So, I’ve spent the last two days trying to resolve this problem, but to no avail thus far. Google searches have revealed that several people have posted similar situations here previously, and so I have attempted various suggested solutions, but I still cannot solve it. So I come to the experts for help…
System description: Lenovo ThinkPad T410 Windows 7 (64 bit)
A couple of days ago, Avast notified me that an update was pending. I performed the update, after which a restart was required. I initiated the restart, but the computer returned to just a completely black screen (no cursor either), with the disk drive LED indicating that it was constantly accessing. After several minutes of waiting, I restarted the computer again (hold down power button method), but same issue. Additional attempts revealed that I couldn’t access BIOS mode via F8 (so no access to Safe Mode, etc).
Next, I boot the laptop from the Windows 7 install DVD, and access the System Recovery Options. In various order (I can’t remember exactly), I have attempted the following (based on my own limited knowledge plus suggestions found in various posts):
Ran Startup Repair (many times) : Result each time → “Startup Repair could not detect a problem”
Ran System Restore : Result → “No restore points have been created on your computer’s system drive.” Comment → This response seems wrong, since I know that there have been restore points. In fact, I know that a restore point was created just a day before this situation started (this latest restore point was created during a Windows Update cycle).
Ran “chkdsk /r” (via command prompt) : Result → completed without error.
Ran “sfc /scannow /offbootdir /offwindir” (via command prompt) : Result → “Windows Resource Protection found corrupt files but was unable to fix some of them.” Comment → I now have the associated CBS.log. I quick search thru it did not identify any ‘corrupt’ entries.
Ran “bootrec /fixmbr”, “bootrec /fixboot”, & “bootsect /nt60” (via command prompt) : Result → All completed successfully, but no improvement.
Ran “FRST64.exe” (via command prompt with frst64 on a USB stick) : Result → I now have the associated frst.txt file.
I may have tried other things too that I’ve forgotten. But the end result has always been the same…no improvement. So I am now at the end of my capabilities (well, I was probably at the end of those capabilities a while ago), so I hope someone out there can suggest additional avenues to pursue. I can share the frst.txt file if that would be useful.
Anyway, thanks in advance for any help given. Much appreciated.
I ran FRST with the fixlist.txt as supplied. It seemed to run successfully. But the subsequent reboot resulted in same behavior (black screen, etc). I have attached the fixlog.txt that was generated. I haven’t tried anything else yet, pending any new suggestions. Thanks!
Here is a fresh frst.txt file. I just have one hard drive (internal), although I believe that it was delivered with multiple partitions (one main partition, plus 1 or 2 tiny partitions that I’ve never explored; e.g., a lenovo recovery partition).
Thanks.
Just thought I’d provide some closure on this topic. I tried the startup repairs, but still the same issue…persistent black screen. I then started the memory test (which takes a while and automatically restarts the computer after it’s complete) and left it to run while I went to sleep. The next morning, the computer was waiting for me at the Windows login screen! Hmph. So, just to see if everything was really fixed, I logged in and then immediately performed a restart. Alas, back to the same problem…persistent black screen. So it wasn’t really fixed, but it did eventually get to the login screen. Double hmph. So this time I left the computer at the black screen again and waited. Somewhere between 2 and 4 hours later, the computer finally got thru to the Windows login screen again. I decided to run chkdsk again, but it didn’t find any issues. So then I decided to download and run SeaTools to perform a deeper disk check. Alas, it found several bad sectors…and it was able to successfully repair them all. And sure enough, my computer is now working smoothly again!
So, I guess Avast wasn’t the root cause of my woes after all…just an unfortunate coincidence.
Keep an eye on your drive, tho. If it is original or old, bad sectors could be a sign of eventual/imminent hdd failure. Suggest doing an image once a week to back up both the disk and personal files. For that, you’ll need another hard drive to back up to.
Excellent advice. I’ve had a hard drive fail without any warning. Worked fine until I rebooted at which time the hard drive could not be found.
In my case it turned out to be a motherboard problem which spiked the HD and killed it.
Without that image backup, much of my personal information would have been gone forever.
Yup, it’s more common then you think. I had my 100GB HD fail only 2 weeks ago after running it with several bad sectors for just over 6 months. It suddenly went into “automatic repair” and just continued to recycle. Never repaired, never found the boot.
Have sinced replaced it with a slightly larger HD.
Excellent point by Mchain
For what it’s worth, I backup to the cloud (CrashPlan). But adding a local image would probably be a good idea, too (especially in the case of a catastrophic drive failure). Many thanks!
Not only that, but restoring (cloning) an image to a new drive is much faster than installing everything from scratch. Option is also there to replace the original drive with a new one before it fails. Maybe a hybrid or SSD drive is in the future with equal or slightly larger capacity? You can use a hammer and a nail or two to destroy the old drive if you decide to toss it.
We’re talking minutes instead of possibly several days if you routinely image your drive vs. fresh install.
