PC won't restart after power outage
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maxi1600 Posted messages 5 Status Member -
maxi1600 Posted messages 5 Status Member -
Hello,
I tried to find an answer on the forum, but I didn't find exactly the same problem.
After a power cut, I turned my laptop back on. It displays a black screen asking me to start Windows normally (or choose safe mode, safe mode with command prompt, last known good configuration), which I do, but the laptop keeps restarting in a loop and always returns to the page that asks me to choose between 4 options. (I tried all 4, but I always come back to the same page).
The fan is running.
I tested a CD to possibly reinstall the system; it seems to recognize it, but I wouldn't want to lose everything that's installed and some files.
Thank you for your help
I tried to find an answer on the forum, but I didn't find exactly the same problem.
After a power cut, I turned my laptop back on. It displays a black screen asking me to start Windows normally (or choose safe mode, safe mode with command prompt, last known good configuration), which I do, but the laptop keeps restarting in a loop and always returns to the page that asks me to choose between 4 options. (I tried all 4, but I always come back to the same page).
The fan is running.
I tested a CD to possibly reinstall the system; it seems to recognize it, but I wouldn't want to lose everything that's installed and some files.
Thank you for your help
Configuration: Windows XP Firefox 3.6
20 answers
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Hello again
I read that my computer might have gone into recovery mode, but what should I do if that’s the case?
I tried to restart with the CD, but I’m not sure if I did it right....
I keep getting the same prompt in a loop.
Can’t anyone help me???
Thank you in advance, I really need to recover my data because I need to work on it... -
Hello, normally your phone has a battery and in case of power cuts, it should take over, so it shouldn't have turned off, or else it was your computer that caused the power cut.
I had a bit of this kind of failure; without the power cut, it was the hard drive that was dead (it sounds like it's searching with little crackling noises and not finding anything).-
Ha... Very true, excellent point regarding the laptop.
It shouldn't have stopped, so he's right, there's another issue. But well, it's not at all certain that the hard drive is toast and it’s worth seeing if reinstalling can make it work. Still, we need to recover the data since there's no backup.
And if the PC won't start anymore, the external case remains the solution, but you need to have one.
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Never forget that a forum is a public place, no one will defend you. Be wary of others.
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For the case, yes, it's an external case for a 2.5-inch hard drive (portable hard drive format) that would be needed to mount the laptop's hard drive and see if it spins and/or, more importantly, recover the files from it using your other machine.
With USB sticks, we won't achieve anything if the PC doesn't boot, because we need something that runs...
Although, it's true that if we can boot the PC from a USB key with a recovery system, it might be possible to copy part of your files onto this key or another one (but we need large USB sticks).
I will check on Google or here to find a utility to boot from a USB key (we'll need to go into the BIOS to change the boot order).
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Never forget that a forum is a public place, no one will defend you. Be wary of others. -
Good evening,
Thank you for your responses.
I agree that we need to back up, and that's what I do very regularly. So I have saved a lot of important things.
But I work many hours every day and I have a lot of programs. That's why it would be quite a "pain" to lose everything.
I also have several websites installed locally.
Yes, I do have a battery, but I should mention that it doesn't charge much anymore because it must be near the end of its life and I thought my laptop was plugged into the mains; the plug had probably been accidentally pulled out, and absorbed in my work, I didn't notice. The completely flat battery then caused the shutdown.
Then I plugged the computer back in, and it was impossible to restart.-
Hello, according to your explanation the problem probably comes from the battery. If your laptop isn't very recent, remove it and plug it into the mains, it should work. If it’s newer, I tried it on mine and it doesn’t work, you need to find a buddy who has the same laptop as you and try with their battery. Bye.
- Good evening,
Thank you for the response.
But my PC turns on and keeps showing a startup page in a loop, so it works when plugged in.
I don't think it's a battery issue and I don't have any friends with a Fujitsu Siemens Amilo Pro V3545.
It's not very old, from September 2007, so two and a half years, but it has been used a lot.
What I would like is to recover my most recent data before attempting to run the manufacturer’s CD.
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re
I don't have an external drive (is it a hard drive?) but only USB sticks.
If I have to reinstall and lose the programs, I will have to take the time...
But I also still have some last unsaved files!
The computer in question is a portable Fujitsu Siemens Amilo Pro V3445, with XP Pro.
So what can I actually try? (because I need to do some work on Open Office that I can't install on the computer I'm using to write here!!).
So if you could guide me a bit... thanks in advance again! -
Yes, I already went into the BIOS and set the CD priority to see if it would work with the reinstallation CD. It started preparing the procedure, but when I got to the repair, I ended up with it looping...
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So it's screwed for a console recovery if it loops at this level too.
So the only option left is a complete reinstallation. But that likely means data loss. Is it a regular Microsoft XP CD or a CD provided by the manufacturer with their logo?
That said, we might have a chance to boot, but first we need to know if we can make the USB bootable in the BIOS?
A little related post.Post
Tips Tips 1
Tip 2 not ccm
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Never forget that a forum is a public place, no one will defend you. Beware of others.
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It’s a manufacturer CD that specifies that all data will be lost...
But in the BIOS, we can boot from USB according to what I see.
What’s crazy is that I just tried to update (on the old PC from which I’m writing) from pack 2 to pack 3 very painstakingly and for a long time.
Upon restarting, I found myself with the same problem as the laptop: it wouldn’t boot anymore!!!!
And the same, the same page in a loop offering me to restart Windows normally (or in 3 other ways). Except that on this one, I could restart in safe mode and do a system restore and here I am back on pack 2! But at least it restarts!
So I wonder if this problem with the laptop also comes from an update from pack 2 to pack 3!!!
because that’s what I did a few hours before!!!-
Possible, such things can happen when updating a service pack while the various drivers on the PC are not updated. Generally, we update all drivers (motherboard chipsets, graphics card, etc.) and then perform an update.
Anyway, the issue here is that it's impossible to boot into safe mode; however, Windows "boots" but loops. With the console, we won't get far, as it allows us to fix certain aspects, but for that we need to know what is wrong (missing file, faulty driver during update, etc.), but here we don't know what the problem element is.
So we should probably focus on creating a bootable USB drive (if possible with large capacity). If it works and you know where your data is located, there might be a way.
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Never forget that a forum is a public place; no one will defend you. Beware of others.
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Hello,
The data I'm interested in is in my documents, but I think it's a large volume.
What USB drive capacity would I need?
Maybe it would be best if I bought an external hard drive that I can use afterwards to back up all my data. I've been meaning to get one for a while.
I'll take a look online, and maybe you can advise me?
Best regards, have a nice Sunday.-
"Important" and "what capacity?" are two related elements :-) It is absolutely impossible for me to answer this question if you yourself do not know it :-) My documents could very well contain 2000 files and take up a hefty 300 MB or 150 files and have a size of 1 GB.
For the enclosure, yes that would be a solution. First, you need to check your disk on the laptop, which is usually 2.5, then purchase an enclosure with the disk included or separately.
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Never forget that a forum is a public place, no one will defend you. Be wary of others. -
Good evening,
Yes, I understand that you cannot know the capacity of the hard drive that I would need.
But what is certain is that an external hard drive will work just fine.
Is there a way to check my computer's hard drive to see if it's dead?
Of course, I will have a lot of software to reinstall if the computer is shot, but what would bother me the most would be losing all my client contacts in Outlook Express! I admit I have been careless in not making the latest backup of my contacts.
If the hard drive is not dead, do I have any chance of recovering them?
I would like to ask if you have an opinion on this Iomega 320 GB hard drive that I could go pick up tomorrow morning.
http://www.darty.com/nav/achat/informatique/disque_dur_externe/disque_dur_portable/iomega_select_320_go.html
Thank you in advance. -
If the hard drive is not dead, you have a 99% chance of recovering your data. So good news IF...
The Iomega drive is indeed a 2.5 and is at a perfectly reasonable price.
PS: Be careful before buying, you need to check the format of the drive and the connector, as there are two types of drives for laptops. And for yours, I only found information stating 160 GB and 5400 RPM SATA, but not the format which exists in 2.5 or 1.8 inches. So the connectors can differ sometimes.
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Never forget that a forum is a public place, no one will defend you. Beware of others. -
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Oh yes, but we will have to find a solution, since it will have to be disassembled anyway if we want to put it in a case.
I don't know this brand (I mean, I've never disassembled it), but in principle there should already be technical markings on the disk (label?). Then to disassemble it, there is often one or more small screws holding it in place that need to be removed, and most of the time we gently slide it flat to disconnect it (key word, never force) from the connector.
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Never forget that a forum is a public place, no one will defend you. Be wary of others.
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re
I'm still wondering while reading testimonials.
Could my phone have locked and gone into safety mode? I see that this has happened to others or could a fuse have blown? (but maybe in those cases the power wouldn't work?)
I've also read that some have simply resolved it by reprogramming the BIOS speed?
If my problem can be solved by either of these solutions, I wouldn't know how to do it.-
The fuse is unlikely because it covers PCs that refuse to turn on.
The speed of the BIOS??? I don't know what they mean except for the speed of the processor, but often these are people who overclock their processor and that's always risky because they try to push their machine to its limits and encounter problems as a result of this particular manipulation. These are hardware issues. That's not your case.
In your case, Windows having suddenly lost power, especially during such an important update as SP3, one or more Windows files must have gone wrong. I'm sure that if we reinstall Windows everything will be perfectly fine, including the upgrade to SP3 (done properly, it happens automatically).
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Never forget that a forum is a public place, no one will defend you. Be careful of others.
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Good evening,
I'm not sure that the SP3 update is to blame because I was able to do some work afterwards for a good while without any problems with my laptop (which is not the case with my old PC that I just reformatted and which immediately didn't like the update to Pack3, is very slow, easily bugs, and I'm afraid it might fail on me at any moment).
I would lean more towards the abrupt shutdown.
Can this symptom of a looping page indicate that the computer has significant damage? And is the hard drive itself failing?
Tomorrow, I will first go get an enclosure with a hard drive.
And then please guide me if you can to try to recover the missing data.
Can I use any brand in 2.5? I've spotted some for 59 euros?
Thank you in advance. -
another solution: you can try booting your PC with an Ubuntu CD
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it's the price... -
Hello,
No, it doesn't make any small crackling sounds (however, the one I'm writing on is very slow and makes lots of grunts, and I'm always afraid it will die on me). -
Stop/Start!
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"Who wants to climb a mountain starts from the bottom!"
Signed: "Gillette" a.k.a. "nobody"! ;) (°!°) -
But no… just me, a bit lazy! ;)
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"Who wants to climb a mountain starts from the bottom!"
Signed: "Gillette" a.k.a. "nobody"! ;) (°!°) -
Sorry, that could have been enough!
Good luck,
Best regards,
See you later
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"He who wants to climb a mountain starts from the bottom!"
Signed: "Gillette" aka "nobody"! ;) (°!°) -
I have the task of proofreading everything: have you tried entering the BIOS and setting the "default" settings?
See you later
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"Who wants to climb a mountain starts from the bottom!"
Signed: "Gillette" a.k.a. "nobody"! ;) (°!°)-
Thank you for letting me try this solution, we have to try everything...
yes, if I did it right, I managed to access the BIOS and pressed F9 to set it to default, and I also tried to boot from the manufacturer’s CD which seems to want to start but doesn't go very far because I would like to recover my data...
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By inserting the CD, you can repair without data loss....
By tapping a certain F..., you can access the recovery console... which would ask you the question "with or without data loss" ...
Good luck, personally, I'm "all in"!
Best regards,
See you later
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"Who wants to climb a mountain begins at the bottom!"
Signed: "Gillette" aka "nobody"! ;) (°!°) -
Good evening,
I've had enough of not being able to work normally, so I went to a repair shop far from my home, but it's run by a friend.
The hard drive wasn't dead, but it was stuck, and it wasn't possible to recover the data, so he had to use software like forensic science.
It seems that during the cleaning, a dll file may have been deleted.
But phew, it's great, I recovered my address book of clients and friends and other data.
Tomorrow he will try to repair it without reformatting.
As soon as I have more information, I will specify before closing.
Thanks already to those who helped me.
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Is it the egg that made the hen or the hen that made the egg?? -
-1) Make the last good configuration
-2) There is a jumper called CMOS BIOS located at the bottom of the motherboard. Change its place and return it after 2 minutes or better, remove the battery and put it back in place. Don’t forget to unplug your power cable
-3) Insert the XP Pack 2 CD and proceed as if you want to format it. Then a message will appear: (press escape to restart, press R to repair, or press enter for ...) so press R. It will download some files and then a black screen will appear (ms_doc) with a message (windows...? press enter to cancel).
If you have installed 2 Windows systems on your PC (type 1 for Windows 1 or 2 for Windows 2) and press enter
If you have installed only one system, type 1 and press enter
Then a prompt will appear (password) if you have a password, type it and (press enter), if you don’t (press enter)
Type chkdsk /r (press enter) it will download files and there’s a progress percentage, when it finishes type: exit
And when you restart it, if you get the same message (choose .....) format it
@ ++ -
It's a problem that happens regularly, it's probably Windows files that were being written at the time of the crash, so they are likely corrupted and Windows is blocking.
The problem is always the same, "not to lose your data". The first thing to say is that if you had been less fortunate, your files would have been lost anyway, sometimes irreversibly.
So before thinking about repair, first think about the "next time", so a system to safeguard your data in duplicate.
Next, I'm not sure if we'll manage to recover everything; it's not looking good, but one thing that can be attempted is to reinstall Windows on itself. This won't overwrite your data, but you'll probably need to update a whole series of things afterwards.
That said, this is only valid for regular Windows CDs, not always the manufacturer versions which often only allow for a full reset.
In any case, the risk of loss is there; the only way to avoid it would be to disassemble the hard drive and put it in a 2.5 case and first copy everything that needs to be saved elsewhere.
Another option is the recovery console with the Windows CD. But there, I'm not too much of an expert and from a distance, it's less easy.
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Never forget that a forum is a public place, no one will defend you. Beware of others.
