Two Separate Drives and Win11 OS

[Friendly]

Most likely, we are not. Is that something accessible via desktop or boot media?
I read is via desktop, but then I'm not see it

Let’s forget about it for now. I’m thinking that if we have to edit things, it’s not as simple as I hoped, so I’ll just stick with bios. I don’t want to feel more confused than I already do.

[Brian K]

Friendly, the EFI System Partition is in Partition Work. It's usually the first or second partition.

[Friendly]

OK, let me clarify. The EFI you’re referring to is 200MB in size and exists on the SN8100, but not on the 860. If I’m way off base, then sure, we can stop here because I’m clearly lost at this point. But if I’m not wrong, then something is missing… and now I feel like I’m losing a few marbles.

[Brian K]

That's correct. The ESP is only on the 8100.

Take a rest for a while.

[Friendly]

Before I delete the drive and move on to BIOS, I recall that when I restored the image from SN to 860 and installed BootIt, everything worked fine after you pointed out, I needed to tick the option to reactivate. The only issue was that the drive didn’t appear in the menu, so something seems off after resizing, copying the OS, and adding it to the boot menu. Have you tried this recently, or have you been running an older version of BootIt? I’m wondering if the problem lies with BootIt, Windows, or if not, then it is the way I’m going about it. Anyway, you’ve been very patient, and I appreciate that. If I decide to try again, you’ll be the first to know. Thanks again for all your help.

[Brian K]

I tried it today. I resized a 70 GB Win11 partition to 30 GB. Did the BIU copy and booted the copied OS about 10 times. All OK.

[Friendly]

I’m a bit jealous, and I’m not just saying that, but we’ll give it another shot eventually.

Thank you Brian K.

[Brian K]

Leave it for a while. Your computer is a mystery.

[TeraByte Support(PP)]

After having gone back through the thread, here are some ideas on the issues (in no particular order).

It would be a good idea to run chkdsk on the Windows partition before copying it to make sure it’s clean. For example, from a Windows administrator command prompt (it will likely need to reboot to check): chkdsk /f c:

Fast Startup is supposedly disabled on both systems. Make absolutely that it is because it can cause issues like what you’re having. Especially since you’re repeatedly installing/copying/configuring Windows. It would need to be checked each time.

If the system is using a separate drive (or part of a drive) as a cache that can also cause the same types of issues if it gets out of sync or corrupted. If being used, disable it. There is usually an option in the BIOS if this is a feature on the system. Some systems with Intel chipsets have this type of feature, for example.

How old is the system? Is the BIOS current (or as current as can be)? It’s mentioned at one point that there was an “Unable to open BOOTIT.DAT” error message. This can be caused by the UEFI file system not being able to be remounted. It may be that the BIOS isn’t fully supporting BIU (especially if it’s an older system).
https://www.terabyteunlimited.com/kb/kb ... r-message/

In BIU Settings, make sure the “Rename Directory” option is enabled. It should be (just checking). Also, make sure the “Use Boot Item Disk IDs” option is enabled.

Can you open “Scripting” from the BIU desktop and then run ‘exit’ to return to the desktop without getting an error message? Can this be done multiple times without issue (say, 5 times)? Same for IFU (“Disk Imaging” icon on desktop).

When Windows has an issue booting and tries repair mode (like the issue you’re having), you could use the fixboot.tbs script to repair/rebuild the boot configuration files for the Windows that has the issue and see if it helps.

In the BIU boot menu items for each Windows, you could try NOT hiding the partitions from each other. At this point, we’re just trying to remove things that may complicate the setup.

It really sounds like things are working sometimes and not sometimes. It may be that the system is borderline in supporting what BIU needs to function.

[Friendly]

Thanks for your input. I’ll answer some of your questions and possibly try following your suggestions today or maybe tomorrow. I recall a long time ago something wasn’t working, I can’t remember exactly what, but after running chkdsk, I was able to proceed, so I’ll give that a try. Fast startup is in fact disabled, as I always keep it that way. The system is very new: x870 Crosshair Extreme, 9950x3D, and 90GB of fast CL30 memory, so there shouldn’t be any issues. BIOS and all drivers are up to date, and so far, I haven’t been hiding the drives from each other. The “Unable to open BOOTIT.DAT” error occurred when I restored the image to the destination drive and then started deleting partitions, but that stopped after Brian advised me on how to create a 16 MiB MSR and move forward. There are a few small things from your suggestions I’m not sure I’ve tried yet. It would be great if something works, as it makes it much easier to use a separate drive from the BootIt menu. I’ll report back with any changes or findings.
Thanks again.