Laptop wont finish bootup

[#1]

My wife's laptop (Win 7 Home) wont boot up properly. It gets to the 'Please Wait' screen, moves on to a black screen, then just stops. I can get from there to Task Manager, but once there, I have no idea what to do. At least I can get there, for what that is worth. One attempt to boot up resulted in the 'mouse' stopping working, but restarting got that working. I suppose it could be overheating (I'm not sure my wife turns her computer off when she isn't using it). It might be that the inside has an excess of dust.

I would be grateful for any suggestions. Thanks

[#2 · Accepted solution]

Hi there, can you get to command prompt? If so, try this..

After booting with Command Prompt you can start the System Restore tool by typing c:\windows\system\restore\rstrui.exe at a command prompt, and then pressing ENTER.

It should do a system restore but will take a bit of time. 

[#3]

Won't that wipe out all data on the disk?

[#4]

You could try F8 boot into safe mode

[#5]

@VileReynard

No, it won't wipe the disc, it restores to last point when Windows worked correctly.

[#6]

I tried getting into Safe Mode, but this laptop asks for ESC rather than F8, and it gives you less than half a second to press it, so I missed several times before I got it. When I did get the list of startups, it only listed Windows 7 (not Safe Mode or anything else) or it suggested using Tab to get to some sort of repair. I have never seen this Tab thing before, but out of desperation I tried it. It allowed me to log in to a list that included System Restore. I ran System Restore, but it eventually stated that it had failed so hadn't changed anything. I came out of System Restore and the laptop rebooted itself. Hey Presto it then said System Restore had worked, and the laptop seems to be OK now. Confused? I certainly am

My thanks to everyone for all your help

[#7]

@VileReynard will probably argue that Windows has never worked correctly

[#8]

Windows has never (yet) worked properly.

[#9]

Nice to know all is well with laptop. 

[#10]

Thanks. My wife told me her laptop wasn't working this morning as she went out to work. Now she has come home and tried it and confirmed it is working without problem, she has told me that last night she did one of those weekly Microsoft updates, and then Zone Alarm told her it too wanted an update so she started that. Part way through the Zone Alarm update, it told her she would have to uninstall the old ZA before it could install the new. Now I don't know whether all she had to do was okay the uninstall and ZA would do that then install the new, but at some point ZA said it would have to reboot the pc - and that's when the problem started. Whether it was just coincidence, or she did something incorrectly, or whether there is an incompatability with the Win 7 update and the new ZA I don't know, but if it is the latter then I suspect others will have similar problems. Anyway, thanks to all once again. Bye

[#11]

@penneck Uninstall ZA permanently... it is no use anymore.. and just clogs up the workings.. I used to use it...but haven`t done so for a few years now. and nothing "untoward" has happened to me... !

[#12]

Sorry Shutter. Have just discovered your post from mid-March. I thought the subject of that conversation had been closed so didn't go back to it until I checked my Notifications just now

[#13]

Time was when I used to get a lot of flak on this forum for suggesting ZoneAlarm was more trouble than it is worth. 

[#14]

I stopped using ZA when I installed W7 soon after it was released as it was then superfluous anyway.

[#15]

You wont get any flak from me. You've helped me so many times over the years. As for ZA, well it might as well go

Cheers