Weird Delay On Boot Up

[r2o2]

I have a very weird problem developed on my computer. I built it 18 months ago and it has worked perfectly since then.

The specs are :-

Asus P8Z68-V LX Socket 1155 Onboard graphics output 8 Channel Audio ATX Motherboard
Corsair TX 650W V2 PSU
Corsair Vengeance 16GB (4x4GB) DDR3 1600Mhz CL9 1.5V Non-ECC Unbuffered
Intel Core i5 2500 3.3GHz Socket 1155 6MB Cache
Win7

But after performing a disk clone using Acronis TIH 2011 (and accidentally cloning the primary disk to itself), on booting up from cold there is a weird delay. Normally the boot up times are :-

From power on switch to BIOS sign-on message : 13s
From first see 'Starting Windows' to Windows logo disappearing : 9s
Then boots fast to desktop

But now they are :-

27s/65s
Then boot fast to desktop

The weird thing is if I leave the cloned HDD connected in the computer there is no delay. Only if I disconnect that drive do I get the delay. I don't want to leave this drive in the computer, so this delay is an annoyance.

Everything works perfectly on the computer apart from this.

What could possibly be going on ?

 

[kbp]

Try setting the boot priority for the drives in the bios first. And, what type of drives are you talking about here?

 

[r2o2]

My primary drive is Crucial 256GB 2.5" M4 SSD

The drive I cloned it onto was a 400GB Seagate HDD. This was just for testing purposes on some VM software.

I fiddled round with boot priorities to no avail.

Clearly something is on that Crucial drive that is causing this. Its affecting BIOS also, not just Win7.

This is not a Win7 issue.

I think its the MBR somewhere that has a problem, no idea how to diagnose or fix.

 

[denis280]

The weird thing is if I leave the cloned HDD connected in the computer there is no delay. Only if I disconnect that drive do I get the delay

remove the hdd.then open CMD and run sfc/scannow.come back with result.

 

[Bubbaleone]

My primary drive is Crucial 256GB 2.5" M4 SSD

The drive I cloned it onto was a 400GB Seagate HDD. This was just for testing purposes on some VM software.

I fiddled round with boot priorities to no avail.

Clearly something is on that Crucial drive that is causing this. Its affecting BIOS also, not just Win7.

This is not a Win7 issue.

I think its the MBR somewhere that has a problem, no idea how to diagnose or fix.

This is a Windows 7 issue now; never try to boot into Windows with both the original and cloned drive connected or what you're now experiencing is the result. The BCD (Boot Configuration Data) for both drives is now corrupt, and the Windows Boot Manager/Boot Loader can't work with junk.

The easiest fix is to use EasyBCD to either (a) create a dual-boot menu (with both drives connected), or (b) repair the BCD on each drive seperately (disconnect one of the drives and repair the BCD on the connected drive, then repeat for the other drive). Neosmart has all the documentation, on how to do either of those procedures, available on their website.

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[r2o2]

This is a Windows 7 issue now;
.

And so the extra 14s delay at the BIOS screen is caused by this BCD corruption also ?

I thinked I messed up when doing the clone, maybe the disk signature option or something like that.

Why does having a drive plus its clone installed a problem when BIOS boot options allow selection of the drive boot order, and allow immediate booting to any selected drive ?

 

[haynesr07]

Have you tried flashing updated BiOS and clearing CMOS?

 

[Bubbaleone]

And so the extra 14s delay at the BIOS screen is caused by this BCD corruption also ?

I thinked I messed up when doing the clone, maybe the disk signature option or something like that.

Why does having a drive plus its clone installed a problem when BIOS boot options allow selection of the drive boot order, and allow immediate booting to any selected drive ?

Because the other drive is powered and therefore visible to the Windows boot manager of the drive you chose from the BIOS boot menu. At startup the boot manager parses every drive for boot data and when it "sees" that another bootable drive has the identical globally unique identifier (GUID), it attempts to correct the error by writing additional data to one or the other of the two identical BCD stores. That's why it appears to boot normally with both drives connected, but has the long delay with just one drive connected; the BCD on both drives is corrupt because part of the same "corrected" BCD is now written on each drive. If you want multiple bootable operating systems connected simultaneously you need to have a multi-boot menu, which is the purpose of using EasyBCD. If you don't want to use a third-party app to fix this, then you'll need to learn how to use the native commandline diskpart and bcdedit tools within the Windows recovery environment.

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[r2o2]

Heh Bubbaleone
Thanks for the great info - at least I have some explanation to what's happening here. I will look into EasyBCD when I get time, and try and do a repair.

 

[r2o2]

Oh well too bad it didn't work -

I tried all 3 repair options under EasyBCD Backup/Repair and also tried Write MBR, but everything is just the same !

 

[Bubbaleone]

Oh well too bad it didn't work -

I tried all 3 repair options under EasyBCD Backup/Repair and also tried Write MBR, but everything is just the same !

I've been using EasyBCD for several years and have never seen it it fail when used correctly. EasyBCD is simply a frontend for the two command-line tools, bcdedit.exe and bootsect.exe as well as including additional useful tools and features. The term "frontend" means that it's a GUI representation that offers a simple means of manipulating the MBR, boot sector, and boot configuration data (among others) without one having to be skilled in the use of the command-line or to have in-depth knowledge of bcdedit.exe and bootsect.exe usage.

It would be very helpful in figuring out what went wrong if you post exactly what steps you took in attempting to use EasyBCD. That would include; how thoroughly you studied (and understood) the online documentation covering these operations prior to performing them, how the drive/s connections were configured, which of the two drives you installed EasyBCD on, the order you performed operations in, and whether or not you actually ran the program as Administrator (right-click program icon and select "Run as administrator").

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[r2o2]

I am currently trying to repair original Crucial 256GB 2.5" M4 SSD only. No other drive is in the system (apart from a 3TB data HDD).

I have two cloned drives a 120GB and a 400GB. Connecting either of them stops the problem.

To recap - the problem is a 14s extra delay from power switch ON to see BIOS sign-on, plus a 1 min delay at the 'Starting Windows' logo.

The EasyBCD procedures I followed were basically :-

https://neosmart.net/wiki/display/EBCD/Recovering+the+Windows+Bootloader+with+EasyBCD

I run with an Administrator level account on Win7.

FixMBR apparently does not change partition table. I suspect could be a bad entry in partition table. I tried slightly resizing partitions with Acronis DD to rewrite the partition table - but no effect. The part of the partition table that is bad is maybe unaffected by resize operation.

I think this is some quirk in the system and it may be quicker to completely re-install the drive than solve it.

 

[r2o2]

This is a very long bump, but the solution to this problem was found and posted here:

POST Delay on Asus P8Z68-V LX

I have a strange delay occuring from power on to seeing the BIOS POST screen of 28sec. Asus P8Z68-V LX Socket 1155 Corsair TX 650W Corsair Vengeance 16GB (4x4GB) DDR3 1600Mhz CL9 1.5V Non-ECC Unbuffered Intel Core i5 2500 3.3GHz Socket 1155 6MB Cache Win7 256GB Crucial M4 SSD connected to SATA6...

forums.anandtech.com

Thanks to all who tried to help.