How to fix black screen of death windows 7 before login

[lola_13]

Hello,


My computer goes through start up but right beofre you log in it goes straight to the black screen...therefore i cant see a cursor or complete the task manager...so what do i do?

 

[nhasian]

Here are detailed step by step instructions with pictures:

How Do I Use the Windows System Restore Utility?
How Do I Perform a Startup Repair or Repair Installation of Windows?
How Do I Perform a Clean Installation of Windows?

Also there is SFC How to use the System File Checker tool to troubleshoot missing or corrupted system files on Windows Vista or on Windows 7

 

[Byrnie]

I ran into this problem with a friends computer this evening. Tried many of the suggestions, and still don't know why or how this happens so I'm sure there are instances when any one, or combination, of the things you come across work but here's what worked for me.

Symptom:

Windows 7 laptop boots up to logo then no login screen, just sits there.

Here are the steps I went through (I've put asterisks next to the ones that were usefull, but wanted to be thorough):

Attempted to boot to safe mode....no luck

*Hit F8 at startup to get to the repair mode and ran a system restore to the oldest date available (approximately 3 weeks earlier).

*After system restore completed the problem was still there, however I could now boot into safe mode.

Uninstalled the video driver and restarted. Problem not resolved.

Reboot to safe mode, downloaded Malwarebytes and did a quick scan, found 33 items. Also ran microsofts fixit tool which removed to add ons that were on IE.

Restarted, still had the intital problem.

Booted back into safe mode, ran sfc /scannow - no problems showed up.

*While still in safe mode, added a second user (saw this in a forum so extra props to who posted it)

*Restarted the pc and now was able to reach the login screen and was able to login as the original user (both original and newly added users did show)
So for me the key was using repair mode to run system recovery allowing me into safe mode. Then adding a second user. Why this worked I have no idea but those three steps got me back into the machine and now I'm just cleaning up the crap, malware, resetting internet settings, removing shady toolbars and applying Windows Updates, etc. I'm going to then remove the user I added and hope everything is cool.

Thanks to those who have posted in this, and other forums, it was a combination of trial and error with the different suggestions that got things back to "normal". At least I'm able to log in now and clean it up without a having to do a fresh install.

Hope this helps, again, the credit goes to all the others that posted.....if anyone knows why adding a second user was the key I'd love to know!

-Byrnie

 

[Byrnie]

Blue Screen Death error also technically referred as a STOP error generally occurs when Windows suffers a serious error and is forced to "stop" completely. In most situations, it gets too difficult to understand the error codes. In fact, facing any such situation is very disturbing, but RecoveryFix for Windows Data Recovery provides an effective way to tackle such condition effectively. The tool is proficient in resolving all such issues and extracts data from hard disk.

Thanks

Thanks for the info, It wasn't a stop error though. The weird thing about this was that there were no errors, the logs were showing clean boots, I ran msconfig at one point and disabled everything non-microsoft in system startup and rebooted, in case it was a third party thing. It wasn't a blue screen, it was just not showing the login screen. It booted to the windows logo then went black. I have to check with the end user today, I have a feeling they may have had it plugged into a monitor or flat screen when it crashed. My hypothesis is that the OS was thinking it was still attached and it was related to that user profile. Which would explain how creating a second user in safe mode then allowed the login screen to show. Just a thought, this has me baffled. It's working now at least so that's good. It's just not fun fixing something but not knowing what was actually wrong. There were no diagnostic errors, no hard drive errors, memory errors, running scn /scannow verified that all system files were fine. Just was weird.

 

[Neha Pathak]

Thanks Byrnie. It helped.
but in my case i took a shortcut.
after hitting F8 and choosing 'repai your computer mode'
I tried to autofix, didnt work.
System restore, no such point was created before.
Memory dignostic, didnt work.

all I did was,
selected an option which described : reboot the sysyem with last succseful login.

and it worked.. !!!
people having no system restore can try it.
I guess it will work.

Neha

I ran into this problem with a friends computer this evening. Tried many of the suggestions, and still don't know why or how this happens so I'm sure there are instances when any one, or combination, of the things you come across work but here's what worked for me.

Symptom:

Windows 7 laptop boots up to logo then no login screen, just sits there.

Here are the steps I went through (I've put asterisks next to the ones that were usefull, but wanted to be thorough):

Attempted to boot to safe mode....no luck

*Hit F8 at startup to get to the repair mode and ran a system restore to the oldest date available (approximately 3 weeks earlier).

*After system restore completed the problem was still there, however I could now boot into safe mode.

Uninstalled the video driver and restarted. Problem not resolved.

Reboot to safe mode, downloaded Malwarebytes and did a quick scan, found 33 items. Also ran microsofts fixit tool which removed to add ons that were on IE.

Restarted, still had the intital problem.

Booted back into safe mode, ran sfc /scannow - no problems showed up.

*While still in safe mode, added a second user (saw this in a forum so extra props to who posted it)

*Restarted the pc and now was able to reach the login screen and was able to login as the original user (both original and newly added users did show)
So for me the key was using repair mode to run system recovery allowing me into safe mode. Then adding a second user. Why this worked I have no idea but those three steps got me back into the machine and now I'm just cleaning up the crap, malware, resetting internet settings, removing shady toolbars and applying Windows Updates, etc. I'm going to then remove the user I added and hope everything is cool.

Thanks to those who have posted in this, and other forums, it was a combination of trial and error with the different suggestions that got things back to "normal". At least I'm able to log in now and clean it up without a having to do a fresh install.

Hope this helps, again, the credit goes to all the others that posted.....if anyone knows why adding a second user was the key I'd love to know!

-Byrnie