Vista Home Premium boots to black screen

Kevin McIntosh

New Member
Hey all ... great forum you have here ... Jerry Lippey/WUGNET at Laptop Computing steered me here to Brink (Shawn)'s tutorial: Repair Install For Vista - Vista Forums.

I have a Toshiba Satellite L300D -01Q (PSLC0C-01Q08C) that is running Vista Home Premium (SP unknown). The kernel completely loads to a black screen (active / backlit black) with only a moveable mouse pointer.

None of the Recovery Options have helped and I can't do an Upgrade Install because I can't get to the GUI.

My priority and objective is to save this system and preserve files, programs and settings.

I read Brink's How to Repair and Verify the Integrity of Vista System Files with System File Checker and I'd like to try sfc /scannow, however, I get the following:

"Windows Resource Protection could not start the repair service"

Searching for 'Windows Resource Protection ... ', I found this thread:
error code: 80040154 - Windows update fails and Flavius' solution post ... but I thought I'd better post first to see if I've gone wrong elsewhere.

I'm booting from a Windows Vista Home Premium SP1 OEM DVD, then choosing 'Repair ... ' and from the System Recovery Options GUI, 'Command Prompt'. This opens a command prompt window entitled:

Administrator: X:\windows\system32\cmd.exe

X:\Sources>_

... so ... presumably, I am in an elevated command prompt ...

sfc /verifyonly gets the same result as sfc /scannow.

What should I do to get sfc to run for me?

Thanks, Kevin
 

My Computer

Hello Kevin McIntosh,
Have you tried this in safe mode ?, do you get the same error results ?, may be worth a try.
Also, when did this start and what caused it, new software/hardware, a change in the system somewhere maybe, if you can pin it to a particular date, a system restore may help sort it.
Hope this helps, good luck and post your results.
 

My Computer

System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Self Build
    CPU
    QX9650 (black box) [email protected]
    Motherboard
    Asus P5Q Premium
    Memory
    8GB-4x2GB Corsair Dominator DDR 2-1066
    Graphics Card(s)
    2 x ASUS EAH 4870 X 2 (Quad)
    Sound Card
    Supreme FX 2
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Fujitsu Siemens 22inch flat screen
    Screen Resolution
    1680x1050
    Hard Drives
    150 Gig WD Raptor
    300 Gig Maxtor
    300 Gig Maxtor, (External)
    PSU
    CoolerMaster 1000
    Case
    CoolerMaster N-Vidia stacker 830
    Cooling
    Noctua NH-U12P x 1x120mm fan, 6x120mm case fans
    Keyboard
    Logitech G15
    Mouse
    Logitech G5
    Internet Speed
    20Mbps
    Other Info
    Audio FX Pro 5+1 gaming head set
Hey stoneys-nutz ... thanks for helping out ...

The machine in question boots to the same black screen in all variants of Safe Mode.

The circumstances surrounding the onset of this issue are unclear as to the when / what / s/w changes (doubtful) ... however, I know there were no h/w changes.

No Restore Points exist. I do not know why, or, if System Restore was previously disabled.

I'm pretty sure the System File Checker is one of my last hopes here. I just have to figure out why it won't run, as per the response when I try:

"Windows Resource Protection could not start the repair service"

Kevin
 

My Computer

My Computer

System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Self Build
    CPU
    QX9650 (black box) [email protected]
    Motherboard
    Asus P5Q Premium
    Memory
    8GB-4x2GB Corsair Dominator DDR 2-1066
    Graphics Card(s)
    2 x ASUS EAH 4870 X 2 (Quad)
    Sound Card
    Supreme FX 2
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Fujitsu Siemens 22inch flat screen
    Screen Resolution
    1680x1050
    Hard Drives
    150 Gig WD Raptor
    300 Gig Maxtor
    300 Gig Maxtor, (External)
    PSU
    CoolerMaster 1000
    Case
    CoolerMaster N-Vidia stacker 830
    Cooling
    Noctua NH-U12P x 1x120mm fan, 6x120mm case fans
    Keyboard
    Logitech G15
    Mouse
    Logitech G5
    Internet Speed
    20Mbps
    Other Info
    Audio FX Pro 5+1 gaming head set

My Computer

System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Self Build
    CPU
    QX9650 (black box) [email protected]
    Motherboard
    Asus P5Q Premium
    Memory
    8GB-4x2GB Corsair Dominator DDR 2-1066
    Graphics Card(s)
    2 x ASUS EAH 4870 X 2 (Quad)
    Sound Card
    Supreme FX 2
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Fujitsu Siemens 22inch flat screen
    Screen Resolution
    1680x1050
    Hard Drives
    150 Gig WD Raptor
    300 Gig Maxtor
    300 Gig Maxtor, (External)
    PSU
    CoolerMaster 1000
    Case
    CoolerMaster N-Vidia stacker 830
    Cooling
    Noctua NH-U12P x 1x120mm fan, 6x120mm case fans
    Keyboard
    Logitech G15
    Mouse
    Logitech G5
    Internet Speed
    20Mbps
    Other Info
    Audio FX Pro 5+1 gaming head set
ahhh ... well, if I can figure out how to run services.msc in DOS, I can give that a go ... K

1230PDT26OCT09 KM edit - nope ... I tried running services.msc from X:\Sources>_ (booted to Command Prompt from DVD as per initial post), and, also, from C:\windows\system32>_ ... services.msc won't run in DOS, so, I'm not sure how I can force that Windows Modules Installer service into running ... if that's the problem with sfc ... thinking about it, I can't imagine why anyone would have disabled that service on this machine in the first place.

1243PDT26OCT09 KM edit - I also tried running the Windows Modules Installer service directly:
C:\windows\servicing>TrustedInstaller.exe
nothing happened and sfc /scannow still produced the 'Windows Resource Protection ... ' error.
 
Last edited:

My Computer

This is catch 22, you cant run because you cant fix it, and you cant fix it because you cant run it.
OK,I'm grasping at straws here, what about F8 on boot up and choose "last known good configuration"


I also lifted this from another site, i don't know if it will be any good or not but at this stage i will try anything.


"I got this problem earlier today and it bugged me all day. The screen went black with only the mouse cursor visible. I wasnt able to get the taskmanager to display. My fix was somewhat easy. I pressed F8 during the bootup and went into safemode with command prompt. Although the desktop never showed up the command prompt did. I typed msconfig into the command prompt and the window popped up. I was then able to choose selective startup. Uncheck system services and startup items. Original Boot Configuration should remain checked. The computer restarted a couple of times and I finally saw my desktop again. I uninstalled my nvidia drivers while I was in there since I had recently let Microsoft update them. I also uninstalled anything else I had installed in the past couple of days. I checked normal startup and everything was back to normal the next time I rebooted. Hope this helps someone."


Fingers crossed.
 

My Computer

System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Self Build
    CPU
    QX9650 (black box) [email protected]
    Motherboard
    Asus P5Q Premium
    Memory
    8GB-4x2GB Corsair Dominator DDR 2-1066
    Graphics Card(s)
    2 x ASUS EAH 4870 X 2 (Quad)
    Sound Card
    Supreme FX 2
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Fujitsu Siemens 22inch flat screen
    Screen Resolution
    1680x1050
    Hard Drives
    150 Gig WD Raptor
    300 Gig Maxtor
    300 Gig Maxtor, (External)
    PSU
    CoolerMaster 1000
    Case
    CoolerMaster N-Vidia stacker 830
    Cooling
    Noctua NH-U12P x 1x120mm fan, 6x120mm case fans
    Keyboard
    Logitech G15
    Mouse
    Logitech G5
    Internet Speed
    20Mbps
    Other Info
    Audio FX Pro 5+1 gaming head set
'Last Known Good ... ' didn't work for me either ...

... nor am I able to see a command prompt when I choose Safe Mode with Command Prompt ... but I sure appreciate all the help ... things are looking a little thin eh?

Maybe I'll just do it anyway and type in 'msconfig' blind ... what can it hurt?

1402PDT26OCT09 KM edit - nope ... no go
 

My Computer

Take a look at this, you can load it on to a a disk or flash drive and load it up, you should not lose any files and may be able to save them to disk.
Have a read through and see what you think, at this stage i don't think you have anything to lose.
If this works you can save all your files and then do a clean install.

Puppy Linux
 

My Computer

System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Self Build
    CPU
    QX9650 (black box) [email protected]
    Motherboard
    Asus P5Q Premium
    Memory
    8GB-4x2GB Corsair Dominator DDR 2-1066
    Graphics Card(s)
    2 x ASUS EAH 4870 X 2 (Quad)
    Sound Card
    Supreme FX 2
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Fujitsu Siemens 22inch flat screen
    Screen Resolution
    1680x1050
    Hard Drives
    150 Gig WD Raptor
    300 Gig Maxtor
    300 Gig Maxtor, (External)
    PSU
    CoolerMaster 1000
    Case
    CoolerMaster N-Vidia stacker 830
    Cooling
    Noctua NH-U12P x 1x120mm fan, 6x120mm case fans
    Keyboard
    Logitech G15
    Mouse
    Logitech G5
    Internet Speed
    20Mbps
    Other Info
    Audio FX Pro 5+1 gaming head set
Back
Top