Vista 32 Bit Black Screen of Death on Boot.

Hey everyone!

I've had an issue with my computer booting properly. I went from a 1:05 boot time to over a 2:00 boot because Vista go's to a black screen instead of loading my desktop.

I'm not sure where to start fixing this, I've always been good with computers and have tried all the text book fixes and I have no where left to go. I made a video which is uploading now and will be up incase this doesn't make as much sense as I'd hope.

I'm running an
Alienware Area 52
Intel Pentium D CPU 3.00 GHz
3 gigs of ram
ATI Radeon x1600

All my drivers are up to date.



Any help / input / advise is greatly appreciated!
 

My Computer

System One

  • Operating System
    n/a


Hi Livewire,

Interesting Problem, I saw Explorer loads but its oviously getting blocked by something and hanging :confused:

Have you tried ending Explorer.exe and creating a new process?

Have you also tired System Restore? (should solve the issue if it just started recently... It doesnt touch your files or data)

Have you also tried creating a new user account? ( I believe your user.ini file got changed somehow or you had UAC disabled and some legacy applicaton changed it :rolleyes:)

Either way, Its a easy one to solve...Let me know the things you have tried so I can point you in the right direction ;)

Steven
 

My Computer

Does the desktop load eventually though?

When I re-install Vista on a machine, the first week of running Vista will usually have a few of these when I boot up as I always tend to say Vista caches everything in its first week running fresh, so can run a bit slow at first.
 

My Computer

System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Custom Built
    CPU
    Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550
    Motherboard
    XFX MB-750I-72P9 NF750i
    Memory
    4096MB Corsair XMS2 PC-5400
    Graphics Card(s)
    ASUS Nvidia Geforce GTX470
    Sound Card
    ASUS Xonar DX
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Dell 24" S2409W & Dell 20" E207WFP
    Screen Resolution
    1920x1080 & 1680x1050
    Hard Drives
    750GB Western Digital Caviar Black & 500GB Samsung
    PSU
    750 watt Thermaltake Toughpower
    Case
    Coolermaster Dominator 690 Nvidia Edition
    Cooling
    Zalman CNPS9700-NT Cooler, 6x 120mm Chassis Fans
    Keyboard
    Logitech G11 Keyboard
    Mouse
    Logitech G5 Laser Mouse (2007 edition)
    Internet Speed
    100Mbps
    Other Info
    abit airpace 54mbps wireless PCI-E x1 card
Hi livewierpyro, welcome to the board.
In what time span the boot time from 1 min increases to 2 min? Are there any new programs, games, or updates installed during that period? Some time new installation will slow down the process. My 3 GHz Pentium D in my HP took lot more then 2 min to complete its boot sequence. Post back.
 

My Computer

System One

  • CPU
    E6850
    Motherboard
    EVGA 122-CK-NF67-A1 680i
    Memory
    4 x OCZ Platinum 1GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    ATI Radeon HD 5850 1GB
    Sound Card
    SB X-Fi X Audio
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Samsung 23" 5MS
    Screen Resolution
    2048 x 1152
    Hard Drives
    2 x Barracuda 7200.10 320GB RAID 0 / 1 x 500GB Maxtor
    PSU
    Seasonic 600W M12
    Case
    CM Centurion 5
    Cooling
    air
    Internet Speed
    100Mbps
Thanks to all those who responded, I can't even express how much I appriciate it!
I'm just going to go down the list and relpy individually.


Hi Livewire,

Interesting Problem, I saw Explorer loads but its oviously getting blocked by something and hanging :confused:

Have you tried ending Explorer.exe and creating a new process?

Have you also tired System Restore? (should solve the issue if it just started recently... It doesnt touch your files or data)

Have you also tried creating a new user account? ( I believe your user.ini file got changed somehow or you had UAC disabled and some legacy applicaton changed it :rolleyes:)

Either way, Its a easy one to solve...Let me know the things you have tried so I can point you in the right direction ;)

Steven

Hey steven, the very first thing I apptempted was a System Restore but there were no backups. I tend not to shut my computer off often and I had ran the Disk clean up.

I made a new user account before I left the house thes morning, but when I rebooted it took me to the same black screen, but it had a window open "Applying application settings" or something of that nature. I got frustrated because it wasn't responding and left. Either way, I don't think making a new account worked, I did like the sugestion though and I really thought it might have been the trick!

I did not try ending explorer.exe and running it manually, I guess I'll throw that on my to-do list.

Hi livewierpyro, welcome to the board.
In what time span the boot time from 1 min increases to 2 min? Are there any new programs, games, or updates installed during that period? Some time new installation will slow down the process. My 3 GHz Pentium D in my HP took lot more then 2 min to complete its boot sequence. Post back.


Thanks, I'll be posting here more often, I'm impressed =]

Yep, it's in the video. It used to take exactly 1:05 for my computer to go from the logo screen to my desktop. The black screen for the last minute of that video is the problem. I ran a clean up utility by a third party program and it's the last time I remember any changes to my system. I didn't shut down my comp for another day or so and didn't notice until it was too late to recover. You can see my application process there, it, to me, doesn't look like there's any updates running and the only start up program I have is Avast, my anti-virus.

Does the desktop load eventually though?

When I re-install Vista on a machine, the first week of running Vista will usually have a few of these when I boot up as I always tend to say Vista caches everything in its first week running fresh, so can run a bit slow at first.


Hey Everlong, that's one of my favrote songs ;)

Yes it eventually loads, but the issue is the one minute hangtime on the black screen. I've had vista for quite some time and that's not a new OS to the system, so I don't think it's still in that stage.
 
Last edited:

My Computer

System One

  • Operating System
    n/a
Hi livewire,

Don't think it's avast, but you could try removing it from startup to be sure ( disconnect from net, obviously ).

More likely to be a corruption of o/s files as Steven says. As you don't have restore points and you tried making a new user account, the other thing you could try is a repair install.

http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/88236-repair-install-vista.html

Hope it helps

SIW2
 

My Computers

System One System Two

  • Operating System
    Vista
    CPU
    Intel E8400
    Motherboard
    ASRock1333-GLAN R2.0
    Memory
    4gb DDR2 800
    Graphics Card(s)
    nvidia 9500GT 1gb
  • Operating System
    win7/vista
    CPU
    intel i5-8400
    Motherboard
    gigabyte b365m ds3h
    Memory
    ballistix 2x8gb 3200
Hey again everyone, I just wanted to post in here again to put this one to rest. I tried everything listed above -- I don't know exactly what fixed the issue with explorer hanging because I tried several things at the same time.. But I think it was a mix of itunes Services and my ATI Graphics Card Driver. I removed my card and it booted fine, tested a few things.. Ended up deleting all my drivers and updating the integrated. Once it was booting properly I did a clean install of the driver and it's been fine since.


Again, thanks again to all the contrubuters, I really appricate it!

:cool: You'll see me around here more often, hopfully putting in my support, not the other way around =]
 

My Computer

System One

  • Operating System
    n/a
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