E000101F4 - Raid 0 problem. How to fix?

I am having the exact same problem as described here: https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=229205&highlight=E00101F4

(sorry topic was to old to be replied on)

Both safe and normal mode of Disk Director (latest version) don't work. They both result in: E000101F4

I need to get there cause I created a new bootable Vista partition (VistaBoot), so I could change the clusters. And I wanted to hide the VistaBoot partition from Windows.

Since this didn't work, I booted to Windows Vista and ran Disk Director from there and hide the partition from there. This resulted in a non booting Windows Vista with the following error code: 0xc00000001 (winload.exe).

How can I fix this?

//update

Went back to the command line from the Windows Vista CD, than used bcdedit and it showed me the Windows Vista partition was located on "I:\", however when I go to I: it says it cannot be read. I also tried using CHKDSK, but it says it cannot be run, caused it's RAW (or something).

I did all the necessary steps in order to get my Vista installation running from 16k clusters (hence the BootVista partition). What am I doing wrong? Sigh.

 

When you were booted to the Vista DVD's Command Prompt, did bcdedit work correctly? Did it run and display the BCD file settings or did it error?

If bcdedit does run, what is the output?

It's odd that DD's Safe Mode would also not find any drives. Do you know what mode your controller is set to in the BIOS (AHCI, IDE Compatible, RAID, etc.)?

 

Yup, bcdedit shows everything up correctly; it shows the VistaBoot partition on HarddiskVolume8 (was previously J: or something, before I hid it in Windows Vista).

And it shows where Windows Vista files should be located as well; on partition I:, but that partition appears to be in RAW (instead of NTFS).

The controller is in RAID mode (bios), since I use the harddisks in RAID 0. (Intel ICH10R controller).

The only thing I did when I created VistaBoot partition, was going back to Vista to see if everything worked. Which it did, then rebooted to DD safe/normal, trying to hide the BootVista partition (which didn't work, like stated in my first post), then rebooted back to Vista and ran DD from inside Vista. Than I hide the BootVista partition and converted the partition containing Vista to 16k cluster. When I came back, the PC was giving me the winload.exe error.

I think I might solve this, if I could change the RAW back to NTFS? Dunno for sure though.

//update

Running Windows Vista Repair utility seems also pointless; couldn't be fixed.
Bleh, guess I am screwed.

 

Well since this isn't my main PC, I decided to format the whole thing and try again.

For some reason DD is now working to boot. Weird.

Anyways, I did something similar to this:

And I am going to install Windows Vista once again.

But if I am going to do this on my main PC, how I am going to make this will work and I will not get the same error as this PC? Cause this will be really unacceptable on my main PC.

 

I think it was the cluster size conversion that screwed up. Often chkdsk will find a bunch of file system errors after doing one of these conversions. The symptom of displaying the partition as "RAW" indicates that something went wrong. Perhaps chkdsk could have fixed this, but reinstalling Vista to a preformatted 64k cluster partition should work OK.

Make an image of your other PC before doing anything to it. If you do a cluster size conversion, do it from the boot CD and then run chkdsk /f by booting to a Vista DVD and going to a command prompt after the conversion. You can always restore the image to recover from serious problems.

 

Thanks for the reply.

Well I did try chkdsk /f, but it wasn't allowed for a RAW-partition or something.

Luckily I tested it on this PC first. I wanted to see if the performance was worth it.

I will sure make a backup first from the C:\ partition, if I am going to do this on my main PC. The other partitions remained untouched, so I am safe if I am going ahead with this. First I will use the test PC to be on the sure side.

 

Okay I redid the whole thing on my "test"-pc, though it worked, it deleted severa partitions (some were empty and one partition was holding the backup, I pre-made of the system).

Why did this happen.

As far as I can tell it happened somewhere around here:

When I did list partition after that, some partitions disappeared.

Now that it really didn't matter on this PC, however I don't want this to happen on my main PC!

Please explain. Of course I will be making backups from my main PC to an external drive, but I want to understand why the partitions disappeared!

Thanks.


//edit


Booting Disk Director from the CD (in normal / recommended mode) is still a problem. It results the error message that no harddisks could be found. Safe mode sometimes work (mostly on the 2nd try).

 

Well I give up.

Did everything as I should. I created the VistaBoot partition, did everything else. Booted to Vista succesfully, after that I rebooted with DD (safe-mode, cause the other one didn't work) and changed the clustersize to 16k.

Next I rebooted with the Vista DVD and performed chkdsk /f (twice to make sure). Removed the DVD and booted back to Vista.

Now it stays ages on "Preparing Desktop" and then I get a blue-ish background color without showing any desktop items whatsoever. I tried CTRL-ALT-DEL and the Taskmanager showed up. Typed explorer.exe and the Desktop would return, however, it seems to be missing a lot of stuff. Apparently my profile cannot be correctly loaded or something. I also receive a warning from Windows about this.

Since the test PC is giving me a lot of problems, I decided to stick with the 4k clustersize (default) on my main PC. These troubles are not worth it. Spend already almost 2 days on this and that is to much of a hassle. Especially since I do not get any kind of result.

I will try a few things more, before I really give up on this...

//edit

And I am not very happy about the fact I cannot use the "Recommended version" of DD when I use the bootcd. I think the problems started as soon as I used the "Safe mode" version. Cause when it boots back to Windows (even with the problems) it seems the partition letters have changed... Sigh....

//edit 2

I tried booting mini XP from Hires Bootcd. Here it also shows the Vista partition to be changed to J: (instead of C: ). Just like when I boot up Vista. Anyway to change that back to C: (so Vista can load all the necessary files including my profile)? E.g. by loading a Hive (dunno how though, access is limited).

//edit 3

In Windows Vista, pressing CTRL-ALT-DEL and run cmd followed by diskpart, also proves useless. I cannot change the volume letter to C:.
I really do not know what to do, I am guessing I have to call it a day and give up.

 

That's caused by Windows reassigning drive letters. When Windows boots and it detects new disks or partitions, it will assign a drive letter according to a pre-programmed algorithm. C: will go to the active partition on the first hard disk, D: to the first logical partition on the first hard disk, E: to the next primary partition... etc. Your main Vista partition used to have the drive letter C: and after rearranging things, the boot partition probably got assigned C: and the Vista partition got J:. It is somewhat tricky to avoid this when you have a separate boot partition or a dual-boot system. The easiest way to avoid the issue is to hide the boot partition for that first boot into Windows, thus forcing C: to go to the Vista partition. After the drive letter assignments have been stored in the registry you can un-hide the boot partition.

But in your case the deed is done and Windows has stored the incorrect drive letters in the registry. To fix this you have to edit the registry. Let the machine boot into the crippled user profile and start Windows Explorer again. Look at the drive letter assignments and note which letter belongs to the boot partition and which letter belongs to the Vista partition. For this example let's assume that the boot partition has been assigned C: and the Vista partition has been assigned J:. Change the steps below if you see something different.

Start regedit. You may have to do this from Task Manager if the desktop isn't fully functional. Go to HKey_Local_Machine\System\MountedDevices and swap the drive letters that are incorrect. Here is an example of what you might see:



Swap the two drive letters that are reversed. To do this, rename C: to a temporary letter like X:, then rename J: to C:, and finally rename X: to J:. Reboot and you should be fixed up.

An alternative approach is to delete all of the entries in the MountedDevices registy key (except the one marked Default). Exit Windows. Use Disk Director to hide all of the partitions except the Vista partition. Reboot and then Windows will have to assign C: to the Vista partition. Using DD again, unhide the other partitions and reboot. Use Vista Disk Management to rearrange drive letters for the other partitions if you don't like the way they come out. (You won't be able to change the drive letter of the boot partition except by editing the registry, however).

It sounds like your cluster size change worked this time and the machine booted, so your BCD pointers ended up correct. You're almost there.

 

Hi Mark,

Thanks for your reply.

I managed to get it working properly once again, however I didn't do what you said.

I restored a backup, which I made. After that I redid the change in clustersize 16k (was restored back to 4k). Next I hid the VistaBoot partition. Selected boot to Windows and in Windows I unhide the partition and changed it back to V: (VistaBoot). Working properly now.

Will conduct some tests with HD Tach (after defragging everything) to see if it's worthwhile to change the clustersize on my main PC as well...

Any other tips and / or recommendations?
(yes I made backups from my main PC, lol)

Thanks so far for the help you have provided so far.

 

Part of learning is to fumble around and learn from the mistakes! I've sure made my share of them.

One other recommendation is to avoid "mixed metaphors". Since you are going to use Acronis tools (DD and TI), remember that they create partitions using the older established 63-sector offset rules. Vista's DiskPart and Disk Management use the newer 2048-sector offset rules. Don't mix the two. Use DD to create partitions and use Vista to format partitions.

Some of the drive letter problems that you saw were due to creating a partition with Vista's 2048-sector offset, then either moving it with DD or restoring an image with TI. Either of the latter two operations will move the partition location back to 63-sector offset. When a partition's starting sector moves then its hex partition ID changes. Different partition ID = new partition to Windows = new drive letter.

 

Well I decided to go for it, after everything seems to be working fine with the test PC, however it didn't go like it should.

I already run into problems with "diskpart", when booting from the Vista DVD.

After doing all the necessary steps provided in the other topic, I exited "diskpart", to do:

But it said something about "Cannot find element" (hopefully I translated that correctly since my Windows isn't an English version). Since this was going to be a problem, I selected the newly created partition and removed it with "diskpart".

After that I thought everything should work like it was supposed to, but after rebooting I the message that it couldn't boot (forgot the message, my bad). After that I decided to put back the copy I made with TI from my C:\ (which contains Windows Vista partition) took about 25 minutes and rebooted, however it still wouldn't boot and was prompted with a new message: NTLDR missing. Sigh...

Any ideas on how to fix this...? And get Windows Vista booting again?

Another weird thing is, when you boot with the Windows DVD and select repair, it cannot find a Windows Vista installation? Is this normal?
I have Windows Vista installed and Windows 7 RC1 (to try it out), however it still should have found a Vista installation when going to Vista repair, right?

I am currently not at home and won't be until monday. Hopefully by then, someone can come up with a solution on how I can fix this and get Vista booting again.

Thanks in advance for your time.

 

I think the English version may have been 'bootrec' is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file. This message appears when the executable file cannot be found. Bootrec.exe is located on the Vista DVD, so perhaps you were in a different directory when you typed the command?

The message "ntldr is missing" is produced from the boot sector of a partition that was formatted by Windows XP. Which partition is set as "Active" on your disk? If you tried to boot into an XP-formatted partition then that would explain the error message. Use DD to set the Vista partition as Active.

If the Vista partition was active and you got that message, be sure that the correct disk is set to boot. Some PC BIOSes will change the setting when you remove a drive, so check to be sure. If none of the above apply, then are you sure that you restored the correct image file? If you accidentally restored a different image (containing Windows XP) then that would explain the boot error message and the inability of the Vista DVD to find a Vista installation. (Grasping at straws here...)

 

THanks for the reply.

Well I ran bootrec just after I exited diskpart and the message I received was:

Found it by typing it in Google.

Like I said, I ran it after I exited diskpart, meaning I was still in x:\sources, when I tried bootrec.

I cannot try things at the moment, since I am not at home... But I will sure try every solution provided here on monday and report back.

 

Okay found the following information, which I will try on monday:

Sounds like it is a solution (except for the last line lol).

And more info, more of the same, just a reminder for myself for monday:

After reading the last quote, I think the problem was caused by the fact it created the VistaBoot partition at the "back / end" of my harddisk instead of the beginning, however I did save some space at the start of the harddisk just for the VistaBoot partition... Oh well, guess I have to wait till monday before I can try things...

 

Bleh... I am stupid.

It was fixed by using diskpart and setting the partition with Vista active.
However, on a sidenote, bcdedit doesn't work for some reason.

It complains it cannot find anything. So this makes it impossible for me to create a BootVista-partition, right?

 

That is a strange one. If Vista booted then there must be a BCD file somewhere on your disk. Is it in a hidden partition? While booting, bootmgr can find the BCD if it is in a hidden partition, but I forget whether bcdedit running in Windows can do the same. Are you running bcdedit from an elevated command prompt?

 

Well I will try again later today, first I have to do some work (before I start messing around again).

Maybe I overlooked something the first time. However I did exactly what was explained in the other topic (and I did the same also on the test PC and resulted in zero problems, for at least that part). So I really don't know, why it didn't show anything. Very strange. Can't it be the result of installing Windows 7? I doubt it, cause it's very similar to Vista and also uses (the same?) bootloader.

Sorry, but I do not understand what you mean with elevated command prompt? I tried bcdedit from x:\sources, Vista DVD, and C:\ D:\ partitions, all resulted in the same problem...

 

If you are running Vista (or Windows 7) and want to display the output of bcdedit you need to run the command from an elevated command prompt. To do this, find Command Prompt in the Start menu, right-click on it and choose "Run as administrator". Otherwise if you're running from the Vista DVD then the command prompt is already running with administrative permissions (elevated).

If you have ended up with more than one BCD on the disk because of installing both Vista and Windows 7, then you may need to direct the command to the desired BCD like this:

Code:

bcdedit /store C:\Boot\BCD
or
bcdedit /store D:\Boot\BCD

However, first be sure of the location of each BCD. You should be able to hunt for them manually on each partition:

Code:

C:
cd \
cd Boot
dir /a

or
D:
cd \
cd Boot
dir /a

Look for the file BCD and note its location for use in the bcdedit /store commands above.

 

Okay thanks, I will give that a go.

 

http://www.mvdl.info/bcdedit.jpg

Well here is the output of bcdedit.
Will reboot now to Windows Vista DVD and recreate a bootable partition for the BootVista-partition.

Hopefully it will work this time. Still don't know what went wrong though.

 

Bleh... I redit all the steps and exited diskpart.
Next I typed bootrec /fixboot and I get the "Cannot find element"-error again.

Any ideas?

//update1

I am starting to think W7 is the culprit, cause when I do bootrec /rebuildbcd it says added on the first Windows installation (which is W7) and it says cannot find element on the 2nd Windows installation (which is Vista).

I will try booting from the W7 DVD and run bootrec, to see if that makes any difference.

//update2

Well I deleted the new partition (VistaBoot) and made the original one (containing Vista) active once again and everything booted up once again.
I was thinking; I have used EasyBCD in the past, could this be the problem by any chance? That would explain why it worked on my Test PC, but not on my main PC (the test PC not having used EasyBCD)?

Maybe I should boot to Vista and run bootrec /rebuildbcd and then try everything again or.....?

 

Just to let you know, I have given up. Didn't work.