How To Fix “No boot device found. Press any key to reboot the machine.”

by Amara Lite · Published August 18, 2023 · Updated August 19, 2023

Fix a “No boot device found.” error without needing a technician.

Today, we’re diving into the world of laptop troubleshooting. We will attempt to fix a problem that emerged with my laptop, which was working perfectly a few months ago. I was surprised to be greeted by an error message: “No boot device found. Press any key to continue.” when I turned it on a few days ago. If you’ve encountered a similar conundrum with your laptop, fret not! There could be several reasons behind this issue, and I’m here to share a potential solution that might just work for you. So, let’s roll up our sleeves and dive right in.

This is the error message that I got when I turned on my laptop.

The first step? We are going to access the BIOS configuration. How do we do this? As we power on the laptop and encounter the ‘NO BOOT DEVICE FOUND’ message, we press any key to initiate a restart. Now, bear in mind that you need to be aware of the BIOS shortcut key specific to your laptop model. This is the key you’ll press while the laptop is rebooting in order to access the BIOS configuration. If you’re unsure about the key for your laptop, don’t worry—we will provide a link below that lists these shortcut keys for various brands. In our case, dealing with a Dell laptop, the magic key is F2.

Here’s the link for the BIOS shortcut key: https://www.disk-image.com/faq-bootme…

As we press F2 during the boot-up process, the laptop seamlessly transitions into BIOS configuration mode. It’s important to note that BIOS interfaces can differ significantly between laptop brands and versions, so what you see on your screen might look different. Our next target within the BIOS configuration is the boot sequence, or boot order. This area lists the devices the computer is capable of booting from. By default, most devices are usually checked, so we want to refine this list. This is what you are going to do if your device supports “Legacy”. For UEFI, you can go to the next step.

Your screen may not look exactly like this, and might say “Boot order” instead of “Boot sequence”.

Here are the devices where the computer can boot from, so we have to remove some that are not applicable/usable for this laptop, such as diskette.

Here is where you can uncheck the devices that are not needed by the laptop.

Additionally, we need to ensure that the boot sequence starts with the hard drive housing the operating system. In the case of this laptop, it supports both legacy and UEFI modes. We are opting for UEFI mode this time. Enabling UEFI mode filters out boot devices that don’t support it, thereby simplifying the booting process. Once we make these adjustments, we save the changes and restart the laptop. Lo and behold, it boots right into the operating system without a hitch! Notice how the Dell logo appears without any errors, and Windows 10 loads smoothly.

This is where we can see Legacy and UEFI.

If we choose UEFI, this is what is going to appear on the screen.

There is an “Apply” button at the bottom right, and we are going to click on that to apply the changes. When we click on exit, it should reboot without errors.

And just like that, we’ve successfully navigated through the ‘no boot device found’ dilemma. I hope this solution comes to your rescue if you’re facing a similar challenge.

Here’s a full video of the troubleshooting. It has more detailed information in case you need it. If you are new to the channel, you may consider subscribing for more informative videos. See yah!