Restore win 10 with USB without bitlocker

@davcbr  I’d recommend using standard Windows 10 installation media from Microsoft rather than Dell. Then just delete all existing partitions on the disk before telling Windows to install to that disk. It will automatically create the necessary partitions. BitLocker won’t enable automatically. That only happens because Dell pre-provisions it to enable if you link your Windows account to a Microsoft account, but that isn’t a default configuration. If you do decide to use Dell media, then do NOT link your Windows account to your Microsoft account (at least not initially) and then go turn off BitLocker, which you might find is shown as being enabled in a suspended state. Or the factory restore media might not pre-provision BitLocker at all. I’m not sure since I’ve never used it.

In terms of recovering files, you need to be able to unlock the current BitLocker partition somehow — ideally you would have your Recovery Key that's designed for this purpose, possibly backed up to the cloud in your Microsoft account. If you can’t unlock it, then you can’t access your data. There’s no back door because if there was, then the hackers could use it. The Recovery Key is what you’re supposed to have for this situation.

@davcbr  Adding a bit to my post above, BitLocker isn't something that you disable in the BIOS.  BitLocker is enabled on a per-partition basis, and formatting the partition would get rid of it (along with your data, of course).  And again, this isn't something that Microsoft would ever enable automatically, nor did they in this case.  This is due to how at least certain Dell systems are configured by Dell at the factory.  In terms of your reference to Macrium Reflect USB media sending your system into a boot loop, I'm not sure why you feel that your bootable media caused that.  Simply booting your system from an alternate device will not cause it to end up in an endless boot loop whenever you try to boot from the normal device (the internal drive) afterward.  And as it happens, I'm a big user of Macrium Reflect, so just trying to use that to create an image backup would not damage your system.  If on the other hand you meant that your system got stuck in a boot loop and that's why you're trying to capture an image of it using Reflect, that would make more sense, but that's not clear from the way your post was worded.

I have never had anything like this happen to me before, and I have been using computers since 1979.

I created a Macrium] WinPE 10 uefi  on a 1GB usb stick on my windows 7 laptop.  I then tested it [boots mbr/uefi].

This seemed straightforward to me, I have used Macrium in the past.  My thought is that I had not studied this machine the way I should have.  I went through the bios, and saw "secure boot" and did not really know what it meant.  I left it on, used F12 and macrium booted.  However, the mouse did not work, and using the keyboard was not "friendly".  I pulled the usb out and shut it down.  Upon reboot, I was into the repair loop.  All I can think is that pulling it out did it in, but why no mouse?  I was able to boot with this device again and I had a usb mouse that worked.  I did use it to image each of the partitions.

Finally, I take it that the c: partition is the only one encrypted?

@davcbr  Removing the flash drive wouldn’t cause this. In fact, Macrium Reflect Rescue Media is specifically designed to allow the flash drive to be removed after it has loaded, since the entire environment runs from memory. But even if you removed it early, worst case that would only affect the Rescue environment itself. It doesn’t make sense that you’d have ended up in a startup repair loop. And BitLocker shouldn’t be a complication here either. If your system booted properly before, then your TPM would have a decryption key embedded, which it should be supplying automatically at boot. If BitLocker or lack of that TPM embedded key was the problem, then you’d see a BitLocker Recovery Key prompt. Unfortunately in order to perform repairs, in most cases you’d need to be able to unlock the partition to perform such repairs, which would require your Recovery Key. Or if you’re fine just wiping your system but want your data first, then once again you’d need to be able to unlock the partition to grab your data first. Have you actually checked your Microsoft account for BitLocker Recovery Keys?

Also, Windows 7 doesn’t support Secure Boot, so I don’t really know how you’d have that enabled if you’ve got a Windows 7 system. WinPE 10 does, so your Rescue Media would happily boot that way, but Windows 7 won’t.

Not sure what happened with your mouse.

Somehow one of my posts did not get entered into this thread.  I don't remember everything on it, but here's what I do remember:

1.   I did download the MS Windows 10 media as you suggested.  I wonder what I use for the install key.

2.   I did get the bitlocker key at the MS account.  Currently using this at computer repair shop.

3.   There is a tool called "Disk Genius" that is worth looking up.  It will read partitions a sector at a time and present you with what is found, similar to some undeleter programs.  But this will pull data from RAW, formatted, and other situations.

I agree with all you say.  Nothing seems to make sense.