[zebedee]

My roommate's Vista desktop started crashing a few days ago. Spectacularly, mind you - BSOD with some message about IRQ. I know that's not too helpful, but he didn't write it down... and since then, we haven't had a chance. Now every time he tries to boot, the BSOD appears with varying error messages. I'll try and get some more details about that if we ever get back to that point. This morning he started up the Startup Repair program... and it's still going. "may take a few minutes"?!? Surely if it hasn't done anything in 13 hours, it's not going to work? Can anyone confirm that?

It's not my PC, and I don't know the first thing about Vista, but I'll try and get more details. In the meantime... other options besides Startup Repair, which pretty clearly has failed, even if it doesn't know it yet? Thanks!

 

[Monty Python]

You've probably got a hardware problem. Possibly malware.

Make sure to unplug all USB devices. Vista installs in about 1/3 the time of XP. For me, in about 20 minutes. 13 hours means it's never going to happen, and if it does it will be completely pooched.

Right down whatever errors you get. Your optical drive could be bad. Is the disk scratched at all ?

What symptoms did it have before it started going bad ? Any error messages, warnings, etc...

Did he have an AV software installed ? What was it ?

 

[FreoHeaveho]

Reset the CMOS and reboot

 

[zebedee]

We canceled the Repair and rebooted, and it came up on its own. Weird. Will keep your ideas in mind if it goes down again. Thanks!