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New WINDOWS 10 ADK Install Fails to Boot at WINLOAD with ALL May 2021 Releases (20H2, 20H1 and 2004)

Mike Pisano 1 Reputation point
2021-05-28T19:03:58.317+00:00

Our Automated Windows installation which uses Extracted index 5 from the WIM Fails to build with ALL newer\May 2021 builds of 10

We were deploying 2004 May 2020 Release and attempted to use 20H2 May 2021 Which fails

Trying to work our wan back thru the builds we found the newer version of 2004 from May 2021 also Fails along with 20H1 from May 2021. The Last working version I have found is the Earlier 20H2 from NOV 2020

Somebody Broke WINLOAD.EXE After the November Build.

I beg somebody at MSFT to look into prior to LTSC!

Current Behavior:

The windows Setup runs to completion "Copying" to "Finishing up", After the reboot windows Hangs at the teal Flag screen with no spinner.
Even though a new OS, I have tried to fix the MBR and BCD from a PE environment with no luck,

Interestingly if I use the boot menu and try to boot windows it randomly will continue. (usually disable early malware or boot logging)
I have successfully completed the full ADK of 10 after many reboots and am still left with unstable machine. (bootwise)

I fails for Repair OS and

Expected Behavior:
Setup would "Finish up" reboot and the Teal Flag screen would continue with spinner and second phase "Preparing %%" would continue along with rest of the installation.

Hardware
Gigabyte H110N with 6700 CPU 8gb Ram and a Samsung 250gb M.2

OS installed from PE, Win 10 32bit WIM and note install Partition is also formatted with legacy 8.3 filename support

It's not HW, I've tried multiple machines and I can swap back the earlier install.wim and it builds perfectly

Any help would be Appreciated

Kind Regards,
Mike Pisano

Windows for business | Windows Client for IT Pros | User experience | Other
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  1. Mike Pisano 1 Reputation point
    2021-05-30T13:40:54.127+00:00

    Additional Comments:

    Seems like SATA Drives will build fine. with H2.

    I'm reading are tons of issues with previous version about Windows not booting past same Blue Logo screen. during upgrades..

    The initial boot failure and random ability to continue via boot menu really feels like a race condition with the M2/NVME being available.

    Going to create a USB and install manually instead or the network ADK deployment and see how it does..

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  2. Anonymous
    2021-05-31T07:11:07.22+00:00

    Hello there，

    I recommend you to use the windows 10 pro 21H1 iso directly without extraction, since the boot issue happened previously.

    I am also glad to see you are ready to create a USB and install manually.
    Here is the instruction and download link:
    https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

    100938-%E5%B1%8F%E5%B9%95%E6%88%AA%E5%9B%BE-2021-05-28-141005.png

    In addition, may I ask which feature of ADK did you use during mentioned deployment?
    Generally, MDT is used most often

    Best Regards,
    Samson Peng

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  3. Mike Pisano 1 Reputation point
    2021-05-31T17:44:12.023+00:00

    Samson,

    Thanks for the response.

    To follow up on the last installed version of 20H2 from NOV 2020, Before I wipe it with a fresh 21H1 I decided to take all the pending updated on it including the 2021-5 Cumulative 5003173.
    The result was after the install the box froze on the first reboot. Power cycling it did finish up the update and the box has now rebooted about a dozen times without any issues.

    I am going to now attempt to upgrade it to 21H1 and see if it locks up again in the upgrade process. Keep in mind the 21H1 (and all May Rereleases) never worked. If it boots past the blue logo screen without retrying via boot\recovery menu. if Successful, I might create a sysdiff and then install 21H1 from scratch and compare.

    Also as a Prior note on the unstable May install I did install the Samsung M.2 driver which didn't help stabilize the NVME boot, and I also did all windows updates and even ran the Intel updater with everything current.

    Let me know if you have any other suggestions,.....

  4. Mike Pisano 1 Reputation point
    2021-06-02T20:17:26.173+00:00

    So After hours of testing and debugging I have more insight.. and a solution and some direction for MS in solving

    I created a bootable USB with the MS tool with both 32 and 64 bit versions

    The 64bit Versions (EFI and FAT) boot and and bring up the Setup Screen perfectly

    The 32 Bit EFI Stops with Status Error 0xc0000359 with file \windows\setup32\boot\winload.efi which I think is normal for 32 bit.

    The 32 Bit FAT boot Locks up Identically to my issue at the Blue\Teal Windows Flag\Logo screen with no spinner.

    I Will also like to document that again that this is not only an Install issue, but also an upgrade on a Gigabyte GA-H110N
    I can boot and install 20H2.1 from November, and I can't boot 20H2.7 from May and the latest 21H1.
    Also When 20H2.1 gets the cumulative May Update from Windows Update it fails to boot.

    Now in further testing I used an Asus H97I-plus which booted the same USB in 32bit FAT mode to the setup screen?!?!

    I started comparing the Bios options between Gigabyte and ASUS and noticed the Gigabyte has VT-d enabled where it was disabled on the ASUS.

    Enabling Vt-d on the ASUS locks the Boot, and disabling it on the Gigabyte has now completed the install, and multiple machines stuck upgrading are booting reliably again!

    So again All May 2021 ISO releases and the Cumulative May rollup of existing Windows 10 32bit will fail to boot if VT-d is enable in the BIOS.

    I wonder how many users are going to lock up when taking the May update. (especially corporate where 32bit is more common)

    Again - I beg Microsoft to look into this deeper before 2021 LTSC

    Mike

  5. Mike Pisano 1 Reputation point
    2021-06-04T03:57:29.817+00:00

    Samson,

    Always glad to help the community, we all look for posts like these to save the pain like I just went thru.
    Now that I have Identified it, I see numerous posts from other years ago with similar problems... makes me wonder how this issue crept back into a stable build?

    Moving Forward; We are an International company with 400+ machine on the WAN that spans the globe and at least 200 are this machine.
    I can't walk everyone thru BIOS changes across the USA and forget about South Africa, Australia, UK, China, Singapore.....
    We have spent 250k+ with MSVL and Open Licensing, I need a stable build. How can we get this issue looked into deeper from Microsoft?

    Please let me know the best direction.

    Regards,
    Mike Pisano

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