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re: Windows will not start Monday, May 25, 2009 at 1:49 pm Posted by rocannon (106 messages posted) is your first boot device in the bios the CD / DVD drive? From your description it sounds like the hard drive is the first boot device. TANSTAAFL! [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: Windows will not start Monday, May 25, 2009 at 1:50 pm Posted by mikey (232 messages posted) so you are saying if you have a bootable cd and hard disconected it work,s but when you hook up hard drive you get nothing then its your hard drive that needs replacing On Monday, May 25, 2009 at 9:58 am, Aidan Jenkins wrote: >Hello, >my dad uses Windows Vista which worked fine up until recently when it will not start. >When it starts up, the screen goes black and just shows a cursor and then all hard >drive activity stops. The same thing happens when I try to load up the repair environment. >I also tried using the Windows Vista setup, Windows 7 setup and Windows PE discs >all of which go to the black screen with only a white cursor, unless the hard drive >is not inserted. When the hard drive is not inserted, the discs load up fine. Because >of this I am unable to attempt a system restore or anything similar, anyone have >any ideas? [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: Windows will not start Monday, May 25, 2009 at 4:52 pm Posted by Aidan Jenkins (34 messages posted) Yes, the CD drive is definitely above the hard drive, the computer also works if a different hard drive is inserted. On Monday, May 25, 2009 at 1:49 pm, rocannon wrote: >is your first boot device in the bios the CD / DVD drive? > >From your description it sounds like the hard drive is the first boot device. > TANSTAAFL! [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: Windows will not start Monday, May 25, 2009 at 4:54 pm Posted by Ricer46 (23825 messages posted) So your system has removable hard drives? Describe the system? Make / model, etc. On Monday, May 25, 2009 at 4:52 pm, Aidan Jenkins wrote: > >Yes, the CD drive is definitely above the hard drive, the computer also works if >a different hard drive is inserted. > > [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: Windows will not start Tuesday, May 26, 2009 at 5:21 am Posted by Charlie Hadden (1338 messages posted) It sounds like a BIOS setting to me. I had similar and it took me over a year to figure out what was going on. No one here nor at Asus had a clue. First WHO, installed your windows? Was it per installed or did someone there do it? If someone at home did the install did you load the RAID drivers when prompted to do so Via the F6 key, early on during the process? What is your motherboard manufacturer and model #? Look in the book for the motherboard and see if there is a setting that turns on AHCI. This is very important to SATA drives. They can usually run without it, but not the best. Let me know. [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: Windows will not start Tuesday, May 26, 2009 at 6:27 am Posted by Charlie Hadden (1338 messages posted) Also if you are not using a SATA drive nut an older PATA (IDE) then it could be a simple as a jumper setting. If they are both on the same cable, set the selection jumper for 'cable select'. Does the drive show up ok in the POST (the black DOS screen at the beginning)? The drive is very likely to be good. You could try a drive diagnostic that you can D/L from the drives web site. I seldom see drive problems in my shop. Even ones that others have claimed DEAD. I still use a couple around here that have been diagnosed as DEAD, years ago. Get the facts before you toss the drive out! [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: Windows will not start Tuesday, May 26, 2009 at 6:57 am Posted by Aidan Jenkins (34 messages posted) Thank you for your help, but I don't think it's an issue with the cables or with the BIOS. Like I said, it was working fine up until recently. I think this is a software issue because I have since formatted the partition using GPartEd and installed Windows 7 which is working fine. However, Windows Vista will not run, I have tried re-installing it but it will not start up. Once I formatted the partition which Windows was installed on, the startup discs worked again and I was able to initiate setup. I do not know why Windows Vista will not work while Windows 7 will, but my dad is itching to get Windows Vista back... (BTW, it is a Fujitsu Siemens Amilo Li 2727 notebook) On Tuesday, May 26, 2009 at 6:27 am, Charlie Hadden wrote: >Also if you are not using a SATA drive nut an older PATA (IDE) then it could be a >simple as a jumper setting. If they are both on the same cable, set the selection >jumper for 'cable select'. Does the drive show up ok in the POST (the black DOS screen >at the beginning)? The drive is very likely to be good. You could try a drive diagnostic >that you can D/L from the drives web site. I seldom see drive problems in my shop. >Even ones that others have claimed DEAD. I still use a couple around here that have >been diagnosed as DEAD, years ago. Get the facts before you toss the drive out! [Reply or follow-up to this message] re: Windows will not start-same problem Wednesday, May 27, 2009 at 3:03 am Posted by Nick (13 messages posted) With Vista sort of same problem-takes forever to go into windows, I also get the black screen on startup with only the cursor and I need to keep moving the cursor via the mouse to get it to load windows. Sometimes when it loads it states; windows failed but has recorvered. Any ideas what is wrong? Thanks. 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