Windows 10 Wont start - black screen with blinking dash

Edgars

Honorable
Jan 21, 2014
12
0
10,510
Hello!
So this morning I started my pc (not a laptop) and before windows (10) it did some win updates and during them I got a blue screen. Unfortunately after restart the windows wont boot. It stays at a black screen with blinking dot like this _ As I understand I can't enter safe mode with f8 from win10 - which is just ridiculous. Is there any other way to enter safe mode without booting into windows? Or is there another solution to the problem? Would reinstalling windows solve the problem?
 
Sounds like the motherboard is not trying to boot from the proper drive. So check the BIOS and make sure the proper drive is selected as the boot device.

If it is then use a Win 10 disk, can be on a flash drive or on DVD, and you can run a startup repair from the disk to fix the windows startup sequence.
 

Edgars

Honorable
Jan 21, 2014
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10,510


Ok I will try this. Anyways, I checked, and it is booting from hdd.
 

Colif

Win 11 Master
Moderator
On another PC, download the Windows 10 media creation tool and use it to make a win 10 installer on USB

change boot order so USB is first, hdd second
boot from installer
on screen after languages, choose repair this pc, not install.
choose troubleshoot
choose advanced
choose command prompt
We need to use the Bootrec.exe tool. Click on command prompt and type in the following commands, one after the other:
bootrec /RebuildBcd
bootrec /fixMbr
bootrec /fixboot
Exit

Now go ahead and reboot your system. In some cases you may need to run some additional commands.

bootsect /nt60 SYS or bootsect /nt60 ALL
 

Edgars

Honorable
Jan 21, 2014
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10,510


Unfortunately this didn't work. All that changed is that the blinking line dropped down an inch sort of from -- to _ :D
 

Colif

Win 11 Master
Moderator
Can try to get to safe mode but often a menu choice isn't there if you boot off USB

boot from installer, on 2nd screen after languages, choose repair this pc, not install
choose troubleshoot
choose advanced
choose start up options << this mighjt not be here, see below
hit the restart button on screen
choose a safe mode (it doesn't matter which) by using number associated with it.
PC will restart and load safe mode

sometimes just going into safe mode is enough to fix oddities like this but while there, have a look in device manager and see if any warnings or unknown devices

if start up options wasn't a menu choice, choose start up repair and see if it fixes it. It will be in the advanced menu

to get to it from start,
choose troubleshoot
choose advanced
choose start up repair - this will scan PC and maybe fix this - will ask for logon info
 

Edgars

Honorable
Jan 21, 2014
12
0
10,510


STARTUP REPAIR FIXED IT!!!! Thanks man. You are the best. Bless ya
 


LOL exactly what I posted in my first post, minus the walk through on how to do it.