Computer wont start, some help please

[leon]

Hi Guys
Maybe someone could suggest what is going on here,
My desk top has been performing perfectly for many years, however today it decided that it didn't want to start for some unknown reason, and the screen comes up like this in a lovely light blue color. with a big smiley face as well.

Automatic Repair

Your PC did not start correctly.
Press "restart" to restart your PC which can sometimes fix the problem.

You can also press Advance Options to repair your PC.

So I press Advanced Options, which gives these options.

Continue: exit and continue to Win 8.1
Use a device: use a USB device, network connection or win recovery DVD
Turn off your PC:
Trouble Shoot:refresh or reset your PC, or use Advanced Tools.

So i go to advanced tools, which says.

Refresh Your PC: If your PC isn't running well you can refresh it without losing your files.
Restart Your PC: If you want to remove all your files you can reset your PC completely.

Than there are more Advanced Options, which states.

System Restore.
System Image Recovery.
Start up Repair.
Command prompt.
UEFI Firmware Settings.
Start up Options.

I have tried all of these options and still it comes up with what i said in the first place, nothing is working, so maybe some one here with more knowledge could give me some suggestions please.

Thank You

Leon:thumbsup:

[Robert9]

Hi Leon.
That all sounds tragic! :( Have a look here https://www.winhelp.us/troubleshooting-windows.html
You don't happen to have made a start-up disk for your PC.
See: https://www.winhelp.us/create-a-recovery-drive-in-windows-8.html
Good luck.
Robert

[Exfso]

Leon can you try and start it in "Safe Mode"? I am assuming it is Windows 8! I must admit the smiley face gives me cause for concern, these sort of things appear if you have some serious issues with your computer. Yeah I know it wont boot and that is serious, but I suspect you may have some serious malware infecting your system. Others here are much more versed in computers, and can steer you better.

http://www.howtogeek.com/107511/how-to-boot-into-safe-mode-on-windows-8-the-easy-way/

[leon]

Thank you for your response, it has occurred to me and it is something i forgot about but we did have a power outage and power surge which did shut the computer down expectantly and since then every thing has gone a bit crazy.

The computer was in hibernation at the time, but i expect that is still powered up.

I have a feeling this is the cause or at least part of the cause.

Thanks Leon

[noeyedeer]

hi Leon, can you get to command prompt in the advanced advanced settings?
If it's still the same as all the other windows, just type win from there and windows should load.
if you can't even get to the command prompt then something major has failed on the hard drive unfortunately, or the boot sectors have corrupted from the spike somehow. as far as I know, that "recovery" process is on all laptops using win8/10... don't know about the smiley face though.
matt

[silv]

yes, part of the cause, at least.

turn off PC.
disconnect all cables/hardware.
the power cord as well.

connect only basic hardware: mouse, keyboard, monitor, power.

power on PC.

any better?

why do this: because a connected hardware might have suffered damage during power outage and is causing trouble to the whole system.

let us know if computer starts okay with only basic hardware connected.

[noeyedeer]

there's 2 levels for system restore, just replace system files, or completely restore to factory settings, so be careful what you choose. the best bet is to get to dos, command prompt first. if that's unavailable then the odds aren't in your favour unfortunately.
those are good tips too silv. leave it off for an hour or two for the battery clock to reset

[silv]

If hardware was not the issue and blue screen still comes up on startup,
choose "System Restore" menu item you listed in your post.

very handy.

http://http://pcsupport.about.com/od/termss/p/system-restore.htm

yup, like Matt says, it's very important not to choose the wrong thing just because it sounds similar. "System Restore" is the option you'd choose.

[GeoffW1]

Hi,

Much the same thing happened to my PC, and it was due to the motherboard button battery needing replacement. This was not a rechargeable type, just a 2032 button.

Cheers

[multiweb]

Before doing a restore after a BSOD, the bios resets to default when the battery is replaced. Make sure your SATA drives are set to IDE and not AHCI.

[leon]

Thank you all very much, I am trying to fix this problem with the help of your suggestions, however it takes me a bit longer to do all this stuff as i'm not a clever as you young fellas.

I will let you know how it all goes.

Many thanks again for your help.

leon

[leon]

I can get to Command Prompt, but nothing really happens here, how do i type in Win, is it directly after the info comes up or somewhere else.

Thanks Leon

[silv]

yes, exactly.
when all the white on black stuff has appeared and the screen stopped moving you type in
win
and hit ENTER

[leon]

Thank You Annette, will have an other go at this, but the more i try something i get the feeling things are not looking that flash.

Leon

[leon]

To all you wonderful people for your suggestions, I have tried everything you all suggested and nothing alters its position and the PC always comes back to the initial screen telling me that the PC didn't start correctly. :sadeyes:

I have even tried to wipe everything and start with a fresh Operating System disc that came with the PC, even that didn't want to run and nothing appeared on the screen. :shrug:

So I am buggered for the moment at what to do, probably a rebuild i expect. :shrug:

Thank you. :)

Leon :thumbsup:

[leon]

OK, what do I do now please. :shrug: :)

Leon :thumbsup:

[redbeard]

Hi Leon,

Can I suggest that now is the time to either take your computer to the computer shop or ask someone over who is technical in this area. This is a hard one to diagnose, (I can think of many things it may be), but as you don't really know what you are doing, you may not know exactly what order to apply the suggested help.

From what I have read so far on this thread, you can get a command prompt which means that the computer is at least booting and has a valid hard disk.

Your hard disk may have bad sectors on it and perhaps that is the reason it won't boot into Windows.

My guess is, assuming that all you hardware is OK, is that your boot sector is faulty and needs rebuilding. How to overcome this is to boot with the original disk that has the operating system you installed, and then use this disk to repair the existing version of Windows. There are many many webpages with how to do this so I will suggest to look them up as it's a fairly simple task. If you do not have the original disk then another disk with the same OS, should also work.

I won't go into the procedure now as I have forgotten exactly the sequence, but as I say, there are heaps of websites with the info, just Google 'pc wont boot up, windows repair' etc....


If you do have a hardware failure somewhere that is causing this, then you need to take it to someone who can diagnose hardware issues.

Hope this help,

Cheers,

Damien.

P.S If you get really stuck after all the advice, have no IT friends and low on cash, even though I'm not an IT expert, I can at least offer to step you through a couple of things to determine if it's a hardware issue or not.

Text me on 0414541487 and we can arrange a time for you to call me. I live in Adelaide. I'm only available after 1pm on weekends though. Or perhaps after hours from 9pm onwards during the week. Just ensure you have all the disks etc ready.

[leon]

Thank You Damien, agreed i am not that handy when it comes to this sort of stuff, however i will try at least to fix it, I am very patient and will keep at it.
Your offer of assistance is very kind, I will keep that in mind, thank you.

Leon

[redbeard]

No worries Leon.

I just found this link:
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/how-to-resolve-windows-8-boot-issues/

Read from: Repair Your Startup Data

This is very similar to what I do in Win 7, I only run Win 7 at the moment .

Win 7 ver:
http://www.intowindows.com/how-to-easily-repair-windows-7-boot-problems-using-startup-repair/

Ensure you boot from the installation disk and not the options on your hard drive.

The automatic repair is the way to go.


Another remote possibility is the power supply. Sounds weird but I had a pc once where Windows seemed to suck too much power and kept re booting. I could tap the power supply when the pc was running from a boot disk in dos, and it would reboot.

All the best.

P.S I just re read my original post to you and definitely did not mean to choose such bad wording, apologies.:thumbsup:

[leon]

All good you are probably right I am no expert at this stuff but i will give it a try, and if all else fails i will seek help elsewhere.

However some good news, after much fumbling around i have got it up and running so to speak. :)

I did a refresh, thingy and it keep all my data but i lost all my programs which is no big deal as i have already loaded some back on.

However the internet seems tricky and dose not want to play very well giving me errors warnings, so i have just left that and will let my friend who is much more experienced to have a look at that.

I don't think that is 100% happy and healthy as there is some writing in the right hand corner of the screen telling me that ( Windows 8.1 Secure Boot isn't Configured Correctly, Build 9600 ) what ever that means :shrug:

Anyway it is in a better place than last night, I have all my Data backed up, so if it dies I really haven't lost stuff other than programs.

Thank you for your help.:)

Leon :thumbsup:

[multiweb]

It sounds like your HD MBR (master boot record) might have got corrupted. When an OS stops working from one day to the other and you get these kind of issues it is very unlikely it is a Windows problem. Windows recovery tools are pretty good and the OS has some redundancy built into it.

The only way to deal with issues like this is to have a clone/image of your HD so you can do a bare metal restore. Even if you managed somehow to fix the problem your HD cannot be relied on. Might do the same thing again in the near future.

[leon]

Thanks Marc, that is not really what i wanted to hear, :lol: anyway from this point on it is going to the Puter Shop. ;)

Thanks for your help.:thumbsup:

Leon :thumbsup:

[rally]

Marc,

Thats not always the case, although by now anyone who isnt backing up or cloning their drive is in need of serious mental help..

The MBR can be corrupt but the rest of the drive is fine.
If the partition tables are stuffed that can be more difficult.

I had a MBR problem recently on my work WinPc.

Cloned the faulty drive to another drive using a cheap USB to IDE/SATA/etc etc external adapter just in case before I attempted to rebuild the MBR. (I bought two of these so its easier cloning from one external drive straight to another external drive)

The PC wouldnt boot but the local drive data and apps were all still there - intact and could be file copied if necessary, but I really didnt want to go through the hassle of reinstalling everything and configuring it all as well - there was a week of work involved in doing that !

The adapter was like this one http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/USB-2-0-to-IDE-PATA-SATA-2-5-3-5-HDD-Hard-Drive-Adapter-Converter-Cable-OTB-/111944791572?hash=item1a106df614:g: HbcAAOSwe7BWt-fw

The beauty is you dont need a HDD case or external drive or power supply - it has everything - all you need is the internal HDD drive and it can be pretty much any type of drive you like.

Fixed the MBR using a free downloaded software tool and all was well again - I then had two working drives !

Total time spent was about 2 hours which included removing the hard drive from the case and replacing it and searching and downloading the MBR repair tool, firing up the laptop to do the cloning and using the USB/HDD adapters for the first time.

The problem was Windows doesnt get the chance to really understand what was wrong, so its diagnostics/attempts were futile.
In saying this was an earlier OS than Win8, so things are a bit different.

Rally

[silv]

glad you got it rolling again.
to balance the scales: I don't think there is a hard drive issue you need to worry about.
power outage corrupted important files is my guess.

The message "Secure Boot isn't Configured Correctly" message goes away once you installed all the Windows updates.

Specifically this one https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/2902864

Very good you backed up all your files, now.
You might want to think of a way to do that regularly from now on.
Some easy way you can actually follow through without feeling overwhelmed by the task.

Maybe open a new thread for this project? Could help others, too.

[AstralTraveller]

Would he have MBR these days? If it is GPT and UEFI couldn't he recover via the firmware? I had a Linux install trash my GRUB but I was able to recover by getting the firmware to boot directly into one of the working Linux installs on the machine. From that Linux I could then fix GRUB and I had a working machine again (though the faulty Linux install was still toast). Not sure if this can happen in the Windows world. :shrug:

[leon]

Thanks again for you responses, :) you have all be most helpful.
Annette, I am pretty good at backing up stuff and do it often, probably to often.:lol:

Leon :thumbsup: