System recovery won't recover?

My Vista laptop is having a bit of an issue. When it boots, the main laptop display is black, it never loads. My second monitor however does load, but only on 4bit color with a 100x100 res. It will ONLY load safe mode, and from there ive been trying to use restore manager to reset to an earlier setting or to restore to factory. I have my backup cd in the drive, but when Restore Manager trys to open to run it, it crashes. How can I fix whatever is wrong with my vista if the restore feature itself is part of whats broken? I have run about 500 startup repairs, and the messages range from "no error detected" to "error unable to be fixed" to "error repaired", but the res and color never fixes, and the monitor stays black, and only safe mode will load. Not sure what to try from here.

Thank you for any tips you can give me on what to try next.

Here is my computer rig, if this helps.

Manufacturer: Hewlett-Packard
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 CPU T7200 @ 2.00GHz (2 CPUs), ~2.0GHz
Memory: 2046MB RAM
Hard Drive: 240 GB Total
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce Go 7600
Monitor: 20 Inch Laptop Monitor + 20 Inch Flatscreen LCD
Sound Card: Internal Speaker/Headphone (Conexant High Definition Audio)
Speakers/Headphones: Razor Gaming Headset
Keyboard: Razor Tarantula Gaming Keyboard
Mouse: Logitech Gaming Mouse
Mouse Surface: RockeFish Tournament Gaming Mousepad (Titanium Surface)
Operating System: Windows Vista™ Ultimate (6.0, Build 6000) (6000.vista_rtm.061101-2205)

In safe mode, deinstall your graphics card then try rebooting as normal on vista.

I gave that a try, still same error as before. I tried running windows update to see if I am missing an update or something, and it crashed when update tried to run. I tried downloading an update from a support website, and it said I failed authentication's test. I have a legal windows, but apparently whatever is wrong is so messed up, the windows no longer is recognizable by the website! I don't know how to force it to reinstall since it keeps saying no disk when i insert the backup CD.

Hello Moonfire,

Welcome to the Forums!

Have you tried either option at the links below?

Repair Install For Vista

or this one,

Create a Recovery Disc

Try them and let us know!


Later Ted

Hi Moonfire,

What is the actual model number of your HP laptop? What happens when you disconnect ALL peripherals from the laptop and try to boot up? Can you enter the laptop's BIOS, and if so, what are the temperature readings in the System Health page (if available)? Laptops are susceptible to problems with heat and overheating if measures are not taken to minimize the risk. It is quite possible that your graphics card has failed, particularly when you say that the main display is blank and the external display can only manage a 100 x 100 resolution at 4-bit colour. Unfortunately, laptops can be difficult to repair. Even if you diagnose that your problem is connected with the graphics and this can be replaced, you may find it difficult obtaining a replacement. If your laptop has more than one stick of RAM, remove it until you only have a single stick installed. Try it in each slot. Repeat with the other stick(s) of RAM.
Dwarf

Neither of those options are viable. My computer did not come with a Vista install disk, as it has a 'premade' backup system. I made the backup disk, and tried to do the install from it, but the computer is saying that it cannot read a disk in the drive. At this point, I just don't know what to do with it!

Thanks, I will try out those things, and reply asap

Hello again Moonfire,

It you can't get Dwarf's suggestions to pan out....

As a last resort the HP Recovery Center is not all that painful, on my machine it only takes about thirty minutes from the time I boot into F11 to be back on a working desktop. It gives me the option to create backups of what I want before continuing.
Of course you do go back to "factory" in the process; but it is an option!

Keep us informed.


Later Ted

That's the problem...the recovery manager isn't working. It won't let me go back to factory settings. I've tried spamming F11, and done it probably 100times now, but the program won't work. I need some kind of override that will force it to go back to factory settings without being able to use the recovery manager.

Also, all of the other suggestions have been tried, and failed This is becoming overly frustrating!

Hello Moonfire,

Is this how you are trying this?

With the machine off press the power button, as soon as you do that start tapping the F11 key.
That should take you to the HP Recovery Center. When there just follow the prompts.
It is pretty much self explanatory. From the time you boot into F11 (not counting
any backups you choose to make) you should be back on a working desktop in about
30 minutes. After it restarts just follow the prompts again to finish the process.

If your first option is system restore select no, which should take you to system recovery.
You want to try system recovery not system restore, unless you have good restore points!

System Restore - How to

Let me know!


Later Ted