VN7-791G Won't Boot After Windows 10 Anniversary Update

Hello! I realize that my issue is about a month old now, but it is still a catastrophic problem for me. I haven't tried asking a question here, but after weeks of trying to work on the issue with someone on the Microsoft Windows Community forum, it probably is a good idea to see if the issue is something unique to my ACER VN7-791G-78ZM. Here is the issue as I described it in the Windows Community forum:

A couple of weeks back (shortly after my laptop attempted to install the Windows 10 Anniversary Update), my ACER Nitro 17, with both a SSD and conventional Hard Drive installed, bricked itself. By that I mean that the system went through the download and preparation steps, then began installing the update, and shortly after the installation began the screen went black, the system fans came on and stayed on high for several hours (more than 3), and then I finally gave up, forced a power off by holding down the power button, and tried to restart the system. When I attempted a power-on restart the system went to the initial ACER splash screen (indicating that the initial BIOS boot had been completed), and the "rotating circle of death" was displayed for about 5 seconds. After that, the whole power-on boot sequence restarted itself, and the same result is repeated... and repeated... and repeated.... I found that I could use the ACER power hotkey to force the system into Advanced Troubleshooting, but almost nothing there works. Neither Refresh nor Reset work (both return "unable to start" error messages), and System Image Recovery does not find an image to restore to. Likewise in Startup settings I cannot start Windows in any mode. The only troubleshooting tool that appears to do anything is the Command Prompt, which lets me boot to a command window that can only directly access a drive called X:

I created bootable media using the Windows Media Creation Tool on another machine, which provided me with an image of the ISO Win 10 64 bit install disk on a USB stick. I then attempted to boot from the USB drive but instead of getting me to a place that would allow Startup Repair, the system pauses at a window providing this message: "It looks like you started an update and booted from installation media. If you want to continue with the upgrade, remove the media from your PC and click YES. If you want to perform a clean installation instead, click NO." I tried the YES option after removing the USB stick and the system went back to endless boot attempts. I even tried YES, but with leaving the stick in place, and the same thing happens. I wanted to check with everyone here before resorting to a clean install without having my files backed up.

Right now if a repair isn't possible, I want to try to get this system running well enough that I can perform a backup of everything to an external drive, and eventually then get a system properly configured without losing any of my apps or data. If that isn't possible, at least I want to preserve all my files. Doing a clean install before backing my files up, if I understand correctly, will obliterate everything that is currently stored on my SSD. I don't want to do that unless there are no other options.

Anyway, after the above attempts apparently got me to another dead end I forced the system back to Advanced Startup Options, Troubleshoot, Advanced, Command Prompt, and within the cmd prompt window I found that now I could actually change drives from C: to to X: and I can see that most, if not all, of my data and system files appear to be present where they should reside. BTW - I tried to do a System Repair with the USB stick installed once I was in Advanced Repair Options, but that just led me back to the message that I quoted above. I also tried to do a System Repair with a Win 10 ISO image on a DVD. The result was the same.

Does anyone have any way to help me restore a machine that won't boot into Windows? I am beginning to hate this Anniversary Update - everything was working fine until this happened.

Thanks!

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philetus

You are not the only one this has happened to. Many people have the same problem.

I would try using the win 10 media from a DVD. May not do anything different, but worth a try.

MS is telling people to run the startup repair. I imagine you heard that.

If you can't get recovery to work, you could remove the drive with your files on it and plug it into another computer with usb and recover your files, then format the system drive and do a clean install.

Another way to do it would be to create a Windows to go usb and boot the laptop into win 10 on the USB. Then you can access the drives and save your data. I made one of these. It was pretty easy and worked.

You may even be able to repair the laptop from it.

http://www.howtogeek.com/196817/how-to-create-a-windows-to-go-usb-drive-without-the-enterprise-edition/

W_C_B

I actually tried a Win 10 DVD, and that didn't work, either. I have not tried the Windows to Go USB trick, but that HowToGeek article applies to Win 8 & 8.1, but it says they haven't tried it with Win 10 yet.

That said, last night I was frustrated to the point of taking an intuitive, undocumentable action. I was wondering why something could fundamentally prevent the system from booting out of the BIOS and even attempting to start Windows... when a moment of inspiration struck. It occured to me that I should have more functionality in the Advanced Options even in a hung system, since I could see all the files needed to allow Windows to boot were still on my C: drive -- Nothing except the Cmd Window interface was working, as I noted in my earlier post. Well, for years we've all been warned not to change any of the settings in a machine's BIOS unless we know exactly what we are doing, or we risk destroying the system's ability to boot. Sounds similar to the problem I'm having, doesn't it? It also occurred to me that I "ported" my old laptop (an old Win 7 machine) to my new ACER VN7 using a commercial cloning tool, PCMover. I had to monkey with drivers after the fact, but in all other respects it seemed that the move from one machine to another, and coincidentally from Win 7 to Win 8.1 in the process, went reasonably well. Subsequent installation of the original Windows 10 upgrade went off without a hitch, too.

But older Win 7 machines (including my venerable old boatanchor) aren't running UEFI, they're still using conventional BIOS. What if there's a sneaky incompatibility between my cloned Win 7 to 8.1 migration... and something in the UEFI implemented on the ACER was different as a result of that migration? I was speculating - actually shooting in the dark is more like it. But armed with that information I did something very simple. In the UEFI Setup utility that you can get to immediately upon startup by pressing F2, I simply did a Restore Default Settings (F9) and saved the changes.

The system was still stuck in the Boot Loop when I tried to boot after the Restore Defaults, but when I forced Advanced Options again, this time the system allowed me to Roll Back to an earlier version of Windows!!! It rolled all the way back to the initial Win 10 build, but when I allowed a subsequent update to proceed I was successful in bringing back a system running with Win 10, Build 1511. I have a working Windows 10 installation again!!

Tonight if I get even more cocky, I may allow it to try to install the Anniversary Update again. I have absolutely no idea why this worked, but if the Restore Defaults allowed the Rollback perhaps it has changed something that will allow the Ann Update as well. By the way, NOTHING in the UEFI Setup utility appears to have changed setting from where it was when the system hung, to where it is now after the successful rollback, so if there is a parameter that has been changed when defaults were restored, it isn't anything visible on any of the setup utilities' screens.

Wish me luck. ;-)

philetus

Sounds like you did great. A lot of people are having problems whith the Anniversary Update.

You may want to hold off for a month or so.

W_C_B

I probably should have held off, but I couldn't resist the temptation! ;-)

I did a full system image backup onto an external USB hard drive before attempting the update again (just to make sure that I didn't have the same issue with no way of recovering all over again), I re-entered the BIOS/UEFI setup and re-selected the Set Defaults (F9) option, and went ahead and manually updated to the Anniversary Update. I'm pleased to report that I am now typing this post from my ACER VN7 that has been successfully updated to Windows 10 Version 1607, Build 14393.105! I notice that the build number has increased a bit since the last time I tried this update, so perhaps my restoring BIOS defaults did the trick, or perhaps Microsoft got things right in the .105 build that they hadn't properly completed in earlier incremental releases. In any event, the Anniversay Update is now complete on my machine, and as far as I can tell it is fully functional!

I hope I never again have to go through this process just to get an OS update installed! To everyone else who hasn't yet been successful in getting the update to work, I wish you good luck - but try the BIOS Defaults reset if you haven't already done so. It appears to have worked for me!

sharky25k

What I would understand from this story is strange.

So you are unable to change most of the BIOS settings because acer locks the BIOS settings in the firstplace, but somehow the OS is able to access certain settings which are locked in the BIOS and change them. Otherwise I could not explain why you had the issue in the firstplace and how would the default settings fix the issue. I think acer should look on this issue and solve these situations, since it's not something which comes in your mind to restore default settings when you didn't even touch the BIOS, and the OS is bricked.