HP laptop 15-ef1xxx does not boot from ssd drive buts pass all tests

[Carlschmitt]

problem  it will not boot from SSD drive.  It diagnose the drive and tried to repair, but can't. I tried resetting OS and save documents but recovery doesn't work -- also tried from network recovery but comes back with error.  Tried to back up to a copy of the system several days before it happen, but it couldn't do that either.  Need help without losing my document folder.  I have no way to produce a USB booting drive either -- it the only PC I have.

[WAWood]

Did it have another drive in it that it DID boot from, and you replaced that with an SSD?  Or is the SSD the original system drive and it has now gone bad?\

The problem with retrieving the files from your Documents folder is that ownership of those files is assigned to your user-id in Windows, and that is not actually the Name you have it.  Instead, Windows took that name and a hashing algorithm and created its own INTERNAL name for ownership of that folder and even if you do retrieve those files, when you copy them to a new PC, I think ownership will be retained and you then won't be able to open them.

What I have done in the past is use a third-party data recovery tool to retrieve the files and then copy them to a USB stick.  I have never had problems copying those files to a new PC or new drive and then reusing them.

The tool I used is GetDataBack from Runtime software -- but I don't think they have a free version -- and I did it by removing the drive from the PC, connecting it to another PC, and using that tool to retrieve the files.