Question

Difficulty: MediumTroubleshooting Windows OS Startup and Boot Errors

A technician is troubleshooting a UEFI-based Windows 11 desktop computer that fails to boot following an sudden power disruption. The boot screen displays the error message: 'The Boot Configuration Data for your PC is missing or contains errors.' The technician boots into the Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) Command Prompt to manually reconstruct the boot files on the hidden EFI System Partition (ESP). Which TWO steps should the technician perform to successfully repair the system bootloader? (Select TWO.)

  1. Use the diskpart utility to select the hidden EFI System Partition and assign it a temporary drive letter.Answer
  2. Execute the bcdboot command referencing the Windows directory and the assigned EFI System Partition drive letter with the UEFI format flag.Answer
  3. C
    Run the bootrec /fixmbr command to write a new Master Boot Record code to the system drive.
  4. D
    Execute bootrec /fixboot followed by sfc /scannow targeting the boot sector volume.

Answer

To repair missing UEFI BCD files, the technician must use diskpart to mount the hidden EFI System Partition with a temporary drive letter and then run the bcdboot tool to regenerate the boot files on that partition.
UEFI-based systems store boot files on a dedicated FAT32 EFI System Partition (ESP). Because this partition is hidden without a drive letter, mounting it using diskpart is a required initial step. Once mounted, the bcdboot command copies clean system boot files from the Windows directory into the ESP volume, resolving BCD corruption.

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Open diskpart in the WinRE command prompt, list volumes, select the FAT32 EFI System Partition, and assign a temporary drive letter (e.g., assign letter=S).
The hidden EFI System Partition becomes accessible via a standard volume drive letter.
Command-line tools cannot write boot structures directly to an unmounted hidden partition.
2
Run the command 'bcdboot C:\Windows /s S: /f UEFI' (assuming S: is the assigned letter and C: contains the Windows directory).
Fresh BCD files and EFI bootloader components are copied to the EFI System Partition.
The bcdboot command rebuilds the entire BCD store and UEFI boot files required for system initialization.

Key Concept

Rebuilding UEFI Boot Files using Diskpart and BCDBoot in Windows Recovery Environment
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