My Dell XPS 8950 was left running overnight while installing Arc Raiders through Steam. The download was around 70% complete, and I selected a drive that I believed had plenty of free space. The next day, the computer displayed a "boot failure on device" message. I don't remember seeing any pending Windows updates or driver notifications before this happened. Dell's ePSA hardware diagnostics completed successfully, but attempting the suggested repeated restarts does not open Windows Automatic Repair or Safe Mode—it just returns to the same boot failure screen. The system is running BIOS version 1.20.0, revision ED.3.2.1. What should I check next, and could this be related to a corrupted boot configuration or the system not detecting the Windows drive?
1 Answer
A successful ePSA test is reassuring, but this error can still happen if the BIOS no longer detects the Windows drive or if Windows’ boot files were damaged. Enter the BIOS and check whether the SSD appears in the storage information, then confirm that Windows Boot Manager is the first boot option and that the boot mode is still set to UEFI. If the drive is detected, boot from a Windows installation or recovery USB and try Startup Repair. If that fails, the boot configuration data (BCD) may need to be rebuilt. Installing a game to the C: drive by itself normally does not damage Windows, although a failed update, storage issue, or interrupted write could have caused the problem.
I’m not sure whether Windows or a driver updated while I was away. I only remember starting the Steam download, and I’m concerned I may have selected the C: drive, since I don’t know what the BCD is or whether that could be related.