Windows 7 Black Screen On Boot, Seperate Bootable VHD Works Fine
- by David Osborn
I have a Window 7 x64 install with a bootable VHD (also Windows 7 x64). I was having problems getting my homeserver to do backups (VSS erred) so I ran check disk and used a tool from MS (cleanc2r.exe) to remove an empty Q drive from the VHD that I believe was a result of installing Office 2010 Beta. (All of this was done on the bootable VHD, not the main install.)
Now I can't boot into the main install. It gets past the Starting Windows screen and then goes black. I can still boot into the bootable VHD and everything works fine from there. I have tried to boot the main install in Safe Mode/Safe Mode with Networking/and Safe Mode command prompt and it has the same issue. I ran chkdsk /r on the main install and after doing all the work there was a message about correcting some free space that was marked as allocated and also that it was unable to make an entry into the event log.
I tried the startup repair utility and it found no problems. I don't see the setting for restore to last know good configuration so I couldn't do that.
I don't recall installing anything new to the main install nor having hooked up any new hardware recently.