Computer wont start

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seveneyes

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Sep 27, 2011
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Hi,

My computer has decided to stop workinv today.

When i power it up i get post but after that it goes to a black screen. After a restart or 2 i get the option to restore windows, which doesnt work either.

I have tried booting from the windows 7 install cd and trying to repair from that but it says it cant repair because versions are incompatible...

I was wondering if anyone could provide some guidance or troubleshooting for me. It worked completely fine prior to this. So i cant tell if its a hardware or software issue

Specs:
Intel 2500k
Asus p8p67
Radeon 280x
Corsair cx750
8gb ram
Windows 7

Cheers
 
Solution
hang-the-9
I woould to go a different hard drive and do a clean installation of Windows on that. From the troubleshooting you've done, things point to a likely hard drive issue.
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seveneyes

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Sep 27, 2011
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Hmmm im now doubtful it is getting past post. Ive tried everything to get the safe mode option up with no luck. It brings up the asus start screen and it is after that when it goes black.

Ive noticed that the cpu seems to be running hot too (when checking in asus setup) for not being fully booted at 50+ degrees. Also if i leave it on black screen for a while coloured dots appear at the top.

I dont have a virus recovery disk and no access to another computer to create one.
 
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clutchc

clutchc

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That's going to make it tough to solve with no virus recovery disk and no 2nd machine to find one online. What are you using to access the web now?

Apparently you can boot to another device like the optical drive. So it would appear to be a Win installation issue. Or a HDD issue. Boot to the Win disk again and access the command line. Have it run a disk check. CHKDSK
 
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clutchc

clutchc

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Then it is probably safe to assume it isn't a failing HDD. Probably.
If the WIn repair disk can't fix it, you may be forced to do a clean install.

If you could borrow another PC or use a public one, you could download one of several virus recovery disks files online and burn yourself a CD or DVD. Then boot to that and see if it finds any corrupting viruses. Here's an example. There are others: http://support.kaspersky.com/us/4162

If you could boot to safe mode you may be able to do this trick to install Win7 over the old copy while keeping your existing pgms.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/243190/how_to_repair_a_corrupt_windows_7_installation.html
Can you access the boot select menu by tapping F8 at boot? I think safe mode may be one of the options. I can't remember.
 
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seveneyes

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This is where im having issues. F8 takes me to the asus boot select menu. So i can't access the options to go into safe.

I can try the virus disk tomorrow at work though.
 
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seveneyes

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Okay i managed to access the safe mode menu. However i couldnt access safe mode as it hangs at drivers CLASSPNP.sys.

I managed to create the Kaspersky disk which i have running now. Will let you know how that goes
 
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hang-the-9

hang-the-9

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Have you overclocked the CPU or video card? If you can get into the BIOS OK, reset that to defaults. Your motherboard does not have onboard video, so you need to test things with another video card.

You may have a hard drive issue checkdisk does not test for physical drive issues, you would want to run a drive test utility from the hard drive vendor, the motherboard may have one built in as well in the BIOS menus.

Also try running with one stick of RAM at a time if you have serveral.
 
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seveneyes

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No overclocking done at all. I do have an old dead video card which ive tested and it produces the same results (i would guess as the drivers dont match the card it would default to the cpu graphics?). Also tested with all combinations of ram.

The Kaspersky check didnt find anything significant, however i didnt do a full scan as that will take 5+ hours. I will try that over night.

Ive also attempted a few of the windows recovery options as i now know how to access f8. Startup recovery yielded 1 issue, it said to do with the hard drive. But it read like it fixed it, but hard to tell.

I also tried to do a system restore back from saturday which completed fine but didnt fix anything either. However i think that was the last time it was working so may still have the issue (if it software based)
 
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clutchc

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The display will only show whichever port the video cable is plugged into; integrated or gfx card. If you are plugged into the gfx card, the card is providing the display. If the driver is not loaded, it will default to Windows default resolution.

Btw, if you have a defective card, remove it and use the integrated video for the troubleshooting. The bad card may be the issue.
 
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seveneyes

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I honestly don't know what the issue is so I've just been trying different things. My motherboard doesn't have a gpu output so i can't use that without a gpu card.

I'm really out of ideas to try and find/fix the issue and safe mode still hangs on CLASSPNP.sys
 
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seveneyes

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Give this man a medal! After coming home from work i thought I'd give it another try and this time i noticed a screen blink up for a splint second before the Asus screen appears - too fast to read. However with the assistance of my phone I've managed to get a frame showing what it says. It's the post screen and guess what it says: no hard drive is detected.

Such a shame i didn't notice that before. Plus post isn't very useful if it doesn't give you time to read what it says (it literally blinks on and off).

So this is it I'll order a new hard drive hopefully to be delivered tomorrow and I'll give it a go.

Will report back if I'm successful our not. Thanks for the assistance so far!
 
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seveneyes

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Yep it finished without errors.

However i believe that chkdsk just checks the Windows installation and not the integrity of the disk itself.

Hence why I'm trusting post and hangs guidance. If you still have other ideas i am more than happy to hear then.
 
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clutchc

clutchc

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No, that's alright. I hope it turns out to be the HDD. That's a pretty simple fix (except for lost data).
 
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seveneyes

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Good news, it was the hard drive. Installed windows and the drivers on the new one I bought and all is running smoothly!

I also took the opportunity to buy a CPU cooler as mine was running fairly hot on stock.

So not the end of the world, thank you every one for the assistance!!!
 
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