Please Help

Dell Inspiron 1525, running Vista Home Premium. When turned on shows DELL start up screen with blue load bar. Load bar gets about 3/4 way and freezes for about 5 mins then goes to black screen, with no mouse cursor.

Put vista recovery DVD in DVD Rom = same
Tried F2, F8, F12, and ctrl alt del at start up before it freezes = same

I've searched this forum and google and cannot find a solution for this specific problem. Please help. Thank you.

It sounds like the computer is experiencing hardware-level problems during the boot sequence, long before it has a chance to find and start running the software on its disk drive (Windows). Hence, there is no way that the Vista install or any other software-level issue is going to be the cause.

If it's still under warranty, you might want to take it back and let them troubleshoot. An experienced tech should realise right away that they're looking at hardware problems.

Otherwise, if you're on your own, check the manual for info on how you'd go about restoring BIOS defaults with some sort of button or switch somewhere on the laptop. Since you seemingly can't get into the BIOS to restore defaults that way, shorting a "jumper" or a similar mechanism would be the only other way.

Beyond that, send it back for repairs. It needs a little rest.

Hi Baseball Ump

Have at these tutorials:

http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/91467-startup-repair.html?ltr=S

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

http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/65361-memory-diagnostics-tool.html

http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/67612-check-disk-chkdsk.html

Baseball Ump said:

Thank you for the replies, although they did not fix the problem. I bit the bullet and called DELL Tech Support. The warranty is expired so this cost me. We troubleshot the laptop and I was told it needs new memory. This sucks b/c the computer is only 2 months out of warranty. Does anyone know of anyway to convince Dell to send out the new memory for free? This seems like a huge rip off since the warranty has just expired. The computer has not been used under any unusual conditions.

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If you have already called Dell and asked them to help troubleshoot and they made you pay for that. There is no way they will supply you with some memory 2 months out of warranty. Most big companies like this are strict and stick with their rules, unfortunately.

Sean

Baseball Ump said:

Thank you for the replies, although they did not fix the problem.

Click to expand...

Unfortunately, the technology to fix hardware problems with words is still in the experimental stages. I tried talking my car out of its issues - no go

Baseball Ump said:

I bit the bullet and called DELL Tech Support. The warranty is expired so this cost me. We troubleshot the laptop and I was told it needs new memory. This sucks b/c the computer is only 2 months out of warranty. Does anyone know of anyway to convince Dell to send out the new memory for free? This seems like a huge rip off since the warranty has just expired. The computer has not been used under any unusual conditions.

Click to expand...

That's rotten luck, but my guess is that Dell won't be swayed. Legally, they're on very solid ground. My only suggestion would be to ensure that it's somehow officially recorded that the "faulty RAM" diagnosis was made by their tech. In other words, you'd want to be in a situation where you can get a full refund if it turns out that the tech was wrong and it wasn't the RAM but indeed some other hardware component.