Dreaded Black Screen on windows XP boot.

[martinstan]

Hi
I hope someone can help
I had a crash, not quite sure in which programme, I then re booted and my computer just hangs with a black screen just before the point where the XP logo would appear. Having tried a few obvious fixes... booting in safe mode(wouldn't)... Last known good config.(wouldn't again), I decided to do a repair using XP disc. Problem is, it won't let me do this either. It tells me that no operating system can be found and says I have to format which I really don't want to do. The other odd thing is that I've also tried making a boot disk(ntlldr, ntdetect.com and boot.ini) and I'm told-invalid system disk. I found this on this forum and wondered if anyone new if it would help me or any other suggestions.

Kind regards
Martin.

Quote:
Possible Fix by reconfiguring boot.ini using Recovery Console.
 1.Boot with XP CD or 6 floppy boot disk set.
 2. Press R to load the Recovery Console.  
 3. Type bootcfg.  
 4. This should fix any boot.ini errors causing setup not to see the  XP OS
      install.  
 5. Try the repair install.
 
One more suggestion from MVP Alex Nichol
"Reboot, this time taking the immediate R option, and if the CD letter is say K: give these commands
COPY K:\i386\ntldr C:\
COPY K:\i386\ntdetect.com C:\        (where K: is your CDROM drive letter)
(two other files needed - just in case)
1. Type: ATTRIB -H -R -S C:\boot.ini DEL C:\boot.ini
2. Type: BootCfg /Rebuild
which will get rid of any damaged boot.ini, search the disk for systems and make a new one. This might even result in a damaged windows reappearing; but gives another chance of getting at the repair.

Regards

 

[jeellison]

Hello,

I seem to be having the same problem, see thread:

http://www.tek-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=995806&page=4

but I get the black screen when I boot using the windows xp disk as well so have no option of repairing etc.

Please update heer on how you get on as this happened to me before christmas and I still havent fixed it.

Best Regards

 

[martinstan]

Hi Jeeillson
Have you checked your bios settings to my sure you are booting from your CD drive. It may help. A collegue of mine had that problem once.
Martin

 

[poetstrm]

I hate to say this but it sounds like your hard drive may be damaged or corrupted. If this is the case, instead of reformatting see if you can get another hard drive with windows on it, just a basic install, and see if you can boot into it and then look to see if you can read any files off your old hard drive with them both hooked up. I have saved a hard drive this way once and was able to just transfer any important data to another drive before reformatting the old one. Hope that helps.

 

[martinstan]

Hi Fellas
Thanks for you rinput. I learned a tough lesson with this one. I thought I'd cracked it by following the ideas I'd picked up from previous listings, copied new files across etc.. All seemed to be going well. Got to the point of re-installing XP back over the top of previous installation (home and dry)!, but on rebooting realised to my horror that everything had been wiped. Will be backing up important files in future....

 

[garebo]

I realize this wont help you this time, but perhaps if it happens again. I had this happen to me twice, bootup gets stuck on the black screen.
What i did was to leave it on for a long time, maybe 15 minutes, then shut computer off, wait 30 seconds, turn it back on, and keep doing this, eventually it will boot to windows. But i had to do this about 10 times.
Now when this happened to me, i wasnt getting any error messages, only had trouble booting into windows, but it worked for me.


Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[martinstan]

Hi
Yes it's too late for me but , you know, I was going to try something like that because we probably all have those lock ups from time to time for no apparent reason-as this was for me. Idid try a few times maybe 3 or 4 reboots but it just didn't seem to be getting anywhere, but I bet if I'd persevered then it might have worked.
Thanks anyway.

 

[cricket]

The dreaded Black Screen is a Microsoft upgrade on the previous Blue Screen of death.

 

[garebo]

I do know that patience and perseverance have worked for me on a few different occasions. I do believe that win xp must be fixing itself, in at least a minor way, behind the scenes, and thats why it works, but it does take a long time. I would like to know if others have had the same experience. As i said above, it can take over an hour, but it usually only takes about 15 min to half an hour. I have had this happen about 5 or 6 times. I have had the same win xp pro setup on this machine for over 3 yrs now, maybe even 4, and a ton of progs installed.



Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[BFOJ]

Another thing that I have tried when a computer consistently fails bootup or locks up at the same point repeatedly. Shutting power off, UNPLUGGING the AC power cord for a few minutes or so, discharges those capacitors and such, plugging it back in, then powering it on. Has helped me resolve numerous problems that turned out to be power related. Worth a try.

 

[LloydSev]

Generally when you are hung at a black screen which you must restart the machine to continue from, that is an indication of a hardware problem. It is not indicative of any certain hardware, as it can come from your motherboard, proc, etc... however it could ALSO be software related. If you were to just do an install over the previous install, it should take care of the problem you are having if it is software.

BTW, my machine had a bad mobo/cpu (K7S5A + AMD2000+) when my machine exhibited these systems myself. I had to underclock my CPU to 1800+ just to run stable and be able to access my CD-Roms, and clock to 1600+ to avoid the black screen hangs.

Computer/Network Technician
CCNA

 

[garebo]

Have to remember that one!

This is off topic, but applies to the power situation BFOJ mentioned. I have a test bench setup and the odd time it doesnt want to boot. I also have a power supply tester, the standard unit you can buy anywhere. When i plug it in the power supply goes on. then i turn on my test system and it boots. The tester does something, must clear the power supply in some manner, similar to what BFOJ is saying. Maybe a different route but does the same job?


Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[LloydSev]

If you are having to do that to a power supply, the best solution is to replace it so that it does not damage any components in your system.

Computer/Network Technician
CCNA