Okay, so I've got quite a problem. The best way to describe it, IMO, is by describing its progression.
(Note: I've been using this computer with Windows 8.1 for months with no issues)
It all started when I was using Adobe Illustrator. I clicked over to Spotify, and noticed my cursor was a horizontal double arrow and Spotify was unresponsive. Figuring the program had crashed, I tried clicking back over to Illustrator. No response from Illustrator either. Naturally, i pressed Ctrl+Alt+Del, but that did nothing either. In short, nothing was working. "Something must have crashed Windows or something...let's do a hard reboot," I naively said.
After doing so, Windows 8.1 greeted me with the usual loading screen and, afterwards....nothing. Just a black screen. No cursor or anything. Thus began my misery.
"Well, let's try again," I figured. Upon re-rebooting, I was greeted by Windows 8's Automatic Repair utility. After running the repair, it of course told me that the repair failed. I then decided to try and reboot into Safe Mode. Upon doing so, I was greeted by the exact same black screen.
I figured I would try to run a repair from the Windows 8.1 install disk. I then remembered that I no longer had a CD drive. One trip to Microcenter and $13 later, I installed a new drive and booted up from the disk. It. Loaded. So. Slowly. Seriously; it took around 10min after clicking "Repair your computer" for the menu to show up. I tested the CD in my laptop, and it loaded plenty fast. I tested another boot disk on the desktop, and it also loaded plenty fast.
That aside, one repair utility told me that I had no Windows Installed, and another told me that the drive was locked. I attempted the fix for that, but I found that the disk utility thinks that the drive is empty.
"Screw it, I'll do a fresh install," I said. I restarted the Windows disk, hit the install button, waited 10 minutes for THAT to load, and was eventually greeted by errors when trying to format my SSD. No luck.
It was time to bust out the heavy weapons.
I booted up Hiren's Boot CD and, now beginning to suspect an issue with the SSD, downloaded the Corsair SSD Diagnostic Toolkit, and, as luck would have it, no dice. Mini XP wouldn't recognize the SSD, so the toolkit didn't work.
Still suspecting drive failure, I decided to try and do a format using Ultimate Boot CD's tools. While booted with that, I ran some diagnostics, and, unsurprisingly, everything passed with flying colors. To make matters more interesting, one tool let me explore my drives, and all of my files are still there on my SSD.
Thus, I'm really at a loss. What's wrong with the computer? If it's the SSD, how can I verify that? I don't want to replace it and find it was something else.
Any and all help would be appreciated. Thanks for reading.
For reference, my specs:
Mobo: ASUS Maximus IV Extreme-Z
GPU: ASUS AMD Radeon 7970 DirectCU II
CPU: Core i7 (Sands Bridge, IIRC)
RAM: 8GB G.Skill
OS: Windows 8.1 64-Bit (yes, it's genuine)
(Note: I've been using this computer with Windows 8.1 for months with no issues)
It all started when I was using Adobe Illustrator. I clicked over to Spotify, and noticed my cursor was a horizontal double arrow and Spotify was unresponsive. Figuring the program had crashed, I tried clicking back over to Illustrator. No response from Illustrator either. Naturally, i pressed Ctrl+Alt+Del, but that did nothing either. In short, nothing was working. "Something must have crashed Windows or something...let's do a hard reboot," I naively said.
After doing so, Windows 8.1 greeted me with the usual loading screen and, afterwards....nothing. Just a black screen. No cursor or anything. Thus began my misery.
"Well, let's try again," I figured. Upon re-rebooting, I was greeted by Windows 8's Automatic Repair utility. After running the repair, it of course told me that the repair failed. I then decided to try and reboot into Safe Mode. Upon doing so, I was greeted by the exact same black screen.
I figured I would try to run a repair from the Windows 8.1 install disk. I then remembered that I no longer had a CD drive. One trip to Microcenter and $13 later, I installed a new drive and booted up from the disk. It. Loaded. So. Slowly. Seriously; it took around 10min after clicking "Repair your computer" for the menu to show up. I tested the CD in my laptop, and it loaded plenty fast. I tested another boot disk on the desktop, and it also loaded plenty fast.
That aside, one repair utility told me that I had no Windows Installed, and another told me that the drive was locked. I attempted the fix for that, but I found that the disk utility thinks that the drive is empty.
"Screw it, I'll do a fresh install," I said. I restarted the Windows disk, hit the install button, waited 10 minutes for THAT to load, and was eventually greeted by errors when trying to format my SSD. No luck.
It was time to bust out the heavy weapons.
I booted up Hiren's Boot CD and, now beginning to suspect an issue with the SSD, downloaded the Corsair SSD Diagnostic Toolkit, and, as luck would have it, no dice. Mini XP wouldn't recognize the SSD, so the toolkit didn't work.
Still suspecting drive failure, I decided to try and do a format using Ultimate Boot CD's tools. While booted with that, I ran some diagnostics, and, unsurprisingly, everything passed with flying colors. To make matters more interesting, one tool let me explore my drives, and all of my files are still there on my SSD.
Thus, I'm really at a loss. What's wrong with the computer? If it's the SSD, how can I verify that? I don't want to replace it and find it was something else.
Any and all help would be appreciated. Thanks for reading.
For reference, my specs:
Mobo: ASUS Maximus IV Extreme-Z
GPU: ASUS AMD Radeon 7970 DirectCU II
CPU: Core i7 (Sands Bridge, IIRC)
RAM: 8GB G.Skill
OS: Windows 8.1 64-Bit (yes, it's genuine)
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