Windows 10 boot hangs on “Preparing Automatic Repair.” “bootrec /fixboot” Access is Denied

Copper Contributor

Dear community,

 

We have a Windows 10 1709 machine (Dell Optiplex 5050) in our office that starts up and goes directly to Windows Automatic Repair. Upon closer inspection, I discovered two "Windows Boot Manager" entries at startup, neither of which load into Win10 1709 installed on the 256GB SSD.

 

Selecting the first Windows Boot Manager entry goes straight to "Preparing Automatic Repair," followed by "Diagnosing your PC," but hangs here and never completes diagnosis.

 

Selecting the second Windows Boot Manager entry makes the Dell BIOS logo appear briefly, and then regresses to a black screen.

 

The first solution I tried was to rebuild the existing boot configuration data (BCD) store using Windows Recovery Environment straight from a Windows 10 1709 DVD:

  1. Bootrec /rebuildbcd

“Result: Successfully scanned Windows installations”

Total identified Windows installations: 0

The operation completed successfully.

  

The second step I tried was to remove any existing BCD stores manually, and then rebuild them again.

  1. Bcdedit /export C:\bcdbackup

Next, I ran the “attrib” command to gain access to manipulate the BCD.

  1. Attrib C:\boot\bcd –h –r –s

 

But ran into the following problem: “Path not found – C:\boot”

 

Then I realized that the Windows 10 "\boot" folder is located in the EFI System Partition (ESP), so I changed to the ESP partition (E: drive) and ran the same command:

1) E:\

2). “ren E:\boot\bcd bcd.old”

 

Next, I ran bootrec /rebuildbcd again

Result: Successfully scanned Windows installations.

Total identified Windows installations: 1

[1] C:\Windows

Add installation to boot list? Yes(Y)/No(N)/All(A):Y

The operation completed successfully.

 

Once the installation was re-added to the boot list, I ran bootrec.exe /fixboot again:

E:\bootrec.exe /fixboot

But the result was: Access is denied

E:\bootrec /scanos

Scanning all disks for Windows installations.

Successfully scanned Windows installations.

Total identified Windows installations: 0

The operation completed successfully

 

 

I then ran a series of bootrec commands in the following sequential order, but received more or less the same results:

  1. Bootrec /fixmbr

Result: The operation completed successfully

 

  1. Bootrec /fixboot

Result: Access is denied

  

  1. Bootrec /scanos

Result:

"Successfully scanned Windows installations"

Total identified Windows installations: 0

The operation completed successfully

 

  1. Bootrec /rebuildbcd

Result:

"Successfully scanned Windows installations"

Total identified Windows installations: 0

The operation completed successfully

 

Next, I obtained some disk volume information using diskpart commands as follows:

  1. Diskpart
  2. List disk

Result: Disk 0             Online   238GB   Gpt: *

  1. Sel disk 0
  2. List vol

Result:

Volume 0             D             CCCOMA_X64F (Win10 1709)      DVD-ROM           4.47GB  Healthy

 

I then attempted to run bcdboot to copy boot files straight from a Windows 10 1709 DVD:

 

  1. Bcdboot C:\Windows /s D: /f UEFI

Result: “Failure when attempting to copy boot files”

 

2) Bcdboot E: /s D: /f UEFI

Result: “Failure when attempting to copy boot files”

 

Issue: The Windows PE environment does not detect any identified Windows installations. It does not detect a C:\boot folder, but does find an E:\boot folder (ESP partition). But when running the "bootrec /fixboot" command, the result is “Access denied” on both volumes. How can I create a new C:\boot (or E:\boot, whichever is correct )folder if I keep getting a "Failure when attempting to copy boot files" error? I have exhausted my troubleshooting efforts on getting this BCD rebuilt. Any suggestions? Thanks in advance.

 

Best regards,

 

Jonathan

4 Replies

I found this old post when looking for "CCCOMA_X64F" (Win10), as the only mention of it in these forums, I didn't get far. And I assume the poster has long moved on. Worst case scenario is that the SSD was dead. But before diagnosing that, we'd need to know whether the BIOS was set to boot UEFI or "legacy", usually found by pressing F12 at boot. This time it seems "EFI" is expected. Then the formats of the existing partitions need to be discovered. Invoke diskpart from the command line, then "list volumes". Is the filesystem (fs) of the EFI boot partition (apparently D: in this case) FAT32? Is C: NTFS? Anything else would be problematic, and reformatting called for. Hidden NTFS? This is a sneakier problem. I usually use a GParted bootable disk (free), https://gparted.org/livecd.php with a graphical interface to fix such problems. Various other "Partition Managers" from bootable media are available and usually from a bootable medium, and many with Free Trial versions, and also with graphical interfaces making it easy to visualize operations, and specifically, multiple partitions on disks. If diskpart from a CCCOMA_X64F boot disk is your only tool, and no partitions or disks are detected- Most likely you have a dead disk, and your only option is to replace it.

@cuvtixo Usualy some hacker service_garbage -p in ram started and locks the hack.

It might also be a process in ram that protects the service_garbage.

Look in register for _garbage and you see lots of them startup=4 disables prevents starting. Immage is the file somewhere on storage thats the problem.

So some or many service_garbage keys after a service acting different than the service_garbage start manually and thats is not 4.

 

When you power down the hack stays in ram.

When you shut down, the hack dumps on storage and takes time.

When for boot up, the hack has to load a 64KB and 3GB in ram to work.

 

After deleting all files unlocked there remained a C:\SYSTEM~1\

No windows 10 map of about 3GB.

There remains also a 64KB file.

After a reboot microsoft hides both out of sight.

I had to recover with setup.exe

I had the same. Its a master boot record virus. Clean Boot up with a write protected setup medium in usb port. Virus infects all internal drives even not inititialized and new exept in raid. It is Loaded in ram at boottime reading all internal single drive ports first sector by bios.
Start setup and choose repair. Then command prompt. Select all available volumes one by one and do bootrec.exe /fixmbr.
So x:\ cd c:
Bootrec.exe /fixmbr
Cd d:
Bootrec.exe /fixmbr
Cd e:
Bootrec.exe /fixmbr
And so on until you fixed all present mbr's.
Do not reset but switch off and wait a minute.