What does “no bootable device found” mean?

That the machine started up correctly, went looking for something to boot from, and found nothing usable. It says nothing about your files — boot files occupy a few hundred megabytes, and everything else on the drive is unaffected.

What should I check first?

Unplug every removable device — USB sticks, SD cards, phones, external drives — and restart. The firmware trying to boot from one of those is genuinely the commonest cause, and it takes thirty seconds to rule out.

How do I know if the drive has actually failed?

Enter the BIOS and see whether the drive is listed. If it is, the hardware is communicating and the problem is boot configuration or damaged boot files. If it is absent entirely, that is a connection, controller or drive fault.

Almost certainly not. Booting and reading are separate things — the operating system failing to start has no bearing on whether your documents and photographs are intact. They usually are.

Should I run Startup Repair or reinstall Windows?

Not before securing your data. Both write to the drive, and if the real problem is a failing disk rather than damaged boot files, that is hours of writes on hardware that may not survive. Copy your files off first.

Can I get my files without the machine booting?

Yes, and it is usually straightforward. Remove the drive and connect it to another computer with a USB adapter, or boot from a live USB and copy the data off. The broken operating system stops mattering once the drive is being read directly.

Boot errors · diagnosis

It started fine. It just found nothing to boot from.

By the time this message appears, the machine has powered up, passed its self-test and reached the firmware. Only the last step failed. And boot files occupy a few hundred megabytes — everything you actually care about sits elsewhere on the disk, unaffected.

Failing drive recovery →01223 655015

Four causes, ranked

Check BIOS first

From £300 +VAT

// the short version

It looked, and found nothing.

About half the time the disk is entirely healthy and something about where the firmware was told to look has changed. The other half it is failing — and the BIOS will usually tell you which.

BIOS

Check here first

UEFI/Legacy

Mode matters

48 hr

Free diagnostic

£300

From, +VAT

×Don’t run Windows Startup Repair or reinstall as a first move. Both write to the disk, and if the drive is failing or the partition table is damaged they can overwrite the structures a recovery would use. Establish whether the drive is even visible before anything writes to it.

// a boot message

not necessarily a dead drive.

This appears when the machine's firmware has looked for something to start from and found nothing it recognises. The drive may be entirely healthy — what has failed could be the boot configuration, the partition table, the boot order in BIOS, or the drive's connection.

It is worth separating two questions that people tend to merge. Can the machine start, and can your data be read? Those are different, and the second is usually a great deal more achievable than the first.

If the data matters more than the machine, do not attempt repairs first. Startup repair, boot record rebuilds and reinstallation all write to the disk.

// what to check

In this order, before repairing anything.

Is the drive listed in BIOS? If yes, the hardware is alive and the problem is the boot configuration or partition structure. If no, it is hardware or connection.

Has anything changed? A firmware update, a new drive fitted, a BIOS reset or a change from Legacy to UEFI all cause this without any fault at all.

Is it making noise? Clicking or grinding alongside this message means mechanical failure. Switch it off rather than continuing to try.

Do you need the machine or the data? If it is the data, stop here and take the drive out. Repair attempts write to the disk and can make recovery harder.

// questions

Answered.

Only if you are prepared to risk the data. It writes to the disk, and on a failing drive that write frequently cannot complete.

Hardware, connection or firmware. Try a different cable and port first. Silence from a mechanical drive usually points at the board.

Frequently a partition table or boot record problem rather than a dead drive. The data is usually intact underneath.

From £300 +VAT for a single drive, fixed in writing after the free diagnostic.