SSD and Windows 10 Recovery

nheather · 12 Jun 2020 at 19:30

My son’s SSD boot disk has failed.

Windows 10 froze while he was using it.

Hard reset

Then froze.

Hard reset in safe mode

Attempted recovery

Got ‘diagnosing issue’ spinning wheel but shortly came back saying can’t be recovered.

So far I have connected it to my PC using a USB to SATA interface.

It registers as drive F: with a message that there is a fault with the disk.

However, I can browse the contents and have managed to copy the contents across to my hard disk.

So my thinking is, I wouldn’t use it again and we are buying a new SSD. But it also feels that it is recoverable which would be worth doing to clone to the new disk.

So appreciate any suggestions of what I can try to recover it.

Cheers,

Nigel

Mcnumpty2323 · 12 Jun 2020 at 19:51

manufacturers software should have a secure erase function
basically resets it back to factory/new state
you lose the data on it though
cloning it would mean if its a software issue you
will clone that issue
could try free macrium software and image it
that way you have an image thats both browsable
and if its not a software problem the image can be loaded to a hard drive
could also run chkdsk on it
or run sfc /scannow
as it wont boot you would need to use a windows disc/bootable usb to do it

pc-guy · 15 Jun 2020 at 00:02

New SSD, new windows install then use USB to SATA adaptor to get info off The faulty SSD if you can.

Quartz · 15 Jun 2020 at 00:16

nheather said:
My son’s SSD boot disk has failed.

I remember reading that SSDs fail into read-only mode. Have you looked at the SMART info?

nheather · 15 Jun 2020 at 09:50

Just to tie up this thread.

As I said I was able to read the disk, so can get any files off that are needed.

I did get macrium reflect and that was able to clone to the new drive but as we were all guessing, it simply made a perfect copy of a corrupted drive.

We could have tried a repair install but in the end decided that a nice fresh windows would be best, the one on there was 8 years old having started out as windows 7 and updated to windows 10 and having gained all sorts of lumps and warts along the way so a fresh install is a good thing. And it turned out there wasn’t so much that would be a chore to reinstate.

Cheers,

Nigel

Mcnumpty2323 · 16 Jun 2020 at 09:54

Good to hear
And yeah it was certainly overdue a clean
Install lol
Now you can use macrium to image a baseline of your clean install for future recovery if needed

Paul_RD · 20 Jun 2020 at 16:35

My son was buggering about with his Windows 10 PC and I think he was switching/installing Hyper V and he ended up with the Windows 10 diagnostic screen on every start.

I decided to accept the challenge and see if I could repair it. No matter what I did, Safe Mode / recovery with a Windows 10 DVD / auto-repair / etc, etc, it had me beat.
In the end I gave up, erased the drive, new partitions and a clean install of Windows 10 - runs really well now (until he buggers it up again).

Mcnumpty2323 · 20 Jun 2020 at 16:41

Paul_RD said:
My son was buggering about with his Windows 10 PC and I think he was switching/installing Hyper V and he ended up with the Windows 10 diagnostic screen on every start.

I decided to accept the challenge and see if I could repair it. No matter what I did, Safe Mode / recovery with a Windows 10 DVD / auto-repair / etc, etc, it had me beat.
In the end I gave up, erased the drive, new partitions and a clean install of Windows 10 - runs really well now (until he buggers it up again).

Make an image of the clean install using macrium for future disaster recovery
Or if you want to have a play around look
At my make your own custom install.wim
Windows USB thread

Paul_RD · 20 Jun 2020 at 16:56

Mcnumpty2323 said:
Make an image of the clean install using macrium for future disaster recovery
Or if you want to have a play around look
At my make your own custom install.wim
Windows USB thread

Thanks for the info, I have bookmarked your "Want your own personal windows install usb?" thread and will have a go of it later.

Mcnumpty2323 · 20 Jun 2020 at 17:01

Paul_RD said:
Thanks for the info, I have bookmarked your "Want your own personal windows install usb?" thread and will have a go of it later.

It's not as fast as restoring a macrium image
But I have had images fail before
And am a belt and braces guy so having
A backup plan is always a good idea

Paul_RD · 20 Jun 2020 at 18:08

Mcnumpty2323 said:
It's not as fast as restoring a macrium image
But I have had images fail before
And am a belt and braces guy so having
A backup plan is always a good idea

The Macrium drive image doesn't really suit me - I prefer to have a bit of manual control and I am quite familiar with using DISM so I think that your method is more my cup of tea and I will certainly be giving it a go - Thanks!

My belt and braces is a word document with every action and setting to install Windows, customise it using the Group Policy Editor, installing all required drivers and software so I end up with exactly the installation I require every time.
I have just done an update of that document to incorporate the changes as a result of Windows 10 v2004 - such as different GPT partitioning options, and additional settings to be made in the Group Policy Editor.