"The drive where windows is installed is locked. Unlock the drive and try again."

[noly972]

Have an Envy M6-K010DX notebook. Due to an internet problem while upgrading from Win 8 to 8.1, the PC doesn't properly boot and Windows Explorer won't load. Decided to 'Refresh' the OS and went to the F11 restore utilities. When I go to the refresh utility and follow the prompts I reach a message that says, "The drive where windows is installed is locked. Unlock the drive and try again." I've searched support for unlocking instructions and aside from some bootrec commands (that didn't work - probably because I don't have a Win 8 disk) not much is available.

The only access I have for running commands is via the Task Manager and F11 command prompt. What is this 'locked' drive, anyway? Does anyone have any information on this?

[noly972]

This is a follow-up on my previous post.

Lacking any suport or clue how to proceed, I cut my losses and bought a new drive & copy of Win 8.1 in order to have a usable PC. Now, I can continue trying to access my data on the locked drive. Does the joy of owning a PC never end?

HP support needs to address this issue; it looks too much like they're intentionally selling PCs that are unfixable while pretending to provide repair options - a new-age bait & switch.

[Photoray002 · Accepted solution]

Hello noly,

IF you were updating from 8 to 8.1 and the process was interupted during installation, this could corrupt the drive and thus the locked error. "Refreshing" the system would not be the answer as you would need to clean install Windows 8 again. Updating to 8.1 can break the link to the recovery partition, especially if it became corrupted as is indicated.

You would need to clean install with the recovery disks you should have created before you updated to 8.1.

Also, if you do not have the recovery disks, you can purchase a set from HP or install a regular copy of Windows 8 and then update the drivers manually. HP has the Windows key embedded in the bios now.

This forum is used on a volunteer basis and is not maintained by HP Support for substitution of contact.

Your post doesnt look like it was even 24 hrs old before you decided to scrap the original computer?

Im sorry to hear you had to do this.

If you need HP Support, you need to contact them directly for your country or area.

Contact HP -USA Phone Assist | HP® Official Site

Contact HP Worldwide | HP® Official Site

Good luck with the new computer.

Whatever brand or model you purchased now, be sure to create the recovery disks/drive.

[noly972]

Photoray, Thank you for responding. The reason for the rush is that it is actually a friend's PC and she needs it ASAP. No restore disks were made. That one lapse cost me a lot of time until I realized a 'normal' fix wouldn't work. The partition info helped me understand the reason for the problem. I think my frustration comes from reading fixes for problems that sound more like urban myths than real processes. She also doesn't have a backup so the next project is to try to access her data. Do you have any recommendations?

[Photoray002]

Its hard to say if it the data is accessable or if the file system is corrupted or not.

Recuva is a free utility to recover files that are missing due to deleting or reformatting.

Not all of the data will be recoverable now but perhaps most of it is.

If Recuva cannot detect anything, I doubt a paid program will do any better.

You can plug the old drive into a sata port on a desktop PC or you can purchase a usb adapter to use on another laptop.

If you go with a USB adapter, get one thats usb 3.O if possible.

Example: for notebook drives...http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812161005

[noly972]

Thanks for the good info, Photoray. As it happens, I had already gotten a USB>SATA adapter when I picked the drive & Win 8.1 disk. You can't imagine my amazement when both the recovery and Windows partitions mounted and all the files were accessable. It turned out that recovering the data was the easiest part of this project.

Thank you again for your help. I'm going to make your first post the solution and give you a 'thumbs-up'.

[Photoray002]

Thats great news to hear.

Glad it worked out and thanks for the K.

[gleno2]

Hi, I have this same problem of the drive being locked and using a satta hdd docking station have been able to access Volume F anf G but not E where windows is.  Being able to access part of the disk at least implies to me that the disk is not broken but how can I access Volume E where all the data is

Do you think any software will let me access volume E the largest part of the disk, if so can anyone recomend.

Any help would be appreciated? 

I have creted a post, a bit long winded perhaps, under 'P6 Desktop - will not boot'