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I am trying for the first time to boot my Windows 8.1 laptop from the internal CD-DVD drive. I have a bootable CD in there, and yes, I do have the bios set with CDROM drive as first in the list to boot from. But when I try to boot from the CD, it won't boot, instead the computer gives me this message:
"ATAPI CDROM has been blocked by the current security policy."
(Its actually a DVD drive.) All it lets me do at that message is hit the Enter key to OK the message, and then it boots from the hard drive.
I have no idea where "security policy" settings are or what they are set for. What do I have to do to get this to boot?
This is a Gateway laptop, 2.2 MHz Intel Pentium processor, 4 GB RAM, 64 bit OS, with Windows 8.1 fully updated, and Windows Defender running and fully updated.
I have already looked everywhere I can find, but nothing seems to address this message or issue, as follows:
*I went to Help menu to look up "Security Policy." While the computer is giving me the message about "security policy," the Help menu has no idea what "security policy" is, it just comes up blank!
*I went to Control Panels/System and Security/Action Center/Change Windows Settings/Smart Screen/... All I found in there that might be involved is a setting to block anything downloaded from the Internet until I give administrator access. Well, the booting issue didn't allow me to give administrator access (yes, I am the administrator) when I tried to boot, I only could hit the enter key to OK. Nonetheless, I changed to: notify me but proceed (not a quote).
With that, I tried again, but it still would not boot from the CD, got the same message, so that setting is not it. I changed the setting back.
I see no other setting there that could be related by even a stretch. And the control panels should be dealing with the OS anyway, and this is happening while trying to boot from the OS on the CD, not the hard drive. That is, this is something in the root.
*I then went into bios area (UEFI Firmware) by sweeping in from the right and into Settings/Change PC settings ..., and found a tab in bios for Security. Looking there, there is a list of things, but it lets me access only "Supervisor Password." It was currently set as "clear," meaning no password. I left it as that -- surely I can't need a password just to boot from a CD, and the message I got in trying to boot from the CD did not allow me to enter a password.
Other settings in the Security tab were not accessible. The only ones they included that might be remotely related were:
*Password on Boot, which was set as no password. But again, the message I get with this issue does not ask for nor allow me to enter a password.
*Secure Boot Mode: Standard (It does not let me access to change that.)
Some others also were in the list that are not worth listing, not even vaguely related.
I then went into some other things elsewhere in the main settings called Startup Settings. The only thing in there that sounded the least bit vaguely related was "Enable boot logging." I punched F2 to go into that, but the machine instead restarted, and did not start from the CDROM, same message again. I went back to it, and it is still listed as Enable boot logging, does not instead say Disable - so I don't know if anything even got changed. I did not touch it again, left it as-is.
So, that's it. I've checked all the settings I know about. Nothing about this bit about "ATAPI CDROM has been blocked by current security policy."
I tested with two DVDs that I have booted from in the past on other Windows machines -- they also would not boot, but they did not give me that message.
I note, all three CDs/DVDs are being read fine by the DVD drive once the machine is booted in Windows 8.1 from the hard drive - so the issue is not that the DVD drive can't read the disks.
Where is this "security policy" set?! What do I need to do to get this to boot from the CD?
Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.
Hi,
So everything is back to normal... or at least working to your satisfaction ?
You seem to know more about manipulating your email than I do, but though I may be able to help by describing what my screen looks like !
I know how that kind of conversation goes... Not so much with Microsoft, but with my internet provider sometimes..
Some hope! I just ran a System Report with Acronis. It no longer sees no empty space on that partition, it sees about 84 GB of empty space now. So maybe chkdsk did fix some of the corruption after all. That's still short by a lot -- it should indicate 321 GB of free space but indicates only 84 GB of free space. So still need to accomplish more.
But this report says nothing for the situation on the external. I previously ran chkdsk on that via Command Prompt -- I wonder if that solved the issue there too?
Here is the piece of the System Report where you can see the Free Block Count. First, the original report. Second the report I just got. Also note on the original one, the second line lists System File Error, and a large number. The new one from today doesn't even have that line, no listing of any System File Errors. Free Block Count on the original is 0. Free Block Count on today's is: 84195642 (321G):
ORIGINAL:
Disk 1 Partition 4
FS: NTFS
File system error: 458777 (F)
FSSize: 941101049 (449G)
BlockSize: 8 (4K)
BlockCount: 117637631 (449G)
FreeBlockCount: 0 (0b)
ReservedSectors: 0 (0b)
FATSize: 0 (0b)
FATCount: 0 (0b)
RootEntries: 0 (0b)
UsedRootEntries: 0 (0b)
InodeSize: 1024 (1K)
InodeCount: 0 (0b)
BytesPerInode: 0 (0b)
VolumeLabel: ................................
SerialNumber: FC 81 5D 3C 98 5D 3C C8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
CheckPerformed: 0
UsefulInformation: 0 (0b)
BadBlockCount: 0 (0b)
FreeInodeCount: 0 (0b)
FilesCount: 0
DirectoriesCount: 1
HardLinkCount: 0
SymLinkCount: 0
BlockDeviceCount: 0
CharDeviceCount: 0
SocketCount: 0
FifoCount: 0
JournalSize: 0 (0b)
TODAY'S:
Disk 1 Partition 4
FS: NTFS
FSSize: 941101049 (449G)
BlockSize: 8 (4K)
BlockCount: 117637631 (449G)
FreeBlockCount: 84195642 (321G)
ReservedSectors: 16 (8K)
FATSize: 0 (0b)
FATCount: 0 (0b)
RootEntries: 0 (0b)
UsedRootEntries: 0 (0b)
InodeSize: 1024 (1K)
InodeCount: 389120 (380M)
BytesPerInode: 0 (0b)
VolumeLabel: Gateway.........................
SerialNumber: FC 81 5D 3C 98 5D 3C C8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
CheckPerformed: 1
UsefulInformation: 269473638101 (251G)
BadBlockCount: 2 (8K)
FreeInodeCount: 20923 (20M)
FilesCount: 289098
DirectoriesCount: 68853
HardLinkCount: 74630
SymLinkCount: 0
BlockDeviceCount: 0
CharDeviceCount: 0
SocketCount: 0
FifoCount: 0
JournalSize: 16384 (64M)
Yes, I understand chkdsk can't make repairs on the drive it is started up from, so reboots to do that during/before the new startup.
But it did not fix all when I used it. There are at least somethings it could not fix.
OK, will get and run defragger. No damage done, so probably will be safe. But I'm not sure you quite understood what I was saying about Win XP might have issues dealing with Win 10 file systems -- although defragging is a fairly limited thing and for that is probably is not an issue, as it isn't changing files, it is simply lining them up.
The Norton thing might be useful.
Will run Acronis this morning and see what System Report now says.
Here are file names of the files chkdsk run from Command Prompt identified as bad on the external machine. That is Win 8.1, and these might have been carried over to Win 10 and be the corruption there. Do you know what these are? These might very well be what is corrupt on the internal drive too. Do you think I should run chkdsk out of Command Prompt on the internal?
-- ICONCA(tilda)4.db -- in Windows/Explorer
-- b2d40.msp -- in Windows/INSTAL(tilda)1 - but INSTAL(tilda)1 was not in Windows when I looked!
-- x264LO(tilda)1. mbt - in AppData/Local/Temp/hb.1440 -- as a Temp, is this automatically available to just delete?
-- WWLIB.dll - in Office 14 -- this is installed, so do you know if this can be deleted without ruining Office?
-- OFFICE(tilda)3.msp -- in -- oh, this is in a file on my desktop! I could get rid of the entire file, burn it is I want ti keep it, whatever.
-- and a font, batang.ttc -- I don't need that, can kill it.
No problem about not responding last night. Hey, you're not at my beck and call. Besides, I went to bed, and didn't expect to pick up an answer before now at least.
Hi,
ChkDsk needs to restart to fix most files... this is because they are probably "In Use" either by Windows, or another program.
The DeFraggler works on Win 10... that is what I tested it on..
It is not actually running on Win 10... Win 10 will not be loaded...
I was concerned that it might mess up Fast Startup, but it did not...
In comparing your Partition Wizard to DeFraggler just as a example...
Partition Wizard is a LINUX based program that is running the LINUX OS when you boot from the CD...
The DeFraggler is a Windows based program that is intended to be installed...
It is instead running off of something similar to the WinRE, which is what you would get froma Windows Repair Disk, or even a installation DVD...
If you see a white bar going across the bottom of the screen, that is what you are seeing... WinRE loading into memory..
In the case of the Hiren's Boot CD, it is using Win XP as the WinRE instead of a newer version... Since it runs from memory as a RAM DISK, it never leaves ant residual files on your HDD..
My only complaint was that it didn't completely defrag the free space...
The actual files were done properly the best I could tell...
With the free space still partially fragmented, a large file like a Image may get fragmented as well, since there is not a large enough segment of continuous free space...
For what you would be using it for, that is not a issue...
When Acronis compresses a image the free space is removed, and then put back when you reload the image...
A number of years ago, I had a issue with a HDD... some kind of corruption...
Nothing was working... As a last resort I ran Norton Speed Disk...
Somehow in the process of defragging the drive, it fixed the problem...
I don't remember if I booted with Speed Disk, or ran it from within windows though.
I just spent around a total of 10 hours trying to get one of my 3TB internal drives working properly... I though it might be failing, and was trying to determine what to do about it...
It worked.. ChkDsk reported no errors... I ran multiple 3rd party diagnostic utilities, and all were normal. But my machine was taking about 30 seconds longer to boot, and if I unhooked that specific drove, the problem went away..
I had a almost brand new 2TB drive that wasn't being used, so I hooked it up through a external SATA connection, and copied the contents of the 3TB to it.... Only about 90% of the DATA would fit, but I had some old images that were no longer needed, and were backed up somewhere else anyway, so I didn't copy them...
I then deleted the partition on the 3TB drive and restarted the machine... It worked properly, without the delay...
It seems there was some type of file table or directory issue that was slowing things down that wasn't showing as a error...
I then copied the contents of the 2TB drive back to the 3TB drive, and everything is still good... It took 10+ hours, but saved me $100 to replace the drive...
I just point this out to suggest what I hope running DeFraggler or something similar will accomplish... I don't know that it will, but there are not a lot of options left...
BTW... sorry about the delay... I went to bed early last night..
sfc /scannow found no errors -- or if it did, it fixed them - it simply said at the end that all was fine.
But chkdsk did find errors -- every time I tried it. It doesn't say it finds errors, but it says something about scanning and repairing during restart, and has me choose to restart now or do it later -- this after it already has run the scan, so I have to think it found something and needs to restart to do the repair. It never says what it finds, it never says all fine. Its a very bad communicator. And it appears it does not get all it find fixed, if it fixes anything at all. And you know that tough one or few are exactly what are causing my problem.
I suppose the real test will be to boot from Acronis and run another System Report and see if it now sees empty space on the primary partition. Hmm, might it be misidentifying the partitions? Maybe it is reading that fragmented one as the primary partition even though it isn't -- maybe it being labeled as Volume is confusing Acronis?
At anny rate, sfc /scannow did not do anything to solve the issue of Acronis seeing no free space on the primary partition. Who knows if chkdsk did. In the morning, I will boot from Acronis and see.
RE Boot CD and Degragger, it occurs to me, this sounds like it must be geared to Windows XP, probably even booting in XP. You ran the defragger, and no problem, just not complete. But if this is geared to Win XP, I would be worried about running that and probably most else on a Win 10 System. That very possibly is why it was not complete, it ran into things it didn't understand because of differences between XP and 10. I think it might be geared to XP: because it has only Partition Wizard 7, we have 9 from 2009, so 7 is earlier than that, likely XP era. It also has that choice you have me making for Mini XP. There we have a mention of XP.
So, I don't have anything else for defragging, and you ran it and no problems, just not complete -- at least no problems you know of so far.
What do you think now about that? You think it safe to run on Win 10?
Also, I was thinking about the possibility the IDE converter to USB is limited in size. Maybe and maybe not, but I don't now think that is the issue about Acronis not seeing all the free space -- this because Acronis doesn't see the free space on the same partition on the internal either, and that definitely has nothing to do with that IDE -USB converter, it isn't even connected now. So Acronis is having that issue, and with the same partition, whether the IDE converter is connected or not. I don't think that converter is the issue.
I will find the box for it, and read everything on it and in it -- but this kind of limitation is the very kind of thing that never gets mentioned anyway. But again, I don't think that is the issue here. It seems more likely there is something going on on that partition that was going on in Win 8.1 (and so in the migrated files) and is now carried over to Win 10. And you have to think it is likely in that corruption is a fault, for lack of anything else to consider.
I can find the list of files identified as corrupt and pst them for you -- would that be helpful? If you know what they were and thew they could simply be killed out, might even regenerate a new, good one, than that might help.
Unfortunately, Acronis won't run a System Report on the external.
