Dell Laptop won't connect

[PTracy]

I have only had my laptop a few months. When I turn it on I get the sign on screen and then a blank screen. It will go no further. All four lights on the front are on, but it isn't going anywhere.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Sounds like either a driver issue or an OS corruption.

Try pressing F8 or Shift+F8 repeatedly during boot up until the advanced boot menu appears and see if you are able to enter Safe Mode. Once in Safe Mode you can go to Control Panel - Device Manager and see if any devices are remarked with a question mark or Exclamation point. If so, you can try right clicking on them and selecting update driver and then update automatically. If that won't work you can double click the item to enter it's properties and try doing a driver rollback. A third option is to manually download the appropriate drivers from the manufacturers product page for your model of notebook and install them.


If there are no driver issues it may be a file system corruption. Try running an SFC/Scannow to correct the issue:

http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/3047-sfc-scannow-command-run-windows-8-a.html


The third likely possibility is an infection. You can follow the steps at the following link to try and resolve infection issues but if the infection is severe, it will likely be easier to simply do a refresh or reset (Or just doing a clean installation) which should also be available through the advanced boot menu you used to get into safe mode or from within windows after entering safe mode. Be sure to back up any important files first, after checking to see they too are not infected.

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/8263-63-simple-free-guide-removing-malware


Windows refresh and reset: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-8/restore-refresh-reset-pc