I have a problem with the boot drive letter after cloning my C: drive to SSD.

When I rebooted my PC from the new SSD I get a message the some files are missing and that windows needs to be repaired. I could open the command prompt and using regedit I found that my boot drive is now X:  not C:.

With the Paragon Hard Drive manager program I can change the drive letter back to C:, reboot and everything works just fine.

But the problem comes when the PC is shut down and/or restarted, the registry change was not saved. I get the same start up problem and the letter for the boot drive is back to X:

I have created a restore point, doesnt help  problems still  there at boot time. I have made an export and import of the registry key, no change.  No error messages it all seems OK. I have  checked security permissions, but I seem to have administrator access everywhere. Could I have missed something there?

Simple question is: How do I get the right values to stay in the registry?

Hi enigma_lh,

"I have a problem with the boot drive letter after cloning my C: drive to SSD."
How did you do that?
I am afraid cloning the system image is not a supported official method to replace the hard drive.It may result in unexpected error message.
To replace the hard drive,we can work with the system image.
Here is a link for reference(It is also applied to Windows 8.1 machine):
Video: Restoring your PC after a hard drive failure
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-HK/windows7/help/videos/restoring-your-pc-after-a-hard-drive-failure#tab=system

Best regards

I used the software provided by the manufacturer of the SSD (Samsung). And I do not expect any problem with that. Anyhow I have now solved the problem myself. I found out that windows restore the registry from files kept in C:\windows\system32\config\regback when the system is restarted. But the registry files are not always copied  as backup  when the system is shut down

But the backup files are updated if you run maintenance from the control panel manually. I did just that,  and now my system is running fine, and booting from my new SSD drive (as drive C: )

• Proposed as answer by MeipoXuMicrosoft contingent staff, Moderator 4 hours 53 minutes ago

I used the software provided by the manufacturer of the SSD (Samsung). And I do not expect any problem with that. Anyhow I have now solved the problem myself. I found out that windows restore the registry from files kept in C:\windows\system32\config\regback when the system is restarted. But the registry files are not always copied  as backup  when the system is shut down

But the backup files are updated if you run maintenance from the control panel manually. I did just that,  and now my system is running fine, and booting from my new SSD drive (as drive C: )

• Proposed as answer by MeipoXuMicrosoft contingent staff, Moderator Wednesday, May 13, 2015 2:28 AM

Hi enigma_lh,

I am glad the issue has been resolved by yourself and thanks for updating.
Please pay attention that cloning the windows system with the third party tool is not an official method to replce the hard drive. This may result in unexpected behavior. It is recommended to work with the method in the link as I posted before to replace the hard drive.

Best regards

I would gladly have followed the recommended procedure, but when I tried to do that I got en error message that some files was missing and a system repair disk could not be created.

I couldn't figure out which files where missing, and I still do not know how to fix that problem without having to reinstall all my programs, and that would have taken days.
Mybe now it is time to ask how can I repair windows so I can make a repair disk?

Hi enigma_lh,

Since you have cloned the system and it is not an official method to replace the drive.I am afraid it is not supported.

Best regards