Computer Dead After Boot Scan!

General Topics
1

Hello, I’m new here. :slight_smile:

I just downloaded and installed the very latest version of Avast 4 Home edition and when it was near the end of the installation, it asked if I wanted to do a boot scan. I said, yes. Then it said it needed to restart to finish the install. I did that.

It came back on with a black screen, white lettering, and was scanning. I left it for several minutes, came back and the screen was blank. I moved the cursor and a message came on but it didn’t stay long enough to read it. Something about scan failed and to consult manual or something … I think.

The computer is frozen, the cursor is frozen … I can’t do anything with it and can’t shut it down either. Can someone please help me?

It is a laptop, Acer Aspire
AMD Turion
54 x2 dual-core mobile technology
Tl-60 (2.0 GHz, 2x 512 KB L2 Cache)
3GB DDR2
250 GB HDD

If you need any other information, I’ll try to find it. Thank you!

Patches

2

Sorry, I have Vista on the laptop.

3

Don’t have an Acer, but isn’t there a power push button that will turn off the computer by holding it down for a few seconds, so you can reboot it.

4

Thanks for replying, sded,

There is a power button for on/off … I’ve held it down and nothing happens. This really has me scared … it’s a brand new laptop. :frowning:

5

You may need to hold the button down for 10 seconds or so. Could also be failure of a new computer, but ??? You could also try unplugging it and taking the battery out to turn it off, then replace and try to restart with the button. Avast! isn’t doing anything in the boot scan that could actually kill a computer.

6

You’re right,sded … I needed to hold the button down for a bit longer than that … and it did shut down. It was unplugged but it was still ON and I was afraid to remove the battery while it was ON.

I wasn’t blaming Avast. The laptop comes programmed to go into sleep mode after 15 minutes of inactivity and I think that’s what happened. It went to sleep in the middle of the boot scan. I didn’t think it would do that because it was actively scanning but … what do I know? lol

Thanks a lot for your help, sded, I really appreciate it! hug

Have a great evening!

Patches

7

Have a good evening (sounds like you can now :slight_smile: ) and welcome to the forum.

8

Oh ya, I can now, thank you! I was ready to slit my throat! LOL

And thanks, happy to be here. Um … that’s a lie. LOL. I’d rather not be here if it means I’ll have to go through that again.

9

::slight_smile: :frowning:

10

Figuratively speaking, of course, ardvark. LOL

11

Hi Patches.

On my computer the same thing happened some time ago (but no messages came out after the screen was blank). And I also think that it was because of the sleeping mode, I am using Vista on HP notebook by the way.

12

Hi mevcit!

I’d be a lot happier if I had XP or Windows 7 on my laptop … don’t like Vista. It takes me so long to find anything on it, things that would take a split second with XP. :-\

13

At first I thought so, too. But a few months later I just gave up missing XP. ;D Vista is definitely safer, and is easier to use for me now. If you are new to Vista and have been using XP (or older versions), it is normal to think that Vista is useless. However, you will not want to use XP anymore after some time (I think). :slight_smile:

Windows 7 will be better of course. I have not tried it so far; but people say that it is really a fast OS, and the UAC function is more configurable.

14

glad to see you solved it.