Suddenly cannot boot into Windows 11 dual boot set up

[rotund iron]

I recently noticed that my pc was skipping the grub menu and when I first started troubleshooting I opened the boot menu it listed two Ubuntu boots and running either would take me to my mint environment, but now I only have the one option. I tried following old posts that got resolved on this discord and guides on youtube but nothing has worked.

[chilly owl]

can you boot Windows 11?

if yes, then make certain fast startup is off via method one in the following:

#1193345280733622272 message

then try again

if still not, use Mint live usb , get to live desktop, and run boot repair tool

[rotund iron]

I can't boot windows at all, I have also tried running boot repair tool

[chilly owl]

see in the BIOS settings, UEFI boot list

(if ur thing is post 2014, UEFI system)

and see if Windows Boot Manager is listed, and put it to the top of boot list

[rotund iron]

There is no windows boot manager

[chilly owl]

oh.

show bios pic

of boot category

[chilly owl]

looks decent. check in UEFI Hard Disk Drive BBS Priorities.

it may show windows boot manager there, along with ubuntu

[rotund iron]

No just Ubuntu

[chilly owl]

ok, can u boot the live linux USB up to a working desktop?

then from there, open the DISKS app (gnome-disks) and show the hard drive selected

[rotund iron]

this is drive that had windows on it

[chilly owl]

alright. click on the "partition 2" 134 MB fat

see if it lists it is EFI system partition.

[chilly owl]

then click on "partition 3", then the play button, then the blue text (which will open a file manager) ensure all ur windows core files are there to run the OS

[rotund iron]

what would the core files be?

[chilly owl]

like all the stuff in the Windows folder

just a quick browse to see it's roughly all there

and not blown into dust

[rotund iron]

yeah there's a bunch of folders some have content others don't, there's a boot folder and it has files in it

[chilly owl]

good, now which drive contains your linux OS ?

[rotund iron]

this one

[chilly owl]

ok. and that one boots just fine?

[rotund iron]

yeah

[chilly owl]

show the ST2000 drive in DISKS

and did u have a third OS between all of these?

[rotund iron]

no the third drive is extra storage for windows

[chilly owl]

show the sandisk one too for good measure

[chilly owl]

ok great

boot into the Mint install as u would normally do

one of those two EFI partitions contain microsoft data (or they used to)

as in a Microsoft folder, with the critical Widnows Boot Manager EFI files

[rotund iron]

I am on my mint install now

[chilly owl]

ok so show the CT2000 drive in DISKS

[chilly owl]

good. when u click the blue text, it opens File manager. do u see any Microsoft folder shown there?

[rotund iron]

i got a pop up saying I do not have the permisssions to view the folder

[chilly owl]

do alt-F2, then sudo nemo

once root nemo opens, do ctrl-L and put /boot/efi and hit enter

[rotund iron]

sudo nemo doesn't seem to do anything

[chilly owl]

do it from terminal

or if ur on xfce, then sudo thunar

[rotund iron]

ok that worked

[chilly owl]

see if only ubuntu or more stuff

[rotund iron]

efi contains a folder called efi, which contains a folder called BOOT and another folder called ubuntu, I believe its all ubuntu

[chilly owl]

alright then.

now do same for the nvme

see what's in its efi partition

if it has Microsoft folder with some efi files, then that's a good sign.

can also do sudo os-prober from terminal, and show results.

[rotund iron]

the folder doesn't have anything in it

and the os prober didn't give any result

[chilly owl]

damn.

so the EFI partition of the nvme (your windows drive) is empty?

[rotund iron]

yeah

[chilly owl]

when viewed from file manager

that sounds more like a Windows .. or maybe user f-up

but u can rebuild it

you'll need a Windows 11 install ISO

just slap it on your ventoy

boot it up, then u can do some command prompt magic with the following.

[rotund iron]

I could have done something I'm new to linux and dual boots

[chilly owl]

I would recommend though that after u put win 11 iso on ventoy, u shut down, and unplug both the ST2000, and the CT2000 drives

[rotund iron]

I already have an iso ready so I'll boot that up

[chilly owl]

less chance of messing anything up that way

then follow this from timecue to very end. https://youtu.be/CZ17JrgFFhw?t=548 (9:08) CyberCPUTech vid on how to fix trashed Windows EFI partition

when u get it fixed, make sure u turn fast startup off exactly as detailed in my first reply in this thread.

[rotund iron]

that'll be difficult cause one is covered by my gpu and the other by my cpu cooler

[chilly owl]

they seem like sata drives. u can unplug a cable from either end

obv. the nvme stays put

since that's what ur repairing thru the vid above

[rotund iron]

the ct2000 is an nvme

[rotund iron]

thats fair I'll take a look at it at another time cause its getting late, I really appreciate the help and patience I was struggling with this for a while

[chilly owl]

np. it should go staightforward from there

then after the smoke clears and win fast startup off, run sudo update-grub from linux install, and it should detect the fixed efi, and add windows to grub

u should be able to boot Windows from BIOS right after the vid.

[rotund iron]

I followed the video and the first command bcdedit yielded "the boot configuration data store could not be opened"

[chilly owl]

keep going with it

i said watch full from timestamp to end

[rotund iron]

Yeah continued with the video and now when I try to boot windows it gives my a 0xc0000098 error

[chilly owl]

if you rebuilt the Windows EFI using the generic method he demonstrated, and there's still error, then the Windows install itself is probably trashed. You could try the SFC system file checker thing he mentions at the end of vid (separate vid)