Flickering Login Screen After Cloning HDD on Windows 10

Flickering Login Screen After Cloning HDD to Larger HDD on Windows 10

If you have decided to clone your old, dying 1TB HDD to a new 2TB drive, you may encounter issues with the boot process, such as a flickering login screen. This article will discuss the possible causes and solutions for this problem, specifically when using the OpenSuperClone tool via OSC-Live for the cloning process.

Symptoms

After cloning the HDD to a larger one, you may notice the following symptoms:

• Flickering login screen
• Boot issues
• Slow boot process

Causes

The primary cause of this issue is the difference in partition table formats between the old and new drives. The old HDD may have used the Master Boot Record (MBR) format, while the new drive might use the GUID Partition Table (GPT). This discrepancy can lead to boot problems and the flickering login screen.

Solution

To resolve this issue, you will need to:

1. Convert the new drive's partition table format to match the old drive's format.
2. Fix the boot process.

Step 1: Convert the partition table format

You can use the built-in Disk Management tool in Windows 10 to check and modify the partition table format.

Using Disk Management

Press Win + X and select Disk Management from the menu. Right-click on the new drive (usually Disk 1) and follow these steps:

1. Select Convert to MBR Disk (if the old drive was MBR) or Convert to GPT Disk (if the old drive was GPT).
2. Restart your computer.

Step 2: Fix the boot process

If the partition table format conversion did not resolve the issue, you may need to fix the boot process using the bcdboot command.

Using Command Prompt

Press Win + X and select Command Prompt (Admin) or Windows Terminal (Admin). In the terminal, execute the following commands:

1. diskpart

   This will open the DiskPart utility.

2. list disk

   Identify the new drive (usually Disk 1).

3. select disk 1

   Select the new drive.

4. list partition

   Identify the EFI System Partition (usually Partition 1).

5. select partition 1

   Select the EFI System Partition.

6. assign letter E

   Assign a drive letter to the EFI System Partition.

7. exit

   Exit the DiskPart utility.

8. bcdboot C:\Windows /s E: /f UEFI

   Replace C: with the letter of your system drive and E: with the letter assigned to the EFI System Partition.

When cloning an MBR-formatted HDD to a larger GPT-formatted HDD using OpenSuperClone via OSC-Live, you may encounter a flickering login screen. To resolve this issue, you need to convert the new drive's partition table format to match the old drive's format and fix the boot process using the bcdboot command.

References

• Master Boot Record (MBR)

  Microsoft Support: About Master Boot Record (MBR) and GUID Partition Table (GPT) partition styles

• GUID Partition Table (GPT)

  Microsoft Support: About Master Boot Record (MBR) and GUID Partition Table (GPT) partition styles

• bcdboot

  Microsoft Docs: bcdboot Command-Line Options