Surface Book 3 - The newest update has completely bricked my Surface Book 3. Is there any hope for me?

Question

Hello, I am desperate for help. Microsoft "support" has told has no known solution. Thank you

Issue:

Since the latest Windows update, my computer will not turn on.

When attempting to power on, I receive the following error:

"Boot Error: Couldn't find a bootable operating system. Check the Boot Configuration to try to fix this"

Support told me to download a "Surface Recovery Image Download" from the website and extract the contents onto a 32gb Thumbdrive. I followed the instruction to boot up the computer with the thumdrive and select the "recovery option"

The computer begins to restart/recover process and immediately stops and goes to a blue screen that says the following:

"Reset this PC. There was a problem resetting your PC. No changes were made." the only option to select is cancel.

Here is where microsoft support says that they know no other solutions and they can only tell me that I no longer have a working computer. I must buy a new computer.

Looking for any help that they might have missed. The computer was working flawlessly before the update.

Details:

Update was the Morning of February 3rd, 2022. I was using my computer normally without a single issue. At about 10am I was prompted to begin the newest Windows update.

I have previously completed every update at the time I am prompted, so I believe I was up to date with all updates.

Device:

Surface Book 3 - 15 in. 512GB i7 32GB with GeForce

Thank you anyone that can help in advance.

My entire business workflow has been devastated. And because of the shortage in supply chain, I can not seem to find a comparable computer available for sale to replace mine

Answer 1

Thank you for reporting this issue.  We are actively investigating. For additional help, contact Microsoft Support

Answer 2

Correct, there is no SSD icon.

Hopefully these images upload to this comment correctly. This is what I see

Answer 3

You're most welcome, SamP87. Just wanted to confirm, after booting your device to the UEFI today, there's no SSD icon?

Please try the methods one more time and see how it goes on the command prompt part.

Answer 4

Hello,

Thank you for the quick reply. No, I have not seen that icon before.

It is to note that my computer was working fine, without any issue during the morning of Feb 3rd, 2022 before the update started. So I believe the issue it solely from the update. There should be no hardware issue.

I was able to get the instructions on how to download the Erase file onto a bootable thumbdrive from a thirdparty youtube video.

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUazixELnDE

When I reboot my nonworking computer with this zipdrive, it does open directly to a command prompt, saying:

"x:\windows\system32>wipeinit"

However it will not let me do anything. I tried typing, pressing enter, nothing on the keyboard will respond.

The trackpad with the mouse is working. But nothing will type into the command prompt.

I will keep trying to restart.

Answer 5

First, you need to secure yourself a Windows running device (it should be working). From there you will convert a clean USB to a bootable USB, please use the methods under "How to create a Microsoft Surface Data Eraser USB stick" (disregard the creation tool part).

If you scroll down, you'll see a download button for Surface Tools for IT:

After you click the download option, check the tick box for the Surface_Data_Eraser_v3.44.139.0.msi.

then continue with the process of converting to a bootable USB.

After you convert the clean USB to a bootable USB, that's where you proceed to How to use a Microsoft Surface Data Eraser USB stick.

Let me know how this goes.