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July 8th, 2023 00:00
XPS 8940, boot failure black screen: B1InitializeLibrary failed 0xC00000BB
I have a Dell XPS 8940 that is booting to a black screen stating "B1InitializeLibrary failed 0xC00000BB". I can get into the BIOS by hitting F2 on boot. I have tried disabling Secure Boot, as suggested on some sites, but that had no effect. I also tried constructing a Windows Install bootable USB to repair the BCD, as suggested on other sites, but ultimately it is not able to boot from USB, either. So, I don't know what to do next.
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GKGlenn
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July 8th, 2023 19:00
Okay, I did get it to come back. Pulling the battery was not necessary. In the BIOS, I did select "Reset Settings" with the "Last Known Good" option. That seemed to be sufficient to bring the machine back to working state.
What precipitated all of this was attempting to add a 2TB NVMe drive on a PCIe riser card. Machine apparently won't boot at all with anything installed in that 4-lane PCIe slot next to the video card. Tried 2 different NVMe drives on 2 different riser cards. At least one of them was known good parts pulled from another workstation. The 512GB NVMe drive the system came with is getting pretty tight. I guess I will have to replace the boot drive with a larger one in order to get more space. That is a larger project for another day.
Chino de Oro
9 Legend
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8.1K Posts
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July 8th, 2023 13:00
Would it help if you replace a new coin cell battery and performing a CMOS reset.
RoHe
10 Elder
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45.2K Posts
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July 9th, 2023 18:00
@GKGlenn - Quite a few threads about not being able to use an NVME SSD on an x4 adapter card in the XPS 8940. IIRC, this started after upgrading BIOS beyond v2.2.0, but you can't go back...
Is the 512 GB SSD the only internal drive in this PC? If you already have a HDD installed, have you moved the Windows default folders onto that HDD to free up space on the SSD?
You can also uninstall some software that's currently installed in Windows on the SSD and then reinstall it, but this time directing the installation onto the HDD. (NOTE: Not all software allows this.) Other apps may let you use the HDD to store some of their files, even when the app is installed on the SSD.
Have you gotten rid of all non-essential software (bloatware) that's installed?
GKGlenn
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July 10th, 2023 17:00
Thanks for pointing that out. It seems there is a history of issues with adding storage on the 4-lane PCIe slot. My BIOS is at version 2.0.13, which is probably what it shipped with. I suppose I could try updating to 2.1.3 and see if that helps, but it looks like anything after that is broken. I have some things that have been moved off to bulk storage, like Office and Visual Studio, but games require performant storage.
RoHe
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45.2K Posts
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July 10th, 2023 18:00
If you're still on BIOS 2.0.13, you're 13 versions behind and missing a bunch of security updates plus some other fixes/improvements.
Why not just image the existing SSD onto the new one and expand the C: partition to use all the extra space in the process? Then you won't need an adapter+SSD in the x4 slot...
You can use Macrium Reflect (free). Image all partitions on the 512 GB SSD and save the image on external media. Be sure to set the option to validate the image as soon as it's created.
Next, use Macrium to create the bootable USB stick you'll need later on.
Now swap new SSD into the NVME slot. Keep the old SSD somewhere safe. Then plug Macrium USB into PC with power off. Power on and tap F12 to open the menu. Select the option to boot from USB and Macrium will launch.
Use Macrium to move the image you created onto the new SSD. You have to move the C: partition last. So move all the other ones first. Only the size of the last partition moved onto the new SSD can be increased, so that's why you save C: for last. When moving the C: partition, set Macrium to expand that partition to use all available free space.
When that's all done, just reboot normally and PC should boot from the new SSD.