Windows Vista My Vista Computer Takes 40 Minutes To Boot! Blank Screen Shown.

Hi,

Yesterday my PC was working perfectly. No new drivers, updates, components or software have been installed. Recent virus scan was clean. Seemed to shutdown fine. However, I turned it on today and now it takes 41 minutes to boot up!! Heres the sequence of events:


23.35PM - Turn on PC. The monitor comes on, motherboard makes a beep, and displays the POST (Power On Self Test) as normal, then a dash _ blinks a few times in the top left corner, after that the monitor just goes completely blank (not even a cursor).

00.14AM - Finally the Windows loading bar appears. Longer than usual delay before the Windows circle icon appears, but from here everything appears to load fine.

00.16AM - Into Windows.


Ive reset several times and it always takes this long (even in safe mode). Though once in Windows everything runs like normal, no errors, no corrupt files etc.

Heres what Ive done so far to try and fix it: reset bios to default, took cmos battery out, removed all peripherals apart from keyboard and mouse, tried different keyboard and mouse, using different monitors, removed soundcard, checked connections, checked fans, tried different graphics card, run virus and spyware scans (clean), defragment, scandisk, registry scan, hard drive health checker, checked boot order.

Additionally, Ive inserted the Vista disk and clicked "Startup Repair" but it found no problems, so manually entered "x:\bootrec /fixmbr" into the command prompt to repair the master boot record which it said was successful. Still no luck.

Does this sound like a hardware or software issue? Is there anything in BIOS or the Boot or Startup tabs in msconfig that I could change to try to fix this? Any changes to the registry I could make? Or any software that repairs startup problems? Or could it be a memory issue?

Please help!





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CPU: Intel Q6600 Quad Core
OS: Windows Vista Home Premium
MOBO: Asus P5N-E SLI
PSU: 550W
RAM: 4GB DDR2 667MHz Memory (4x1GB)
GPU: nVIDIA GeForce 8800GTS 512MB
SFX: Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatal1ty FPS
HDD: 2x 500GB SATA Hard Drive with 16MB Buffer
LCD: Samsung T220 22" Widescreen
MANUFACTURER: MESH Computers
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Hi and welcome to the BBS,

Did you build the computer yourself? (Looks like it, BTW, good system info , you might want to put it into your WindowsBBS User profile information).

You can pull out and reseat the cable connectors for the drives, power, etc. If you have moved things, connections may have become loosened.

It would appear to be having trouble finding a boot device, that may be a HDD, a CD/DVD, a network boot system, an external drive, etc. You have reset the BIOS to default, but check the "Boot Device Order "....there may be something that the BIOS is confused about booting to...that's why I have suggested reseating the cable connections.

Matt

 

Do you have any other monitor cables plugged in? If not are you sure that you have your monitor cable plugged into the primary port? Post is displayed down all ports before output is switched to just one. That is unless if dual monitor output is enabled.

Otherwise you may need to a attempt a windows repair.

Does it start up in safe mode?

 

Thanks for the replies.

@ mattman: Nope I did not build it. Although I have subsequently installed different soundcard and graphics card a while ago. So I dont think theres any loose cables. I have rechecked the connections just incase.

@ tanturia: Tried different graphics card, different monitors and different ports.


Additionally, I have tried this:

• Ran several checkdisks with recover bad sectors enabled.
• Made sure DMA was enabled (tho on one IDE channel it had no option to enable or disable)
• Swapped RAM sticks over so can rule out memory issues.
• Used Knoppix Live Linux Boot CD. Booted into Linux fine from the CD within about 5 minutes. So does this indicate either hard drive or windows problem?
• Disabled everything under services and startup tabs in msconfig. And booting in safe mode. No difference.
• Now Im running a Spinrite 6 scan (says 40 hours remaining!!) in DOS.

One thing I didnt mention is that while the screen is blank, the hard drive light still flashes, and sounds like its reading one part of the drive continously. I guess this would indicate a hard drive problem, but then youd think it wouldnt be able to boot at all and have other issues once in Windows?

I shall try looking at the event logs later, and doing a repair install of Vista (do I need to uninstall SP1 first?).

Many thanks for all the help.

 

You can create a Boot log. Go to Start, in the Search bar type msconfig and open msconfig.exe. Under the Boot tab, put a check in the Boot log box, click Apply. You don't need to restart immediately. The log will show drivers loaded/not loaded. See the section To View the Safe Mode Boot Log File here:
How to troubleshoot startup problems in Windows Server 2003
You can follow the other suggestions, they should be the same for Vista, although for Vista, MS just say to run Startup Repair.

It still looks to me that the BIOS is having a problem finding the boot device (you don't see the Windows loading screen till after the blank screen, right?). Another suggestion, try disconnecting the CD/DVD drive/s.

Matt
PS Are the HDDs in a RAID array?

 

If you are not sure, Disk Management should tell you
http://www.theeldergeek.com/disk_management.htm
Edit: I expect they would be listed as a Dynamic type, not Basic (I haven't used RAID)

 

Thanks very much for the replies. Its great to be helped by two certified experts.

Unfortuately, the Spinrite 6 scan is still running in order to attempt to repair the hard drive. It will probably be a further 30 hours before its complete!

After that I will carry out your reccomendations and post here to let you know the outcome. Btw no my hard drives are not in RAID.

One thing I thought of is booting with "Last Known Good Configuration ", but how do I get to that screen? On my PC pressing F8 just brings up the boot order menu!

Cheers.