whatever reason you're still having issues you can try to reconfigure the EFI Bootloader. 

 

Ztruker, feel free to veto this of course.

 

 

If you're willing to give it a shot, let's try for the EFI Bootloader.

 

1. Boot from the disk and get to the command prompt as  you have done previously.

2. Enter the command "diskpart" without the quotes and press enter.

3. There should be a partition that's formatted as FAT32. This is your EFI partition.

4. Assign a drive letter to it and making another attempt at rewriting the boot sector onto the system partition by using the commands:

DISKPART> sel vol 3

DISKPART> assign letter=x:

exit

cd /d x:\EFI\Microsoft\Boot\

bootrec /fixboot

5. Next we're renaming the BCD file with this command:

ren BCD BCD.bak

6. Now we're going to use bcdboot to recreate the BCD with this command:

bcdboot c:\Windows /l en-us /s x: /f ALL

7. Reboot and see where we're at.

[footprintsonmyceiling]

Agh. Did all of the last step, rebooted, computer diagnosed repairs and attempted them, then failed. Again gives me the usual refresh, set pc to an earlier time etc. None of them work, when I try to 'continue to win8' my computer reboots and the cycle is repeated.

At least GRUB isnt coming back.

Had a little trouble with command prompt, but everything was completed sucssesfully, I think...

[hazard209]

When you say "the cycle is repeated" do you mean that it's still booting to the cd? What's exactly happening when you try to boot into Windows now?

Edited by hazard209, 11 November 2014 - 07:19 AM.

[footprintsonmyceiling]

Well it gives me the option to boot the disc by pressing any key, after a few seconds it boots into windows8, attempts its repairs and fails. Then gives me the usual recovery options, all of which havent worked...

[hazard209]

Have you tried refreshing from the recovery disc that you made?

[footprintsonmyceiling]

Ok. Refreshing it from the system gives me "the drive where windows is installed is locked"

Refreshing it with the disc ...
Assuming Im at the correct menu, the options I get are startup repair, system restore, system image recovery, windows memory diagnostic, command prompt and recovery wizard.