twodoh

I have a PC with a Gigabyte mb, Intel E8200 dual core processor with 2 GB RAM and a Gigabyte 8600gt GPU.

The Monitor regularly stays black after startup is completed. The startup runs its normal course and the welcome screen shows then the screen goes black with only the mouse arrow showing on the black screen and the arrow can be moved around the screen.

This happens about 50% of the time. My son says that if he opens the optical drives at startup the problem happens less but I am not sure about this.

I have reseated the RAM and GPU and the problem contiues. If the PC does fully boot it appears to operate properly with all its normal functionality as far as i can tell.

Thank you all for your help

regards - Terry

dai

what are you running
video card
cpu
m/board
ram
power supply
brand
wattage

check the listings in the bios for voltages and temperatures and post them

twodoh

Hello Dai

what are you running - surfing the net, photoshop elements 7
video card - Gigabyte PCIE 512mb 8600gt
cpu - Intel E8200 2.6ghz dual core
m/board - Gigabyte P35-DS3
ram - Kingston 2x1gb DDR2 800
power supply - 550W
brand - Antech 550W Earthwatts


check the listings in the bios for voltages and temperatures and post them - how do I do this??

thank you

Terry

dai

on the advanced tab in the bios look for
pchealth
hardware monitoring

or something similar the wording will differ depending on the brand of bios

twodoh

Thank you Dai,
I went into the BIOs and retreived the following information

Current System temperature - 39deg

Current CPU temperature - 43 deg

Vcore - 1.22 OV

DDR18V - 1.92 OV

+3.3V - 3.296V

+12V - 11.921V

Fan CPU - 1493 rpm

The problem is only at startup and the screen does not go black during a normal session. Some of my comments from the first post are copied below:

"The Monitor regularly stays black after startup is completed. The startup runs its normal course and the welcome screen shows then the screen goes black with only the mouse arrow showing on the black screen and the arrow can be moved around the screen.

This happens about 50% of the time. My son says that if he opens the optical drives at startup the problem happens less but I am not sure about this."

I look forward to your reply,

regards - Terry

dai

tap f8 when booting and from the options try
last known good configuration
check if you can get into safe mode

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=314503

twodoh

I have tried last known good configuration and safe mode with the same result. The startup process goes to the first "welcome"screen and then goes black with the mouse arrow showing which can be moved around. In safe mode all the "safe mode" white lettering at the top and bottom of the screen shows but no desktop appears. I have viewed the link you provided and tried to system repair but the processs got disturbed. I tried to carry out the repair process again but on the restart i again get a black screen before the "upgrade to XP" completes.

I have not tried the advice on the microsoft link to create and use a boot disk as I do not have a floppy drive.

The hard drive is in 3 partitions,
c: for XP
d: for programs
e: for data

Do you have any more suggestions??? This is very frustrating

thanks - Terry

dai

what do you mean by this system repair

a windows repair install or a system restore to an earlier point

twodoh

I mean a repair using the XP installation disc and enterred R for repair and followed the prompts. This process was unfortunately interrupted and when i tried to do it again the black screen problem occurs again and the process seems to see it is relacing the OS with XP rather than repair.
I cannot access the system restore even in safe mode. I was hoping to be able to carry out a system restore and see if it works.

i googled this matter and someone suggested that the explore.exe file may be missing. I do not know much about this.


Please let me know if you need any further information

I appreciate your patience and assistance

rregards - terry

dai

to do a repair install
set the bios to boot from cd first
pop in the disk
reboot
choose install
ignore the first repair option and continue with install
when windows finds the previous installation
then do the repair

twodoh

This is the process I tried to follow but when the computer restarts to complete the installation after loading the files the same black screen occurs after the first XP screen. I cannot follow any prompts because I cannot see the GUI.

I will try to do this one more time.

thankyou Dai

dai

check the hard drive

d/load and run the h/drive makers diagnostic utility on the h/drive

http://www.tacktech.com/display.cfm?ttid=287

twodoh

I have a 500GB SATA WD HDD. The model No is HDDWD008-ST08. I visited the tacktech site and downloaded the Data Lifeguard Tools 11.0 for DOS and Windows (CD) (01.02.2007). I burned the image and booted the problem PC.
The screen comes up with a command line but I do not know what to type at the command. Also the program says there is an error no CDROM drive or device driver installed.
Driver not found : "generic"
A:\NWCDEX.EXE requires a driver name to be specified
command or file name not recognised.
I am not experienced with command lines but I can follow good instructions.

If I have problems are there any other easy to use diagnostic tools that are GUI based that I might use?

thank you

Terry

dai

are these numbers correct as i cannot find it listed

HDDWD008-ST08

raptor_pa

Did you get the bootable cd ISO image of lifeguard? Sounds like maybe that was the floppy image. since it is looking to the A: drive for cd drivers If so try reburning, might have been a bad burn.

twodoh

Thanks Raptor I will reburn the Data Lifeguard Tools 11.0 for DOS and Windows (CD) (01.02.2007). I asume I have downloaded the correct tools - it is a bit confusing which to select.

Thanks Dai the model number was incorrect and I apologise for my error- I took it from my receipt. I have now opened the case and the model number is
Western Digital WD5000AAKS

thank you both - Terry

I am going to transfer the HDD out of the problem PC into a working PC to see if the HDD will boot and if possible transfer some important data. Any direction here would be appreciated.

Can you please also answer my earlier thread. I will need some direction on which Lifeguard file I need as it is confusing on the WD site. Also it seems that it may operate by command line so I will need some guidance here also.

I have a another thread in the HDD forum initially about transferring data but it is now discussing similar issues as here,

This is all very frustrating. It seems I have enough knowledge to get myself into trouble of fix minor problems but this is out of my league. so thanks again for your time and patience with me.

regards - Terry

dai

slave the hard drive in the other pc and drag what you want off

thi is the diagnostic

burn to cd as an iso and then boot from it

http://support.wdc.com/product/downl...sid=30&lang=en