New SSD Not Booting Correctly

[Kirshy]

Up until today I've been using a 1TB Seagate Barracuda HDD as my storage for all my programs, games and OS. Today I bought and SSD to try and get that wonderful speed boost everyone talks about. I got the Samsung 850 EVO 250GB. So I plugged in the SATA and power cable and booted normally so I could migrate everything. I did that. I had to delete about 40GB of stuff to make it fit onto the SSD. So I did the migration. It told me it worked then it shut down my computer, I signed in and it showed the OS was now on the SSD and that all the files and what not had copied over. The HDD still had all the original stuff on it so I clicked format to erase it and when it finished it shut down my computer. Then I went into the boot order in the BIOS and moved the SSD forward and now I just get "Reboot and select proper boot device or insert boot media in selected boot device and press a key... This happens when i put the SSD first. I'm confused as to why in the boot order there are 4 things even though I only have 2 drives. There is, Windows Boot Manager (P2:ST1000DM00: Windows Boot Manager (P4: Samsung SSD , P2: ST1000DM003-1ER162 and finally P4: Samsung SSD 850 EVO 250GB. When I booted off the Seagate it seemed to take me to log into Windows 8.1 screen where I type in the password. It had my Microsoft email but it wasn't using the Windows theme I had selected when it was booting properly. When I typed in my password it just got stuck on "Preparing Windows". I am so confused as to why it isn't booting correctly... I have the original installation media on a USB. Any suggestions?

 

 

 

[Redsun20]

 

Up until today I've been using a 1TB Seagate Barracuda HDD as my storage for all my programs, games and OS. Today I bought and SSD to try and get that wonderful speed boost everyone talks about. I got the Samsung 850 EVO 250GB. So I plugged in the SATA and power cable and booted normally so I could migrate everything. I did that. I had to delete about 40GB of stuff to make it fit onto the SSD. So I did the migration. It told me it worked then it shut down my computer, I signed in and it showed the OS was now on the SSD and that all the files and what not had copied over. The HDD still had all the original stuff on it so I clicked format to erase it and when it finished it shut down my computer. Then I went into the boot order in the BIOS and moved the SSD forward and now I just get "Reboot and select proper boot device or insert boot media in selected boot device and press a key... This happens when i put the SSD first. I'm confused as to why in the boot order there are 4 things even though I only have 2 drives. There is, Windows Boot Manager (P2:ST1000DM00: Windows Boot Manager (P4: Samsung SSD , P2: ST1000DM003-1ER162 and finally P4: Samsung SSD 850 EVO 250GB. When I booted off the Seagate it seemed to take me to log into Windows 8.1 screen where I type in the password. It had my Microsoft email but it wasn't using the Windows theme I had selected when it was booting properly. When I typed in my password it just got stuck on "Preparing Windows". I am so confused as to why it isn't booting correctly... I have the original installation media on a USB. Any suggestions?

 

 

Do a clean install and copy all your data to an external drive. That cloning utility you were using probably didn't work right

[Kirshy]

.

[Kirshy]

Do a clean install and copy all your data to an external drive. That cloning utility you were using probably didn't work right

Won't a clean install remove all data I have on the SSD? 

[Redsun20]

 

Won't a clean install remove all data I have on the SSD? 

 

Yes. So first, transfer any important things to an external drive

[Kirshy]

Yes. So first, transfer any important things to an external drive

How would I do that when I can't boot into windows 

[Redsun20]

How would I do that when I can't boot into windows 

But you said you could boot in to the hard drive

[Kirshy]

But you said you could boot in to the hard drive

It just gets stuck on "Preparing Windows" 

[Redsun20]

It just gets stuck on "Preparing Windows" 

Oh ok

[Jarsky]

You cant boot/repair that device, and I guess the SSD is to full to be side loading a new Windows install into that partition.

You're going to have to use another computer to plug your drives into, to copy everything back to the HDD.

 

You cant just copy a Windows installation. You have to prepare the disk with a bootsector, and then use something like xcopy to copy all the needed system files - or you needed to use a clone software which does this all kind of transparent. It sounds like whatever you used it didnt do the job properly - perhaps it was some sort of data migration software instead of a cloning tool designed to also look after boot partitions and OS files properly

[Kirshy]

You cant boot/repair that device, and I guess the SSD is to full to be side loading a new Windows install into that partition.

You're going to have to use another computer to plug your drives into, to copy everything back to the HDD.

 

You cant just copy a Windows installation. You have to prepare the disk with a bootsector, and then use something like xcopy to copy all the needed system files - or you needed to use a clone software which does this all kind of transparent. It sounds like whatever you used it didnt do the job properly - perhaps it was some sort of data migration software instead of a cloning tool designed to also look after boot partitions and OS files properly

Okay so I did something. I unplugged my SSD and reinstalled a fresh copy of Windows to the HDD. Now I loaded into it perfectly fine and I also plugged the SSD back in as well. I can see the SSD and all of it's files on it using the Windows installed on the HDD. Is there a way for me to move all the files on the SSD back onto the HDD? I need a course of action lol... 

[Jarsky]

You would just need to copy over the folders of data you want to keep.

Once you've confirmed you've definately copied everything - then format the SSD, and use something like Clonezilla or Samsung's HDD to SSD migration tool to migrate the whole install to SSD.

[Kirshy]

You would just need to copy over the folders of data you want to keep.

Once you've confirmed you've definately copied everything - then format the SSD, and use something like Clonezilla or Samsung's HDD to SSD migration tool to migrate the whole install to SSD.

Okay all things seemed solved. I migrated everything important over after formatting the SSD. Shut down the PC. Unplugged original HDD. Booted up into Windows on SSD. All things seemed dandy so I turned it off and plugged the HDD back in. It still has all the crap on it from the original migration but when I go to format it says "The Drive is already in use. Another program or process is using this drive. Do you want to format anyway?". I feel like the first time agreeing to it was part of the cause for why it wouldn't boot up right before. Should I say yes or what. (I'm trying to be REALLY cautious with everything I do to that drive right now...)

[Kirshy]

Update* I still haven't formatted the HDD for fear that there is something currently running on the HDD that is necessary to run Windows on the SSD. I've also noticed sometimes I get an error when I open certain things. Example. When I search for manage audio devices in the Windows 8 search bar it says 

 

E:\Users\"Name of Drive"\AppData\Local\Packages....    Windows cannot access the specified device path or file. You may not have appropriate permissions to access this item.

 

I can however access the audio devices by going directly to the control panel. The drive used in that error is E. That is the drive for my HDD. How can I see exactly what is running on the HDD so I know that if I format it even with that error stated above I will still be able to boot up properly. Any suggestions helpful