Help! No bootable device, no legacy, boot priority order empty Swift SF315-41

MC1975

Hi all,
Hoping that someone can help me. I have a Swift SF315-41 laptop which worked fine up until yesterday. I went to switch it on and it was in an endless boot loop and then the “no bootable device” image appeared and has stayed. I’ve gone into BIOS, and tried F9 to load default settings, I’ve tried resetting the battery, I’ve tried pressing and holding the ALT+F10 keys whilst pressing the power key, and none of these have worked.

The BIOS Information tab identifies the HDD, but the Boot priority order is empty. There is also no legacy option.

What else can I do? I desperately need my laptop to work!
Any help would be appreciated!

Thread was edited to add model name to the title

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Easwar

Hi MC1975,

It's look like HDD is showing in the BIOS page so it may be the OS issue. I suggest you to try resetting it once again.

MC1975

Hi Easwar,
What do you mean resetting it again? Sorry, I’m not very techie!!
thanks!!

Easwar

Hi MC1975,

# Reset the unit, (It will remove all the data--->Unit goes to Day 1 of default version)

1. Turn OFF the unit.

2. Press and hold Alt+F10 keys(without releasing the keys) ---> Trun ON the unit.

3. You will get a blue screen(Title Choose an option). (Release the keys)

4. Click troubleshoot option.

5. Click on Reset this PC.

6. Go with the option (Keep my files/Remove every thing)

7. Then follow the on screen instruction.

Check this T/S and post the result.

billsey

There have been a bunch of different SF315-41 models, Which one is yours? What type and size of drive is in it? You will get a "no bootable device" error if it's not able to load the EFI partition, which can be from a corrupted partition (theoretically some malware packages can cause that) or a failing drive. Since yours was going through problems with the Windows load before completely failing I'm more inclined to think it's the drive...

ttttt

@MC1975

You have tried holding down ALT+F10, but I think for your laptop it may be ALT+Fn+F10 at bootup. Your laptop has no optical drive. If ALT+Fn+F10 doesn't work, you still can use an external USB interface DVD drive( about US $30) with repair disc or a bootable USB repairing flash drive to bootup and get a restore menu similar to the one @Easwar said.

This kind of “no bootable device” message can frequently be associated with loose connection to the HDD/SSD. Since I frequently changing SSD/HDD inside my desktop, I get this kind of message quite often. Try re-seat the HDD/SSD connection ( and clean the connector as well).

If everything fail, then replace the HDD/SSD.

MC1975

Thanks everyone for your advice. I’ve tried pressing and holding Alt+F10 keys and ALT+Fn+F10 at boot up and I still get the “no bootable device” image appearing on both counts. I’ve also made the rookie mistake of not backing up my files so if the hard drive is the problem, then I will lose everything... I was hoping that wasn’t the case!!!

Commodore_1995#

Does ssd or hdd appear in the information tab of the bios?

Easwar

Hi MC1975,

It looks like hardware issue. Contact acer tech support,

https://www.acer.com/worldwide/

Or

Book the unit for repair service,

https://customerselfcare.acer.com/CS2/#/

MC1975

I did contact acer support and I explained my issue, I was just told to just get a new hard drive. I was expecting them to give me some options, or talk me through what else I could try before going down that route. Unfortunately, they weren’t much help at all.

ttttt

@MC1975

If you have decided to change the HDD, why bother contacting Acer?

Just go buy a 2.5" SATA3 Solid State Drive with the capacity and price that you like ( take this opportunity to change from an old style spinning HDD to a SSD) from Amazon or other electronic stores. Old spinning HDD has sequential read speed close to 105 MB/s, while SSD has 550 MB/s.

Go to Youtube and find videos about replacing HDD/SSD of your laptop ( or similar models). Changing HDD/SSD is usually pretty easy.

If your laptop has a M.2 slot( I haven't checked your model yet), go change for a M.2 NVMe SSD, that may go as fast as 3,400 MB/s.

ttttt

@MC1975

Oh, you haven't mentioned whether you opened up your laptop and cleaned/ reseated the connections. This is usually pretty easy, even for non-technical people.

MC1975

@ttttt
i contacted acer before writing this post, to see if they could help me. They didn't suggest any possible ways to retrieve my files or get the laptop starting again, hence why I wrote this post. I thought I would have better luck here.
im still trying to find a way to retrieve my files, before changing the hard drive.
and yes I have opened up the laptop, cleaned connections, reseated them but still does nothing.

ttttt

@MC1975

Since you can still see your drive from the BIOS, maybe you can try one more thing. Go borrow a bootable USB with Windows in it from a friend. If you can use another PC, go to the Microsoft web site and download the Windows 10 and create a bootable Windows 10 to a USB flash drive, and then boot from there.

Here, we are trying to use the bootable USB flash drive ( or if you have the external DVD drive and a Windows 10 Repair Disc) and get to the Restore Menu and its "Startup Repair" section. Hopefully that will repair the boot sector of your HDD. If he HDD is not really dead, there is pretty good chance the boot sector can be repaired.

I believe that's the last thing you can try to recover your HDD and data before declaring the HDD dead. If data are really too important , paid professionals who can recover data from dead drives at an expensive price.

In the future, don't forget to do system image backup once every couple months.