“Default Boot Device Missing or Boot Failed” – What Now?

✴️ My laptop died with a “Default Boot Device Missing or Boot Failed” error. Here's the process I went through to resurrect it.

✴️ Boot device missing
When my laptop failed to boot, I:
* CBooted from external media to see if the machine was working at all.
* Removed and tested the machine’s SSD to see whether it or the motherboard had failed.
* Replaced the SSD and reinstalled Windows.
* Though there was no data loss, restoring an image backup would have been faster than reinstalling.

Chapters
0:00 Default boot device missing or boot failed
0:20 This is just one scenario
2:00 Worst possible timing
2:25 Initial attempts
5:32 The world inside the computer
7:00 Replacement
9:19 Where was my image backup?

More Ask Leo!

#askleo #ssd #failure

[askleonotenboom]

It happened to me at the worst possible time.

[JohnFekoloid]

I first owned a laptop in 2001. Used a bit in school and then 10 Gb hard disk failed, data lost. Now I'm hearing this 21years later. SSDs fail, data lost, unrepairable, and you were "just lucky" to have setup cloud backup. I'm really not impressed with computers.

[boblangill]

A few months ago, I left my desktop at a shop for possible motherboard repair (having trouble getting a card to work in the PcIe slot). I needed to use a program that was only on my desktop so I had them return it Friday afternoon before they'd completed the work. When I turned it on Friday evening, it gave me the boot fail message. The shop isn't open on weekends, so I got into the bios setup to see if could get it to recognize the drive (2TB SATA SSD). I tried a few small setting changes before I discovered Restore Factory Settings. That worked, even though the factory original drive was a 1 TB HDD.

[markanderson]

well said! back up, back up, back up. even backups for the backups. I myself made that fatal mistake 2 years ago, I had a NAS drive for backups. so all my data was on it, then without warning it died.

So painfully I lost most of my data, thankfully I had an older drive that I had replaced for a new one because it was failing. I was still able to retrieve most of my data. I learned my lesson!

So you are absolutely correct that anything can go wrong suddenly and without warning. So yes, one should have more than 1 copy and never put all your eggs in one basket.

[JacobJohnson-lhgx]

I've had this happen to my mechanical hdd on my desktop computer. I had the error boot failed as well, I also tried reformatting it at least so that I can use it again but to no avail. I ended up buying a new hdd, sad to say I wasn't able to back up all the files that was inside my old hdd. That scenario taught me a valuable lesson to always back up your files in the cloud storage every 1 or 2 months, nothing is permanent when it comes to computer hardware. Thank you for covering this Leo, your videos are one of the best and simple to understand when it comes to computers for us not so tech savvy people. Great content as always keep it up!

[MatthewSuffidy]

Well I started watching this thinking like it was 2000. These days however, secure boot, and encryption is another set of problems that I have never had to deal with. I still use legacy boot split win10/Fedora Linux.

[davidwayne]

I have an SSD for operating system and all my data is on a SEPARATE internal 2 t harddrive... and I can use it with any system.. and if my system crashes-- I STILL have all my data, work etc.. and LOVE the setup. I now have it encrypted and TIMESHIFT protected as well as a SNAPSHOT in MX linux.

[sniperpink]

can you remove email andress that be take still deleted bye create same email andress

[kevincoones]

Hi Leo
i was to confident thinking that an SSD wouldn’t even Even though i don’t any Yet.

[lordcustard-smythe-smith]

Just occasionally I've managed to recover a badly corrupted drive using partition software that boots from usb. I'm assuming my gpt/mbr was so badly messed up windows couldn't read anything from it. The software managed to reformat it and I could restore from a backup image. Never had it with an ssd, just nvme drives.

[lucasoorschot]

Did you try the windows setup stick with no drive at all in the laptop?
Would be interesting to know if it blue-screened because of the bad drive or because of not having one at all.

[hishambasil]

Hi Leo, I would like to share an issue I had with an ssd m.2 running on an enclosure suddenly currepted and after my effrot and tries, it turns out that the enclosure was not working properly. so you make a vedio on that issue cause i could not find any vedio or a hint to think about the probable issue.

[Thaleios]

Windows setup doesn't crash if you are missing a drive. It will show no drives available. It probably was trying to access the dead ssd and crashed for a variety of reasons. Good debugging steps though.

[Obie]

I'm having somewhat the same problem with a Ryzen 1600X Desktop with a Aorus B450-M and a 120 gig crucial sata boot drive. The Bios see's the drive but every once in a while the system shows not boot OS. Now, This system isn't set up for prime time media use yet and I do switch off the main power when not using it. My "Temporary" fix is going back in the bios and setting up windows UEFI boot options instead of the drive name itself and if fixes the problem. (The bios forgets changes) The drive is really old but has very little hourly use over the years. (spare startup with fresh Windows 10 pro installed) I'm going to look into replacing sata cable first then the battery to see if this problem goes away. I don't get blue screens but curious if it's hardware or bios related. Thanks for the info Leo!

[larrytaylor]

Wow...a rare failure. I really do need to ask what brand of NVMe SSD failed. Most SSD's have 5-year warrantees now, so, you be able to get it replaced by the manufacturer.
Thanks....Great video.

[davidwayne]

Windows IS a bug.. damn termite!!! Seriously- I've had the same issue- and the power supply was weak- and finally died.

[franciscohorna]

interesting video its wierd yer ssd failed cause its my understanding that mechanical hdd have higher probability of failing thans ssd´s do not saying they cant fail and uer ssd was not even very old as well infact on my lenovo ideapad 510 laptop had to replace mechanical 1tb toshiba hdd cause it failed on me did not even last 3 years on me replaced it with a 2.5 icoolax 1tb ssd so far no failures on ssd and its way way much faster than my original toshiba mechanical hdd hopefully yer new ssd is ok now and working fine

[robertmaxa]

you can get the same error, by disabling the boot flag, in a system using MBR.

[bart]

Did you have to buy a new Windows license, or did Windows accept it as the same hardware?

[markfischer]

Personally I don't like SSDs. I bought what is probably the last laptop, a Lenovo with a 1TB HDD and a DVD R/W internal disc. I can't believe you didn't backup your image on an external hard drive. Personally I hate laptops even though I have two of them. My go to computer is always my desktop. It's got two 1T HDD drives and two DVD R/W drives internal as well as a 2 TB external HD. If you think the cloud can't be hacked, I don't think so. I don't understand why the price of computers, especially laptops has become so expensive.