Screen broken - stuck in safe mode

cnels

Honorable
May 1, 2012
7
0
10,510
Hello,

In a massive spell of stupidity, I managed to 1) break my laptop screen so only a portion is visible, (I've been using an external monitor afterwards,) and 2) restarted in safe mode to do something requiring safe mode, without realizing that the laptop, (Dell 1737 Studio, Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit) doesn't send a signal to an external monitor while in safe mode. I now can't see to get the damn thing back out of safe mode... can't see enough of the screen to check the "don't restart in safe mode next time" dialog.

I have Linux Mint on a thumb drive, and that will send a signal to the external monitor, and I can see and access the Windows 7 files themselves, but Windows isn't running when Linux Mint is.

Either 1: Does anyone know the exact keystrokes to log onto my account while in safe mode? (I have to accounts that show on the welcome screen: mine and the Administrator account, (which is me) that MS hides by default in Windows 7, but which I made visible.)

Or 2: Is there a way to make changes in windows 7 via the files only, (since it isn't running at the same time Linux Mint is,)

Or 3: Is it possible somehow to dual-boot into Windows while Linux Mint is running at the same time. I do have an XP-Mode virtual machine on the laptop, and another by Oracle or someone, but what could be done from within Linux Mint running off the 8GB thumb drive?

Helppppp! Trapped in safe mode forever, (or until I can afford to replace the broken screen.)

Thanks in advance,

cnels

 
Solution
Start windows normally is the bottom item in the safe mode menu. Try tapping F8 when booting. Then when you guess your in the F8 menu, then arrow down like 11 times and hit enter.

cnels

Honorable
May 1, 2012
7
0
10,510


bucknutty:

It worked! Not quite as expected, but it got the job done. For some reason, I tried 11 down-arrow keystrokes 5 or 6 times, but the machine continued to reboot into a screen with a blue background. For the longest time, I thought this was the safe mode welcome screen, which it is not.

It must be something to do with recovering a lost boot password, or something along those lines. I realized this when I just moved the cursor around the screen and kept clicking, even though I couldn't see what was being clicked. I eventually noticed the corner of a dialog box, which I was able to grab with the mouse and move into the (barely) visible part of the screen. It said:

"This feature requires removable media such as a floppy disk or a USB Flash Drive. Please insert a floppy disk or USB Flash Drive, and then try again." In the left hand corner of this box, it reads "No Drive".

I Googled that, to find that it has to do with a password reset disk. I was in the wrong screen all the time, but couldn't see it.

I restarted again, tapped F8, and selected plain "safe mode." Now that brought me to a safe mode screen, where I blindly typed my account password a few times, hitting bingo on the 3rd or 4th try.

From there, I was able to bring up a portion of a barely visible Control Panel, where I clicked on Administrative Tools, then System Configuration, which brought up the good 'ol MSCONFIG. From there, I could set "Normal" for a boot option. Tadaaa!

Although I couldn't find the "Start Windows Normally", or at least couldn't get it to work by pressing Enter, nonetheless you got me thinking about what was not showing, and the rest is history.

Please overlook the long-winded response, but I thought it important to post the exact sequence that finally worked, so it is available to anyone else with the same problem.

Thanks again!

cnels

 

newza

Honorable
Sep 27, 2013
3
0
10,510


Well I have the same problem, I have gone down using the down arrow 11 times and the mouse appears briefly (10sec) on the xternal plus resulution text 1024*768/60 Hrtz, and the screen goes blank again, now I dont know what to do
 

cnels

Honorable
May 1, 2012
7
0
10,510


See my post of May 1, 2012. If you have any portion of the laptop display visible, it might be possible to tell if you are in the correct screen to begin with. I wasn't, but luckily eventually figured this out, and was able to bring up the right one, to get out of Safe Mode. If nothing shows at all on the laptop display, you are probably doomed to buying another replacement display for it, so you can at least see what you are doing. I replaced my own, and I''ll say this: it was a difficult, tedious job. I downloaded the repair manual from Dell, and almost went cross-eyed trying to follow it. Luckily, I was successful after many hours of work.

Unless the machine is very old and not worth fixing, you might be better off bringing it to a reputable repair shop. I got a replacemlent screen online, although I don't recall where at the moment. It was a good deal, compared to many other sources, including Dell itself- they wanted a small fortune for their replacement display. If you intend to buy a replacment display online to install yourself, IM me privately, and I'll dig up the information as to who it was. The price was quite fair, but that meant I had to do the work- something I'm not sure I'd try again.

No one coulld tell me how to boot up in Safe Mode and have it show on an external display. I'm not sure its possible, so the only two options seem to be what I just described.

cnels

 

Extreme noob

Reputable
Mar 13, 2014
1
0
4,510

Hey I'm in the same situation . I seriously need your help :/