"Bootmgr is missing" - Windows 7

Rezident

Rezident

Rezident

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System in sig, Windows update just now, restarted Windows and it wouldn't boot.

Bootmgr is missing
Press Ctrl+Alt+Del

Infinite loop. So one time I kept pressing F8 and it asked which device to boot from so I selected my C: drive and windows booted up seemingly fine, surprisingly - except now my other SSD (not the drive with Windows on it) is gone, I can't see it in Windows.

Something seriously wrong here, what are my best options? I was going to do a system restore to before the Windows Update? But I'm afraid to restart in case it doesn't boot again.

Windows has been having massive slowdowns lately, like ten seconds plus to open a firefox window

What's the best thing to do?

Also, I can't find my Windows 7 disc to repair must have left it in my old place!
 
Possibly one of your drives is borked. (Hence the slowdowns)

When you installed Windows, did you do it with only one drive connected? It's highly recommended to install Windows this way, to prevent boot issues if a drive is removed.
 
bledd. said:
Possibly one of your drives is borked. (Hence the slowdowns)

When you installed Windows, did you do it with only one drive connected? It's highly recommended to install Windows this way, to prevent boot issues if a drive is removed.
Click to expand...

No I probably had all the drives connected. Why are there boot issues if a drive other than the one with Windows is corrupted?
 
from what I can see you have a 128GB Crucial as your OS SSD?

you can get any version of windows 7 ISO from the below link, free and legal!

http://www.w7forums.com/threads/official-windows-7-sp1-iso-image-downloads.12325/page-2#post-124821

download the disk that relates to your OS you currently have and you can activate it with your current OS key.

I would download the OS from the link and try a repair on the current installed OS, if this fails or still getting slowness once its fixed I would re install the OS again but disconnect all other drives and just leave the SSD you want to install windows on connected. this should fix the issues

you maybe having boot issues if your second drive without windows on it is not being seen by the PC or having issues as when the OS was installed it may have stored some windows files on there and now the drive is not seen the OS cannot boot properly.

can you see the drive in disk management or is the drive not visible at all?
 
Last edited:
The boot files may not be on your Windows drive.

Remove all other drives, chuck in your Windows disc and run startup repair.
 
ED209 said:
from what I can see you have a 128GB Crucial as your OS SSD?

you can get any version of windows 7 ISO from the below link, free and legal!

http://www.w7forums.com/threads/official-windows-7-sp1-iso-image-downloads.12325/page-2#post-124821

download the disk that relates to your OS you currently have and you can activate it with your current OS key.

I would download the OS from the link and try a repair on the current installed OS, if this fails or still getting slowness once its fixed I would re install the OS again but disconnect all other drives and just leave the SSD you want to install windows on connected. this should fix the issues

you maybe having boot issues if your second drive without windows on it is not being seen by the PC or having issues as when the OS was installed it may have stored some windows files on there and now the drive is not seen the OS cannot boot properly.

can you see the drive in disk management or is the drive not visible at all?
Click to expand...

Yes the Crucial 128gb drive seems to have failed, it does not even show up anymore but the OS is on a different ssd. I didn't know that a different drive failing would stop windows booting, pretty sure previous drive failures didn't cause this bootmgr error. Thanks for the tip, I will make sure all other drives are not connected when re-installing windows, never heard that one before.

When I opened up the case, the Crucial drive was at the bottom covered in dust beneath my other drives so maybe the heat killed it? If that's all that's wrong, it's fine I'll just get another (bigger!) ssd. But would that explain the massive slowdowns for the last week or so even when launching apps on completely different drives to the dodgy one?
 
might sound like a weird one nut make sure you haven't got any usb thumb drives or external hard drives plugged in, a lot easier to unplug usb items than start messing around inside the case.
 
The boot file on wrong drive issue has been around since XP. Having more than one drive connected during install is an unwritten no-no.

Try the M4 in another machine, it may just need a new firmware. There's an issue with the M4 that makes them play up after 5200 hours of use, unless they're upgraded to the newer firmware.
 
yaboydom said:
might sound like a weird one nut make sure you haven't got any usb thumb drives or external hard drives plugged in, a lot easier to unplug usb items than start messing around inside the case.
Click to expand...

OK no usb drives in and my external drive has not been connected in a while.
 
bledd. said:
The boot file on wrong drive issue has been around since XP. Having more than one drive connected during install is an unwritten no-no.

Try the M4 in another machine, it may just need a new firmware. There's an issue with the M4 that makes them play up after 5200 hours of use, unless they're upgraded to the newer firmware.
Click to expand...

Really? That could be it then, I hadn't heard about that. But I can't even see it in Windows to upgrade firmware. I'll try it in someone else's PC tonight.

Cheers for the suggestions all.
 
Sounds daft, but try this..

Get the M4. Only connect that up to a PC, leave it in the BIOS screen for about 30 minutes.

Then reboot and see if it sees it. If so, run the firmware update.




"after a hard reset (forced power off) my 256gb m4 ssd with firmware 010g was not seen anymore by the bios of my dell latitude e6500. neither the power cycle recommended by crucial nor the various boot-media related strategies (fw flasher, parted magic) worked for me. i discussed that in crucials live-chat support and was told to try a prolonged power cycle. so i let the drive be powerd on for 12 hours (power cable only, no data connection). then i disconnected the drive and put it back into my laptop where it was detected and booted normally.

so it seems that sometimes it takes a much longer time for the drive to settle (i.e. garbage collection).

after so many users reporting similar problems i think it is time for crucial to make an official statement to the wide spread problem. this situation could ruin their good reputation.

regards,
metulski"

from the Crucial forums
 
Wow - I would not have thought of that, cheers! I gave it to a mate who will try it on their system so I don't have it now.

I can get back into windows but on boot is still says bootmgr is missing everytime - how do I get rid of that? I have removed the dodgy drive.
 
bledd. said:
The boot file on wrong drive issue has been around since XP. Having more than one drive connected during install is an unwritten no-no.

Try the M4 in another machine, it may just need a new firmware. There's an issue with the M4 that makes them play up after 5200 hours of use, unless they're upgraded to the newer firmware.
Click to expand...

Definitely check this - I ended up buying a new home server when this would have fixed it!
 
Bizarrely, the Crucial M4 drive failure had changed the boot order in the BIOS :confused: Primary drive boot option was a storage drive with no OS on it, followed by my other storage drives with no OS! The drive with my OS was not even listed in the boot order anymore! How on earth did that happen? I made the OS drive the primary boot and now Windows loads as normal, minus the dodgy M4 drive.

Do the M4s returned to ‘normal’ after the fix mentioned above plus the firmware update? If the drives are even a little dodgy I would rather just get a new one. My priority these days is stability over performance.

Also, I see they have 500Gb and even TB SSDs these days, and I haven’t bought any upgrades since my gpu last Christmas… (I know I’m supposed to be saving for the wedding next year but I’m literally drooling at the thought of a TB SSD :)…)
 
After firmware upgrade, yes they're normal again.

(assuming yours isn't broken in some other way).


But hey, it's Christmas, treat yourself :D
 
Check the cables.
I've just replaced a faulty cable on my PC because of a BOOTMGR missing message.
The cable was only to a data drive, but when it went, my BIOS decided to change the boot drive.
 
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