Windows 10 troubleshoot boot to UEFI settings gone (Win 10 Pro 64 bit)

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Under Win 8.1, I used to be able to do a troubleshooting reboot to get to my UEFI settings. Since removing my former OS and doing a clean install of Win 10 Pro, I now don’t seem to have this option. I have to fiddle with timing the F2 button while powering up instead, which is always a bit of a hit and miss affair. Anyone know where the Win 10 UEFI reboot went?
TIA
Paul

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Under Win 8.1, I used to be able to do a troubleshooting reboot to get to my UEFI settings. Since removing my former OS and doing a clean install of Win 10 Pro, I now don’t seem to have this option. I have to fiddle with timing the F2 button while powering up instead, which is always a bit of a hit and miss affair. Anyone know where the Win 10 UEFI reboot went?
TIA
Paul

Is it Advanced Start Up you are looking for under update and security. Click bottom left icon/type Recovery In “Find a Setting” and then click on Recovery/ then there is a link at the bottom of Advance Recovery Tools “if you are having trouble with PC…..” this takes you to Update and Security/ Advance Startup.

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Is it Advanced Start Up you are looking for under update and security. Click bottom left icon/type Recovery In “Find a Setting” and then click on Recovery/ then there is a link at the bottom of Advance Recovery Tools “if you are having trouble with PC…..” this takes you to Update and Security/ Advance Startup.

That’s where I was in the first place. Doesn’t help, but thanks for verifying I was looking in the right place – in W8.1 it used to be in that general area, but the option seems to have gone, or been moved or suppressed.

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You were in Advanced Startup? Did you re-boot? It should be available when you re-boot from Advanced Startup. See How to Access UEFI (BIOS) Settings on Windows 10, 8 and 8.1[/url] for details.

Joe

--Joe

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You were in Advanced Startup? Did you re-boot? It should be available when you re-boot from Advanced Startup. See How to Access UEFI (BIOS) Settings on Windows 10, 8 and 8.1 for details.

Joe

Thanks Joe. Yes and Yes, and it wasn’t. Here’s some screen photos of the sequence. Sorry for photos, but screen shots only work when logged in…

[*]from the desktop (or anywhere, really) click the start button or the windows key:
41720-DSC_1971
[*]from the start button, click on Settings:
41721-DSC_1973
[*]From the Settings tile menu select Update & Security:
41722-DSC_1974
[*]From the Update & Security menu, select Recovery, then select Restart Now under the Advanced Startup item:
41723-DSC_1976
[*]After clicking Restart Now, the user is force logged off:
41724-DSC_1977
[*]After some wait, the Choose an Option menu is returned. Select Troubleshoot:
41725-DSC_1979
[*]Then I get the Advanced Options screen. The only option is Startup Settings. Select that:
41728-DSC_1980
[*]The only option on the Startup Settings is to click Restart.
41726-DSC_1981
[*] Clicking restart reboots the PC then takes me to the Startup Settings screen:
41727-DSC_1982
[*]From the Startup Settings screen I can go into 9 different startup modes or do a normal reboot, but none of them take me to the UEFI.
[*]So, please, what have I missed? The UEFI setting should’ve been on step 7 above, but its clearly not there. Lots of other stuff in your link aren’t there either.

Thanks again for all the comments. What I’m getting (on a totally clean install – full SSD repartition and reformat during the install process. No artifacts from previous installations present) is not what everyone else is seeing, apparently.

Paul

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One of the aspects of the UEFI interface is that the OS can “speak” directly to the UEFI/BIOS and make changes in the settings, such that the UEFI/BIOS menu doesn’t act like it did before an OS upgrade.

In my UEFI/BIOS (Intel manufactured motherboard) there is a setting that is unavailable to the OS which allows me to insert into the boot menu an option that will allow me to boot directly into UEFI before the OS boot menu ever presents itself. In order to restore this setting, I had to boot into the Intel UEFI Reset Defaults setting, which involves a complete shutdown, holding the start button down until 3 beeps are heard, then releasing the start button.

That allowed me to boot directly into UEFI reset to default. I then went back through the settings and made my preference changes, one of which was the option to boot directly into UEFI. The boot sequence pauses and waits for my input. F2 will take me into UEFI, and ESC will proceed with normal startup.

This option may or may not be available for your motherboard, but it might be worth looking into, in order to restore some personal control to your machine. I don’t have to go through the OS in order to boot into UEFI settings, which is a comfort in the event that the OS won’t boot for some reason.

Always create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates; you may need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do with our systems; we don't need anyone's approval, and we don't all have to do the same things.

We were all once "Average Users".

Computer Specs

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One of the aspects of the UEFI interface is that the OS can “speak” directly to the UEFI/BIOS and make changes in the settings, such that the UEFI/BIOS menu doesn’t act like it did before an OS upgrade.

.

And part of the problem is we have to find out mostly by trial and error WHAT the OS has ‘told’ the UEFI. Every vendor is making their own ‘tweaks’ with little documentation available to end users and non OEM techs.
I am hoping to find a windows based alt to efimanger in Linux

:huh:

🍻

Just because you don't know where you are going doesn't mean any road will get you there.

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One of the aspects of the UEFI interface is that the OS can “speak” directly to the UEFI/BIOS and make changes in the settings, such that the UEFI/BIOS menu doesn’t act like it did before an OS upgrade.

In my UEFI/BIOS (Intel manufactured motherboard) there is a setting that is unavailable to the OS which allows me to insert into the boot menu an option that will allow me to boot directly into UEFI before the OS boot menu ever presents itself. In order to restore this setting, I had to boot into the Intel UEFI Reset Defaults setting, which involves a complete shutdown, holding the start button down until 3 beeps are heard, then releasing the start button.

That allowed me to boot directly into UEFI reset to default. I then went back through the settings and made my preference changes, one of which was the option to boot directly into UEFI. The boot sequence pauses and waits for my input. F2 will take me into UEFI, and ESC will proceed with normal startup.

This option may or may not be available for your motherboard, but it might be worth looking into, in order to restore some personal control to your machine. I don’t have to go through the OS in order to boot into UEFI settings, which is a comfort in the event that the OS won’t boot for some reason.

On my Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro 1370, I have a OneKey Optimizer (ballpoint pen push) button that used to do that. but of course I lost that functionality when I deleted all the SSD partitions to do a clean install. So now I have to rely on the hooks in the OS and/or timing the pushing of F2 at cold boot time to get into the UEFI.Going in via an OS menu is much cleaner and less frustrating and avoids multiple power shutdowns (with risk to disk memory states)

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EasyUEFI is free for non-commercial use.

cheers, Paul

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Thanks Paul
I will check it out! I had seen their WinToUSB product before bur never tried it.

:cheers:

🍻

Just because you don't know where you are going doesn't mean any road will get you there.

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The problem is now resolved….
Firstly, the EasyUEFI program wouldn’t install. It insisted it’d only install in a system that had UEFI – which mine does have.
HOWEVER: my UEFI settings were set to allow legacy boots, with UEFI as the first try. Although Win 10 will install either way, unless UEFI is set to be the ONLY boot option (i.e. no legacy support in the UEFI), it will install without UEFI support and require an MBR partition. When UEFI start ONLY is configured, Windows 10 will install with UEFI support and only on a GPT partition.

I tried setting the UEFI to UEFI start only, but Win 10 wouldn’t start. So I set it back and backed up all my data… Then set UEFI to UEFI-only, again, and reinstalled Windows 10. The installer didn’t like my MBR partition so I had to convert to GPT (a bit of fiddling involved with the diskpart program under Recovery), then everythink went fine with the new clean installation. Following the installation I checked the advanced recovery options and it now shows all the goodies I was missing before, including the boot to UEFI setting.

Once I got all that working, I went back to the UEFI settings and changed it to allow legacy booting as a secondary option and see if it still boots okay. That now works, Win 10 boots fine with UEFI/GPT, and legacy boot is still available at boot time (which I needed for some other software).

Lessons learned: Install Win 10 on a UEFI machine with UEFI-ONLY enabled if you want the Windows 10 hooking into the UEFI. Once the installation is done you can change the UEFI settings to allow legacy start as an option. Systems without UEFI (i.e. BIOS only) of course don’t get these “choices”.

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Does EasyUEFI now install? Does it show what you expect?

cheers, Paul

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Does EasyUEFI now install? Does it show what you expect?

cheers, Paul

Yes, Thanks. EasyUEFi now installs and behaves as advertised. Not so sure that the program is all that helpful though. Easier now to reboot to the real UEFI to make changes there, if needed, but at least it gives me a peek at some of my settings without having to reboot, so I might keep it.

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