Problems with Norton Security and Windows 10 2004 chkdsk /f

Norton Security | Norton Internet Security
1

When I execute chkdsk /f for drive C: (system) upon reboot it never scans. It just counts down, says "scanning and repairing drive", then after a pause, it continues to windows. It doesn't actually show it scanning.

On a rare occasion when it does scan it does not reboot once it reaches 100%. I have to press the reset button.

It will scan each and every time for all the other non boot drives however. There appears to be some Norton process interfering with chkdsk on bootup for Windows 10 version 2004.

This is on a clean install. I deleted all partitions on the SSD before installing fresh. It didn't do this on 1903.

As a workaround, anyone having this issue can mark the drive as dirty and the scan will run upon reboot. Here is the command:

fsutil dirty set c: <------marks drive c: as dirty.

Change the drive letter if the drive you wish to mark dirty is different. Windows will still hang when the scan reaches 100% but just press reset and the OS will reboot normally. Scan results can be checked as usual in Event Viewer searching under the application of Wininit.

Try this yourself and see what I mean.

So I discovered the culprit!!! It is Norton Security Online!!! What I did to find this was do an "in place" upgrade. That is, I installed windows again and chose "keep my files and apps". Before I did this I uninstalled Norton as in the past Norton has been found to interfere with windows installation.

Well, upon completing the install I immediately tried chkdsk /f and it worked. Each and every time. It still "hung" at 100% and didn't boot into windows until I pressed the reset button, but it DID scan each and every time. So I then installed Norton and checked it again. Chkdsk /f did NOT work. It behaved exactly as previously stated.

So then I uninstalled Norton again and tested. Chkdsk worked again as expected. Each and every time. So it would seem the "in place" upgrade was unnecessary. There is something about Norton loading immediately at startup that is preventing chkdsk from running.

Also it would seem chkdsk is still somewhat broken in that once it reaches 100% it doesn't ultimately boot into windows and must be restarted via the reset button.

So to work around this issue I issued the fsutil dirty set c: command as stated in the OP. I then booted into safe mode and the scan runs as expected. It hangs at 100% and I press reset which then allows windows to boot into normal mode.

I guess I'm ok with the workaround but I hope Norton and Microsoft address these issues soon as this didn't happen with Windows 1909.

2

I also disabled Secure Boot a week ago thinking that might be it. No luck. The same thing happened. I disabled ELAM by selecting option 8 in "startup options" as well. No effect. Same results. Thanks again for responding.

3

Hi there. Thank you for the response. There is no ELAM switch under the Automatic Protection tab. I am still awaiting a response from technical support for this issue.

norton.jpg

4
rawintellect:

I just discovered something interesting. I believe I have further narrowed down which part of Norton needs corrected for Windows 2004. It is "Boot Time Protection". ...Please see the attached screenshots of chkdsk with "Boot Time Protection" set to OFF vs "Boot Time Protection" set to NORMAL.

Hi rawintellect:

Have you made any progress on this issue since Norton customer support requested diagnostic logs?

Just a thought, but if Norton's Boot Time Protection setting affects how Check Disk (chkdsk /f) runs on your Win 10 v2004 machine, you might also want to check the effect of your Early Launch Anti-Malware Protection (ELAM) setting in Norton - see the Norton support article Early Launch Anti-Malware Protection.

After reading bjm_'s comments in ekarabekir's 22-Jun-2020 thread Early Launch Anti-Malware Protection it occurred to me that the Trusted Boot features built in to Win 10 that are described in the MS Docs article Secure the Windows 10 Boot Process (e.g., Secure Boot, ELAM, etc.) might behave a bit differently in Win 10 v2004 or have an undocumented bug.  If so, ELAM or some other Trusted Boot feature in Win 10 v2004 could now be causing a glitch with loading of Norton services loads at boot-up, and could also affect the behaviour of Check Disk (i.e., with or without Norton installed).

The TenForums tutorial How to Disable Early Launch Anti-Malware Protection in Windows 8 and Windows 10 (kudos to bjm_ for providing the link) has more information about Secure Boot and ELAM, but please note those instructions will only temporarily disable ELAM for one system restart; the next time you re-boot ELAM should be automatically enabled again.
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64-bit Win 10 Pro v1909 build 18363.836 * Firefox ESR v68.9.0 * Windows Defender v4.18.2005.5 * MB Free v3.8.3
Dell Inspiron 5584, Intel i5-8265U@1.60/1.80 GHz, 8 GB RAM, Toshiba KBG40ZNS256G SSD, Intel UHD Graphics 620

5

I have NS installed on three 2004 systems.

When I perform chkdsk on the C: (Boot) drive it doesn't finish and reboot.

No error messages - just that annoying broken circle spinning around at 100% complete.

FWIW.

6

Please reread my OP. My problem isn't checking the logs. My problem is chkdsk doesn't scan with Norton installed. Without Norton it scans but hangs at 100% where it would normally reboot, then boot into windows. I am working around that by pressing reset once the scan is done.

I really do appreciate your replies but your solutions don't involve my error. Thank you. 

7

Hi again -

You can also view the chkdsk log in System Volume information on your C: drive.

This is a hidden file and you may have to manipulate permissions to view it:

Here is a link to gather that information:

https://www.wintips.org/how-to-fix-access-denied-at-system-volume-information-folder/

Please keep us posted.

Thanks. smiley

 

 

8

They actually emailed me for the diagnostic logs. I am content with my workaround for now. But if they are interested in looking at it I will provide them with what they requested.

9

However I do believe Norton is contributing to the skipping of the actual scan.

Given the current chkdsk code from MS, this may be true. But there is no sense in Norton putting resources into trying to fix something that calls a broken Windows function. MS needs to fix chkdsk first, then MS and Norton can test the scenario you are seeing.

 

10

I agree the hanging is a bug of Windows. However I do believe Norton is contributing to the skipping of the actual scan. Here are the flags for chkdsk. Based on what is listed below the flags that you suggest I run would mean chkdsk would actually attempt to repair bad sectors. That scan would take hours. I see that the /V flag applies to FAT/FAT32 systems but I went ahead and tried it anyway with this command: chkdsk c: /f /v. Same results. Again, thank you for responding as the more people that report this issue the better.

I do not believe I have bad sectors on this drive as it's happening on 4 other machines I have access to. It does not happen on my wife's Win 10 Home version however. All of my pro machines are (1) Scanning successfully but, hanging at "Scanning and repairing complete 100%", then not booting into windows, this happens when Norton is not installed and is definitely a Microsoft problem. and (2) With Norton installed the scan is skipped altogether. The culprit I believe is Boot Time Protection. But I will await the results of the logs I sent to support. 

  volume              Specifies the drive letter (followed by a colon),
                      mount point, or volume name.
  filename            FAT/FAT32 only: Specifies the files to check for
                      fragmentation.
  /F                  Fixes errors on the disk.
  /V                  On FAT/FAT32: Displays the full path and name of every
                      file on the disk.
                      On NTFS: Displays cleanup messages if any.
  /R                  Locates bad sectors and recovers readable information
                      (implies /F, when /scan not specified).
  /L:size             NTFS only:  Changes the log file size to the specified
                      number of kilobytes.  If size is not specified, displays
                      current size.
  /X                  Forces the volume to dismount first if necessary.
                      All opened handles to the volume would then be invalid
                      (implies /F).
  /I                  NTFS only: Performs a less vigorous check of index
                      entries.
  /C                  NTFS only: Skips checking of cycles within the folder
                      structure.
  /B                  NTFS only: Re-evaluates bad clusters on the volume
                      (implies /R)
  /scan               NTFS only: Runs an online scan on the volume
  /forceofflinefix    NTFS only: (Must be used with "/scan")
                      Bypass all online repair; all defects found
                      are queued for offline repair (i.e. "chkdsk /spotfix").
  /perf               NTFS only: (Must be used with "/scan")
                      Uses more system resources to complete a scan as fast as
                      possible. This may have a negative performance impact on
                      other tasks running on the system.
  /spotfix            NTFS only: Runs spot fixing on the volume
  /sdcleanup          NTFS only: Garbage collect unneeded security descriptor
                      data (implies /F).
  /offlinescanandfix  Runs an offline scan and fix on the volume.
  /freeorphanedchains FAT/FAT32/exFAT only: Frees any orphaned cluster chains
                      instead of recovering their contents.
  /markclean          FAT/FAT32/exFAT only: Marks the volume clean if no
                      corruption was detected, even if /F was not specified.

11

@rawintellect -

In Windows 10, release 2004:

Have you tried running chkdsk in NTFS mode?

chkdsk C: /R /V

Please let us know the result.

The other way, does a FAT32 check and will end up in the same condition you had described above.

IMHO, it's a bug. However, it is not Norton, since I have it on other systems without Norton installed.

Thanks.

12

Hello, support has asked me to upload diagnostic data. Here are the logs. There was no Setup.etl file in %WINDIR%\Panther

13

Hi rawintellect:

I don't know if this is relevant to your problem, but Microsoft has stopped rolling out Win 10 v2004 to machines that use the Storage Spaces feature, which is a type of software-configured RAID at Control Pane | System and Security | Storage Spaces that manages data storage over 2 or more disks.  Win 10 v2004 users are now reporting they can lose significant chunks of data if they run ChkDsk while Storage Spaces is in use.  From the MS support article KB4568129: Issue with Some Storage Spaces Configurations After Updating to Windows 10, Version 2004 and Windows Server Version 2004:

"Important:
We do not recommend running the chkdsk command on any device affected by this issue."

Kudos to Woody Leonhard for posting about this in his 17-Jun-2020 AskWoody.com article Another Major Win10 Version 2004 Bug – Storage Spaces.
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64-bit Win 10 Pro v1909 build 18363.836 * Firefox ESR v68.9.0 * Windows Defender v4.18.2005.5 * MB Free v3.8.3
Dell Inspiron 5584, Intel i5-8265U@1.60/1.80 GHz, 8 GB RAM, Toshiba KBG40ZNS256G SSD, Intel UHD Graphics 620

14

Thank you sir!!!! It feels good to not be alone in this issue. I'm hoping Norton will address this. The workaround is fine but I hate having anything wrong with my setup. I also hope Microsoft addresses the 100% hanging as well. It does this on all of my machines, but I'm glad you're not having that issue.

15

I have been trying for the last 12 hours to figure out the absolutely identical problem that "rawintellect" is having with chkdsk /f.  I have done a clean reinstall of Windows 10 Update 2004 four times today trying to solve this very problem.  To help figure out what was going on, I only loaded Win 10 Update 2004 and Norton 360.  Rawintellect's work-around of "fsutil dirty set c:" works!  My Norton was just this week automatically upgraded to Norton 360 (formerly just Norton Internet Security).  I did not do all of the testing of installing and uninstalling Norton like he did, but I believe that a conflict between Norton 360 and Win 10 Update 2004 may indeed be what's causing chkdsk /f to fail.  I have repeatedly tried things like turning off hiberation ("powercfg /f off"), "dism /online /cleanup-image /restore health, and "scannow /sfc", all to no avail.  But using "fsutil dirty set c:" works consistently without using Safe Mode, although it works in Safe Mode, too.  

One oddity I noticed with using "fsutil dirty set c:" is that the chkdsk results under "wininit" in the event viewer do not show up right away.  It takes roughly two minutes for the chkdsk results to show up.  Whereas before this problem, chkdsk results under wininit showed up immediately as soon as the computer rebooted.  Also, unlike in Rawintellect's post, in my case using "fsutil dirty set c:" does NOT cause chkdsk /f to hang at 100%, it always fully completes and boots up normally.

Thank you for posting this problem!  It is a very real frustrating problem, but at least now I have a work-around to use until Norton and Microsoft get this sorted out.

16

Thanks. I am new to these forums and appreciate you pointing this out for me.

17
rawintellect:

Please see the attached screenshots of chkdsk with "Boot Time Protection" set to OFF vs "Boot Time Protection" set to NORMAL.

File Attachment: 
screenshots.zip

 How to post an image in the forums
https://community.norton.com/en/forums/how-post-image-forums-0

18

I am running v22.20.2.57 of Norton. The install of Norton cannot be more pure than on a new partition and a newly installed version of windows. I have in the past run the cleanup tool successfully so yes I do know how to clean up the install should I need to but it simply doesn't apply since Norton never existed any of these machines until I installed it.

19

Yes, as I noted in my OP, my workaround for this issue is to mark the drive "dirty" and then reboot into safe mode. Doing this allows chkdsk to actually scan and repair the drive.

I understand not wanting to upgrade to 2004. But I am hoping someone does try to recreate this issue as I have done it on several different machines I have access to.

It's not a show stopper by any means as I do have a valid workaround. But it is something Norton should address.

And yes WOL means Wake on Lan. I need remote access to my machines at home for work.  When I say several machines these are my personal computers, laptops, et al. Running on my home network. The motherboard is a x399 E-gaming board by ASUS. It has issues with P6 power states that WOL must use to work. So in order for WOL to work fast startup must be disabled.

20
rawintellect:
... As I stated before I'm certain that the "hang" at 100% isn't Norton as this happens even without the product installed. But, I do think it's worth looking into the product's hooks into Windows as it starts. In protecting the boot drive Norton may need to wait until utilities such as chkdsk have run their course before activating protection. Something has definitely changed in Windows 10 2004 startup sequencing....

Hi rawintellect:

Have you tried running chkdsk /f after booting up in Safe Mode?  See the MS support article Start Your PC in Safe Mode in Windows 10.

Sorry, I have no intention of updating to Version 2004 until until most of the serious bugs, including known issues already acknowledged by Microsoft at https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/release-information/status-windows-10-2004, are resolved.  However, I posted in the Tech Outpost thread Windows 10 May 2020 Update Released earlier today and mentioned your Check Disk problem, and I'm hoping one of the Version 2004 users following that thread might run a test on their own machine.

Also note that Comcast/Xfinity has their own user forum for the Comcast/Xfinity-brand Norton Secuirty Online (NSO) at https://forums.xfinity.com/t5/Anti-Virus-Software-Internet-Security/bd-p/13.  Norton Guru yank is an NSO expert and posts in the Comcast/Xfinity forum as user USAF_E-8_RET, and we can contact him if you ever want to try a clean reinstall of NSO.  I've posted general instructions <here> for a clean reinstall of Norton Security Standard (currently v22.20.2.57 for users in this forum who paid for a retail version of Norton) but those instructions would have to be modified since you would be downloading NSO and installing according to instructions provided by Comcast / Xfinity.  When you uninstall Norton from the Control Panel there are always orphaned files and registry entries left behind that could interfere with Windows Defender (or whatever third-party AV you use instead of Norton) or even cause problems with Norton after the reinstall.

... Fast Startup is disabled. It has to be for WOL to work on this particular motherboard. I have all of my machines configured with WOL and fast startup causes more problems than it's worth. I never enable it....

...and could you just confirm that WOL means "wake-on-LAN"? If there's something unusual about your MOB or network configuration perhaps posting additional information about your computer make / model and system specs would be useful. If you "have access to several machines" this doesn't sound like the typical home network most users posting in this Norton forum would have.
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64-bit Win 10 Pro v1909 build 18363.836 * Firefox ESR v68.9.0 * Windows Defender v4.18.2005.5 * MB Free v3.8.3
Dell Inspiron 5584, Intel i5-8265U@1.60/1.80 GHz, 8 GB RAM, Toshiba KBG40ZNS256G SSD, Intel UHD Graphics 620