Windows
Windows
I've posted in the troubleshooting section a couple of times recently, but at this point I'm just going to do what I know which is to reformat my boot drive and reinstall Windows 10 from scratch. But how did I get here? Well, I haven't had many problems with my PC since I built it back in August, 2018 aside from some GPU driver issues and some CPU instability due to an aggressive overclock, but nothing that I couldn't handle. Within the past week, however, it has been nothing but trouble, and I have nothing to blame other than Windows. First, I had a problem where my audio outright stopped working which I have documented in this thread here . This would prevent me from starting numerous programs so I had to reinstall windows, although I maintained my personal files. After I reinstalled Windows, everything appeared to be fine, aside from a networking issue which I have documented in this thread here . I ultimately decided last night that I would try a dual boot with Ubuntu to see if the problem persisted, but it was already late so I put it off to today. I shut my PC down for the night, and when I went to start it up, it booted into the motherboard graphic and told me that there was a boot error and that it was trying to repair such. Nothing seemed to work and so I went and found an online guide. I ran some diagnostics with the command prompt, and although none of my files were corrupted, I discovered that Windows was not recognized as being installed despite all of the files still being intact and my boot drive and subsidiary drives still being fully functional. I created a boot stick with my Laptop and got into Ubuntu, double checked that all of my files are okay, and then installed Ubuntu permanently on a separate hard drive so that I have something in the future to boot into. I'm now planning to format my Windows boot drive and install Windows from scratch to see if it will finally play nice with my PC. I have no idea what happened other than that some recent updates must have messed something up, and I consider this experience to be unacceptable as most users are far less knowledgeable than myself about PC's and would be helpless in this situation. If anyone knows what could have happened, please let me know. I haven't formatted anything yet as I'm curious to see if this is a known issue, but I will be doing such later tonight.
I didn't encounter any problems with Ubuntu or my BIOS, which makes me think—especially since my motherboard is just six months old. If something was wrong, it's unlikely to show up now.
Typically, Windows issues stem from hardware faults. Poorly configured hardware like a faulty CPU, RAM, or GPU can cause these problems. Sometimes the RAM itself is defective—using only one stick for testing is advisable. Motherboard defects are another common cause. Trying to install Windows on hardware with existing issues usually leads to failure. If you encounter hardware problems, you risk losing your data because the installation may not succeed. Based on my experience, a reinstallation isn’t a magic fix; the installer simply recreates the same files. It’s not like copying a VHS tape—your files will retain their original quality whether you reinstall, cleanly, or on a different drive. You might compare files with a tool to verify differences if you suspect a distinct installation outcome. Prioritize checking hardware stability above all.