| 25 Gustaf, on Jan 25, 2009 12:09:26 pm GMTI'm having the same problem. I am using vista and when the screen goes gray I activate sleepmode and then deactivate it. I will soon do a virus search. | 26 123, on Jan 28, 2009 8:29:14 am GMTFFS does anybody actually have the answer? | 27 Dijital, on Jan 28, 2009 8:10:17 pm GMTOk, I am a certified technician for a prominent computer manufacturer. There is a problem with several of the posts in this thread. Several of you have different issues, all of which have the same symptoms.
First off-Michelle: You need to check your video drivers. This is the most common cause of random characters/vertical or horizontal lines. Since it is successful in safe mode, I would start by checking drivers.
Danspan: When you get the black screen of death (mouse cursor on a black screen) you can try and restart explorer as you posted (ctrl, shift, esc will bring up task manager) and then click File-New task-explorer.exe. This will (in most cases) let you get your icons and desktop up normally, at least once so you can back up your data.
CompTech: You are exactly right. Most of the problems (with the exception of the crunching hard drive) IS ABSOLUTELY caused by the user. Malware, Spyware, Adware, and viruses cause the majority of damage to computers we see today. Be careful where you go. Don't download crap from limewire, torrents etc. Even if you think you are protected by running your Norton or Mcaffee, you are being fooled. There are between 8 and 10 THOUSAND new viruses written every WEEK, mostly from eastern Europe and former Soviet Union. If i was a virus programmer, I would write it to do everything in its power to avoid the major antivirus software, which is what most of you probably have.
For most of you, (if you do not have premium tech support from your computer manufacturer), your system is probably too hosed for you to fix on your own. You will more than likely need to do a full format and start from scratch.
Anyone reading this, take it as a life lesson, or a wake up call. The internet can be a very very dangerous place, depending on what you do and where you go. ALWAYS back up your data. I recommend 4 programs for the average user. All of these are FREE! Malware Bytes, SpyBot search and destroy, AVG free antivirus, and CCcleaner. CCcleaner is a great utility that fixes bad and unused registry entries, along with normal housekeeping (ie cookies temp internet files etc. )
When Vista wont load (or Xp for that matter) its a direct result of either new software being installled, or a hardware failure. Simple as that. Software can be anything you intentionally loaded, or something that came in the back door and infected the computer (like spyware or a vurus)
AND MOST IMPORTANTLY!!!! Anything that says Windows Antivirus 2009, or Windows Antivirus 2008, or Windows Antivirus Xp, or anything with Windows and Antivirus in it---is a VIRUS! It is very sneaky and looks like a real program. It will eventually tell you your trial is up and asks for a credit card number. It is stealing this information. It looks like a legitimate program and many people think It's a Microsoft application. It actually runs what looks like a legitimate virus scanner. It is so sneaky, that if you select restart from the start menu, your computer doesn't actually restart. It simply shows an image onscreen that looks like the Windows XP reboot screen. We see this happening on Vista machines all the time.
Pop ups, or redirects to pages you didnt select are indicators of malware/spyware. Malware Bytes should take care of most of these.
Hope this helps some of you. | 29 Dijital, on Jan 28, 2009 8:19:07 pm GMTOh one last thing. To correctly run check disk...
get to the command line.
Type cd/
type chkdsk /f /r
There is a space between the chkdsk and /f and /r
It should read as follows
C:/chkdsk /f /r | 31 Sherri7352, on Jan 29, 2009 7:48:26 pm GMTI like what I read under your response and have a similar problem. I would like it if you could help me. I have a Toshiba Satellite 215-4196 w/ Vista Premium. Love, love love it. However, one night I had fallen to sleep on the couch with a glass of water next to it. You know where this is going. I left early in the morning for the day, came home that evening, pushed the button to turn it on. And it wouldn't come on. I checked all the connections and when I looked down, there was a letter misising and it was absolutely soaked. We had a new kitten and I beleive what had happened was that she decided to play in the water. I quickly disconnected it. But fear it was too late at that point, and let it dry out for a few days. A few days later it would reboot. Came on and I was able to use it like normal, until the battery died. Then I removed the battery and gave it to someone at my place of work to copy all my data that I desperately needed. He did that, and said good news you can use it with the battery removed. But you may have fried the charging system. So being excited I took it home, plugged into the wall and turned it on. The welcome screen came up, and asked for my password. I promptly entered it. I kept giving me an error message saying it was the wrong password and the hint came up. It was exactly what I thought it should be. I kept reentering it, and on occasion it looked as though it was loading. Then an error message stating to use a thumb drive or floppy disk because there was no drive came up.
My question would be... any thoughts on what drive they are referencing? Can I download it from Toshiba? Do you know any way of getting around this? I can work a program, but when it comes the guts... I'm useless, but I do follow direction quite well. Can you help me please? I'm just devastated. You don't know how hard I had to work to get this lap top and how long it took me to save for it. | 32 Dijital, on Jan 30, 2009 8:19:48 am GMTSorry to say, but you're pretty much hosed on this one. If the water got under the keyboard, it probably fried it. This would explain your password not typing correctly. Im really not sure what drive its asking you for. It sounds like you might need to start saving again for a new laptop. | 34 Sherri7352, on Jan 30, 2009 12:16:46 pm GMTThanks so much for your help. I apperciate it. Have a great day! |
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| 42 hypnoali, on Feb 23, 2009 10:31:06 pm GMTHey, really interesting things you are saying here but don't know if it helps me at all. I have a brand new dell studio pre-loaded with vista home premium - thought i had ordered professional but apparently you cannot have that with a non business machine from Dell! Anyway, I am trying to get it and my son's laptop to recognise my creative zen vision m mp3 player which I use for recording my work sessions for clients. The computer just won't recognise my device at all. I have downloaded the vista service pack 1 in the hope that this would do the trick, have spoken to creative who are at a loss and it looks like my registry already has all sorts of problems but I am no expert and sure as hell am nervous about downloading anything at all. Anyway to cut a long story short, the service pack has made no difference and in the device manager, my mp3 is not registering at all. Each time I plug it in, the computer tries to install the drivers but with no success. Can you talk me through a possible answer to my problem in as easy to understand and follow as possible instructions as I am no computer expert and want to get it all right. Many thanks. |
| 44 Natalie, on Mar 4, 2009 1:06:50 am GMTHello my name is natalie, im having quite the same problem apart from i have a toshiba satellite L40-14N, well my laptop basically just all of a sudden used to freeze whenever i got past the login page so i tried re-installing vista but when vista says its completing installation the screen goes black all of a sudden and it wont let me do anything so i shut it down and now when i turn my laptop on i cant do anything it just comes up with a black screen telling me to install it again cause it was failed but when i do it still doesnt work please help im lost without my laptop! I just want to be able to use it again, and it has just to say ran out of warranty :( please mail me if you have anything o0__natalie__0o@hotmail.com |
| Hey guys, I was having the same problem. My computer wouldnt get past welcome screen when I tried to start it up normal. It would start up fine in safe mode so I went to run and typed in: cmd.exe then hit ok. Then it looked like this C:\Users\and whatever your name is> then u type in chkdsk /f/r with a space in between the k and the / and hit enter. Then it should tell you it cant check your computer because it is running so it will ask if you want to check it at the next startup so just type Y and hit enter. Then restart your computer and if it works it should go through all of your files and fix all of the bad ones. After I did that I tried to start it up again in normal mode but it was still taking a little while so I started the task manager and clicked file then new task then type in explorer.exe and like dijital said it let me in. So I got on the internet and downloaded MalawareBot and scanned my PC and then restarted it and it working fine now. Just wanted to say thanks to Dijital and I hope this helps some other people. | 54 Kristen, on Apr 15, 2009 8:37:36 pm BSTI'm having the same problem as you are and I'm sure that If I could get into safe mode it would work. I can't even get to safe mode. The comp starts up and the loading screen is there and then the screen goes pitch black and comes back on, but with a lighted black background and just the cursor. If I go to the f8 help menu when the computer starts up and click on safe mode it will load and you will see all the white lettering scrolling up the screen and then once again it goes to the loading bar and then black screen again and I get the same results. Do you have any advice? |
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| 30 Rahul, on Jan 29, 2009 4:02:53 pm GMTHi digital,
I have a Acer Aspire 5100- 5528. I recently got a blue screen error and the laptop just rebooted. It said "Error: 200: Failure fixed disk drive 0". On a reboot again Vista worked flawlessly, till recently when the dreaded blue screen again came up and then the vista wont go beyond the "Microsoft Corporation" screen. The windows logo too wont show up. I did a complete system restore back to original factory default and again the same thing that windows wont boot beyond the "Microsoft Corporation" screen. On a reboot it came to the initial settings screen and again would not go beyond a certain point in setting up Windows.
I have even tried the Acer service centre which advised me that the hard disk has gone bad. I replaced the hard disk with a new one and tried using the old hard disk as a external USB HDD. When connected through the USB port the HDD works absolutely fine without any problems. I tried to reboot the system using the USB HDD as the first boot option. Again the same thing.
Please advice is it really a HDD issue or is it something with Vista. Is there any way I can use the old HDD instead of the new one? Could it be a boot sector failure on the old hard disk.
regards | 33 Dijital, on Jan 30, 2009 8:25:59 am GMTThis is either one of two things...more than likely your motherboard hdd controller has died. Possibility of a corrupt chipset driver. Or, since there was a gap between the initial error, and the current lockups, they might not even be related. But I feel its the controller on your board. Nothing you can do about that one except warranty. | 45 Kristen, on Mar 11, 2009 1:38:36 am GMTHi Dijital,
I am having pretty much the same problem as everyone else on here, but mine just a bit different. A while back I downloaded an emulator(stupid move, I know.) and it gave me the blue sreen. I was able to log in for a short period of time, but wasn't able to really do anything. Safe mode worked fine also. So, I downloaded avg and put it on a cd and loaded it to my laptop and did a scan in safe mode and it fixed the blue screen problem and the computer worked fine again. It worked good for about 2-3 weeks and on night I went to download something and the computer just froze and wasn't doing anything. I tried ctrl alt delete and nothing. So I restarted and now I have the problem where the computer starts up and the loading screen(without the logo) shows up, then the screen goes pitch black, comes back on as a black screen. I can tell the screen is on because the mouse moves around and when I let it go idle the screen saver comes on. I can't even get to the login screen and I can't use the computer in safe mode either. And I also can't use the restore either. I've tried everything I've read and nothing is working. I have no idea what's wrong with it and I haven't been able to use it for a long time. It runs in the background if I leave it on. Can you help me? I've tried other sites and I don't get anything back from anyone. Hopefully you have an idea what could be wrong.
Thank you! | 46 Kristen, on Mar 11, 2009 1:41:00 am GMTOh and I almost forgot I have an Acer Aspire 5920 with windows vista premium. |
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| 59 Helpless, on May 27, 2009 11:35:47 pm BSTHi I am wondering if you can help me I have a Sony VAIO VGN-NR430E. I t keeps taking me to the WIndows Error Recovery window I choose safe mode and it brings me back to the Recovery window. If I leave it alone it restarts on its own about 3 times and then it stays blank. can you guide me through this? I would really appreciate this. |
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| 41 betto, on Feb 23, 2009 5:11:07 pm GMTDijital: this 4 programes that you recommend (Malware Bytes, SpyBot search and destroy, AVG free antivirus, and CCcleaner), should i use the 4 of them? or any of them is enough? thanx very much for you answers man, its been the bes help i`ve found on the net.
cheers |
| 69 aidan, on Jul 12, 2009 12:53:38 am BSTWell this is my problem! because you are like one of those smart computer people i relly need help!!!!
this wat ive done: i have pressed the button on the mointor to shut it off a cupple of times.
:i have done a system restore
:i have done a test to see if it has happen before
its vista and a desktop computer and its new i got it at x-mas
all my system things to fix the computer it says "get rid of music/movie player" and i havent dowloaded anything from crap sites like lime wire ect!
So do u know my proplem! if u do plz help it would be very nice. thank you
(some one said dowload Winsp?) |
| 78 jeccakyle, on Sep 11, 2009 12:06:14 am BSTHi. You seem to know allot about computers. my friend has this dell laptop and today when he got on he was typing and everything was fine but then when he hit the "U" key it brought up this screen. it did it a few times and i clicked on something that brought up the keyboard and i put it on key "f12" or something like that.then he signed back in and his keyboard was locked. and then you could only type anything by holding down the keys.
he doesnt want to call and ask. idky. |
| 79 LawDawg, on Oct 1, 2009 6:18:35 pm BSTI first want to thank you for insight into this matter. I tried to load norton 2010 last night that i downloaded from a torrent site, and thats when the problem started. First it would not load the desktop at all just the black screen so I did a system restore. Ok thats fine the desktop is loading now but if I click on one of the shortcuts or click the start menu and click on a program or folder the laptop just freezes. I know now that it more than likely had something to do with the torrent I downloaded last night but now what can or should I do to resolve this problem. Also I was one of those laptop/computer noobs that did not make the recovery/restore/backup discs when I first got my laptop. Any and all help will be greatly appreciated. |
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Acer aspire windows xp blue screen won't load