Windows 10 System Restore Failure! Now PC Won't Boot Up!

[Arkstar]

Hello,
Recently my PC has gotten a virus. I've tried to get rid of it but every time i ran a scan with Malewarebytes the virus is always there once again. Since I have nothing of any value on my PC (besides steam games which i can easily reinstall) i figured i would do the Windows 10 reset where it clears all of your files and re-installs Windows in order to get rid of the malware. I began the re-installation process selecting the option which states "Use this option if you plan to keep the PC." After selecting this i let it begin. When i left my house the reinstall was at 1%. When i came back (1 hour later) it was at 2%. I thought something could be wrong with the reinstall since i had done a reinstall on the same PC before and it didn't take nearly this long. So i proceeded to shutdown and restart the PC. After doing this i realized it was a big mistake. Now my PC loads up the BIOS menu, but then the screen goes black and repeats this over and over. Anyone have any ideas on what to do? All help is much appreciated!

 

[Rocky Bennett]

At this point your only option is a fresh installation of Windows 10 from an ISO on either a DVD or a USB stick. Download a fresh ISO from Microsoft.

 

[cat1092]

There's no better 'reset' than with fresh install media, I wouldn't trust this process, especially with a SSD installed, may mistake it for a HDD & perform a full format.

Rocky is correct, download the latest Windows 10, which now has been upgraded to yet a newer version (have a collection of install media for this OS). You should then be able to fresh install Windows 10.

By chance, and adding this for informational purposes only, if one has a Samsung SSD & RAPID enabled, disable before reinstall when feasible. Leaving it enabled may cause install issues.

Good Luck & I hope you're up & running by now!

Cat

 

[LukeFatwalker]

Next step after doing the steps you've done is to re-install the OS.

Bare in mind, you will lose your data. So going forward you'll want to have a more *ahem* reliable backup solution. Something along the lines of a disk imager or snapshot program. Macrium Reflect Free and Rollback Rx are great free tools.

 

[cat1092]

Yes, Macrium Reflect has came a long ways.

There's a hidden secret that many doesn't know exists, one can backup/restore/clone their drives by using under 'Other Tasks', adding the boot menu option. Works like a charm, and the best thing of all, since no Windows processes are running during backups, less chance of corruption.

Though one should still create the bootable CD, or at a minimum, as long as two computers are available, store the bootable ISO in a folder on an external. Do this every time Macrium upgrades, am not sure if older ISO's or bootable media (CD or USB Flash drive), works with images created with newer releases.

For being a free backup solution, Macrium does a lot. When I purchased my XPS 8700 in late 2013, was able, after disabling Fast Boot, System Restore, reduced page file size & Disk Cleanup as Administrator, being sure that Windows Update leftovers were deleted, managed to get all partitions (even Recovery) of a 1TB HDD onto a little 120GB Samsung 840 EVO (when these were over $120).

And after installing Samsung Magician, noticed that some overprovisioning was needed, so shrank the C drive by 12GB to slide things over, enough to give Magician the 10% needed to maintain the controllers. In practice, though many ignores this, it's recommended to have 10% free at the far end of any SSD (except models with inaccessible chips built in for this purpose). Plus not let the C drive get over 65-70% full.

Yet if it wasn't for the free Macrium Reflect, I don't believe that I could had done this.

Finally, it's the lack of computer owners not creating drive images that keeps most busy, especially those that includes a Forum for Malware cleaning. Backup rates today are no higher than the turn of the Millennium over 16 years ago, despite the lowest cost per/GB in history backup drives on the market, though I prefer to build my own. Some are 2.5" HDD's that came out of notebooks when upgrading to SSD's, others were older HDD's of the SATA-2 generation (WD Caviar Black/Samsung HD 103SJ) all three are 1TB in size, and nothing was wrong with neither.

Just kept on purchasing SSD's & the HDD's were piling up, so figured to make good use out of these. In addition to these in enclosures, have a SATA-3 docking station compatible with both 2.5" & 3.5" drives.

A physical backup is the best System Restore point one can have.

And I have plenty!:lol:

Cat

 

[LukeFatwalker]

A physical backup is the best System Restore point one can have.

Absolutely.