I recently had an issue where I had used Acronis clone to image Windows 10 from a SATA HDD over to SanDisk SSD and after the cloning the Dell OptiPlex 3040 would not boot up.
I googled and got all the usual answers, run MBR fixes, try cloning with different software and hard drives, update the BIOS, tweak BIOS setting and try different cables/ports and on and on.
Ultimately, the issue had to be with this Dell’s interpretation of the boot record however because I could see the hard drives and boot up with the same hard drives in other computers.
Even if I took a working clone of another Win10 hard drive and popped it into this OptiPlex it still wouldn’t boot it up!!
The real pain was that after I updated the BIOS I couldn’t even get the initial HDD to boot so I couldn’t just leave the client and say sorry, not gonna work, stick with the HDD.
What I ended up doing was speculating that it was a GPT issue (read my blog about Dell’s server issue to see a similar story).
After downloading the Windows Media Creation tool and creating a new ISO, I used RUFUS to create a GPT Win10 bootable USB and re-installed the O.S. and sure enough, Windows 10 was finally bootable.
I still have no resolution for cloning as it is coming from MBR and I could not get this OptiPlex to see Windows 10 MBR, nor could I get it to see MBR at all after the BIOS update (so the BIOS update actually made things much worse).
How I fixed when my Dell Optiplex 3040 wouldn’t boot Windows 10 after a clone
- Download the Windows Media Creation tool here from here
- Run the tool and choose the ISO image option and save the ISO to your local computer
- Download RUFUS here
- Run RUFUS and choose the Windows 10 ISO and select the GPT partition scheme
- Go ahead and create the bootable USB and then use it to either install Windows 10 or use it to try and change the MBR and GPT stuff via the repair tools on the ISO
You may be able to run all those /FIXMBR commands that you see in millions of other blog posts or use AOMEI to try and convert it from MBR to GPT but I ended up just saying fuck it and reinstalled Windows 10 from scratch.
