SOLVED Operating System Not Found

[StarSky12]

Hi, my Acer Aspire One was upgraded to Windows 10. Eventually, I ran into some issues with the start menu not popping up, so I decided to run a clean reset of Windows 10. The reset failed, so I turned off the notebook. When I turned it back on, the message "An operating system wasn't found. Try disconnecting any drives that don't contain an operating system. Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart," popped up. My first option was to try to use either f2 or f12 to see if there was some way to get around the issue, but then I remembered that, recently, my notebook had stopped responding to those commands. I do have a USB Logitech K120 keyboard hooked up to it (since the original keyboard messed up,) but it had been working fine for those commands and such up until now.

Today, I downloaded Win 10 using the Media Creation Tool in an attempt to create a bootable USB drive. I plugged that in, yet it doesn't seem to recognize it at all. The same message pops up as before. My acer doesn't have a CD-ROM or anything of the sort, so the USB appears to be my only hope. Is there anything that I can do? I'm hoping there's a way I can force the notebook to recognize the USB, or at least boot into the f2 or f12 commands to see if I can use them in any way. Thank you.

 

[Trouble]

Try hard resetting your notebook.
Turn it off.
Disconnect the AC power
Remove the battery
Flip it over and press and hold the power button and count to 30 while holding it.
Flip it back over, replace the battery
Reconnect the AC power.
Press the power button and see if responds to F2 or F12

 

[StarSky12]

I just tried it, but, unfortunately, it didn't respond to either of the keys.

 

[Trouble]

Unfortunately I'm not familar with Acer BIOS, but
did you also try Esc, Delete, or other possible function keys, like F8

 

[StarSky12]

Yes, I tried hitting as many keys as possible at one point, just trying to get a reaction out of it. I think that perhaps my best bet is to try to somehow force the notebook into entering that mode, or at least recognizing the USB. The problem is how.

 

[Trouble]

If you are continuing to get the message "Operating System not found" even with the USB ThumbDrive plugged in then I'm going to guess that there is something wrong with the install media contained on the ThumbDrive.
Although the fact that you cannot seem to enter the BIOS or evoke a boot menu, might suggest another problem altogether.
I think I would start with re-doing the boot media.
I would download the ISO from here
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/techbench
Then I would use Rufus from here
http://rufus.akeo.ie/
Then I would first try by setting it to create boot media for UEFI / GPT like this

IF that didn't work then I would change the drop down to MBR partition scheme for BIOS or UEFI #2 above which will in turn change #3 above to NTFS and burn the ISO again
AND
I would make sure that I tried every USB port on the computer each time before switching.

 

[StarSky12]

I will try it; are you saying that the notebook should have recognized the thumb drive anyway? I had assumed that perhaps the problem was that I had to change the boot order or something of the sort. If it was supposed to be recognized no matter what, then that worries me quite a bit.

 

[StarSky12]

I followed the process, but it didn't work. I'm thinking that perhaps it's a boot-order situation, but that complicates everything, since I apparently cannot change the boot order.

 

[Trouble]

I apparently cannot change the boot order

That would appear to be the biggest problem currently, in that you cannot seem to access the BIOS or evoke the boot menu.
Try the hard reset steps again, only this time press and hold the F2 key in advance of even tapping the power button. Don't let go of the F2 key until you see something on your screen.
Also you might want to try your USB connected keyboard in another USB port just to see if there is a problem with the one you are currently using for it.

 

[StarSky12]

I just attempted it, but it didn't work.

 

[StarSky12]

You're not going to believe this. The original instruction, "Disconnect any harddrives," worked for what we're doing. I realized that I could disconnect the one inside Acer, and it finally recognized the USB!

 

[StarSky12]

The problem I'm running into now is that the repair option for Windows is telling me that the drive where Windows is on is locked.

 

[Trouble]

You should be able to use the Command Prompt options to at least copy off your profile folder(s) onto external media before you try anything else.
OR
Is that the Startup Repair option that is giving the error?
That message typically means that the last time that windows ran, it was not shutdown but hibernated instead. Often a product of "Turn on fast startup (recommended)" a checkbox when you define what the power buttons do in Control Panel, All Control Panel Items, Power Options, System Settings.
The disk may currently have read only attribute assigned....
See if you can determine if that is the case from the command prompt type
diskpart
hit enter and type
list disk
hit enter and type
select disk 0 (assuming only one and that disk 0 is the disk that contains your windows installation) hit enter and type
attributes disk
hit enter and see if Read-only says "Yes" or "No"
OR if the disk contains multiple volumes you may have to
List Volume
Select Volume
Attributes volume
In order to find the information.
IF "Yes" you may be able to remove the Read Only attribute with the
attributes disk clear readonly
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc766465(v=ws.10).aspx
OR you could try the Linux Live distro and mount it using the
,ro (instead of the ,remove_hiberfile switch, which I've found doesn't seem to always work) but the ,ro switch does
As noted here http://www.howtogeek.com/236807/how-to-mount-your-windows-10-or-8-system-drive-on-linux/
and copy things off that way.

 

[Trouble]

I realized that I could disconnect the one inside Acer, and it finally recognized the USB!

I was under the impression that this was a laptop with a single hard drive configuration.
I was not aware that it contained a multi-bay / multi-hard drive option.

 

[StarSky12]

I managed to enter disk part, but the USB doesn't appear to be read-only. I suspect that perhaps the main drive is the one that's locked somehow. My only chance may be to find a way to have the USB force a boot into BIOS, and that way I can specify that the USB is to load first. Then, I'd be able to plug the main drive in the notebook before I power-up. I'm hoping that would disable the lock. Since currently I'm attempting to plug the main drive in after the notebook has booted up the USB, perhaps it's not recognizing the drive. I didn't see it on list disk. Maybe that's what the whole locked mess is about.

 

[Trouble]

I'm attempting to plug the main drive in after the notebook has booted up the USB,

Not generally a good idea.
1. Because the interface is not hot swapable
2. There is a dangerous risk of causing damage to the drive and or the motherboard.

 

[StarSky12]

Unfortunately, it appears I'm back where I started, almost. I still have to figure out a way to get to bios.

 

[Trouble]

I'm think'n you need to take that drive out and attach it to another working computer where you can
1. Rescue any data
2. Run chkdsk against it to see if it it bad

Docks and cables made for just such a purpose
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_n...drive+dock&rh=i:aps,k:usb+3.0+hard+drive+dock

And maybe pick up a new drive to test in the system to see if you can boot to the install media and install windows 10 on it.

 

[StarSky12]

A potential breakthrough has occurred. In desperation, I kept messing around with Acer's original keyboard and managed to get it to work for a second long enough to enter f2. Now, I'm finally booting off the USB, so there is some hope. The complication I'm running into now is that, for some reason, the USB's going along very slowly with the Setup process. It's stuck on "Setup is starting." Before that, it took around 10 minutes to even bring up the main screen. And that was after I used rufus again to reinstall the ISO, in case that were a cause, because, initially, I thought it may be from all the repeated shut-downs provoking an error. I'm puzzled but hopeful.

 

[StarSky12]

It's taking forever to even bring up any options. I guess this means something's wrong. No idea whether it's the USB or the notebook. What's weird is that it never took this long to reach the options before, so either the USB itself was corrupted from the shut-downs, or somehow the drive being inserted is messing with the USB. I'll attempt to format it and retry the whole process.