What else could I do to fix my windows 10 pc?

[InDarkestNight]

This started a few days ago. Upon booting up, the thing showed me a blue screen telling me it failed to start up. After several tries, it booted into winRE, which is some repair tool windows 10 comes with.

At first, none of the options would work. They all required me to enter in my password, but none of the options would accept it. I tried changing my password through another computer (my account is tied to my email address), but that did nothing.

Eventually, I managed to install windows 10 on my usb drive in some shape or form (it was a download from the windows website, still not 100% sure what it is to be honest). Plugging that in allowed me to use the options winre gave me but without having to enter my password. None of them really did anything though. It told me it wouldn't find an image to repair with, I did multiple different scans through the command prompt but that accomplished nothing. I also could not access the reset option while the usb was plugged in. I couldn't even get the option through the cmd, it just told me it didn't recognize the command (it was systemreset -cleanpc I think). The only thing that did anything was to do a system restore to the prior day. This worked.

I did a full boot-time scan with avast to see what could've caused this, but it turned up nothing. I chose not to make a restore or backup because it spent the rest of the day downloading updates for seemingly everything.

Yesterday, it started doing it again. This time though system restore accomplished nothing, probably because the only state it had was dated the 19th unlike the previous which was on the 18th.

I was able to use my laptop here to make a repair disc to see if it would give me different results (they both have windows 10 on them). It was the same story with the usb; outside of system restore and the command prompt scans, everything refused to work. I did have a 'factory reset' option now, but that did absolutely nothing. Didn't give me a window, I just clicked it, chose my operating system, then it went back to the main menu. At least everything else gave me an error message in some form.

I am at a loss as to what else I could do. Windows just recommends to keep trying to guess what password it'll accept, seriously. I've typed in every password I can remember, even though I've never changed my password on this pc until now. If I could get past that issue, I may be able to use the reset option at least. Of course, the factory reset thing straight refused to launch, so maybe not? I really don't know what else I could do. I've tried everything I can find and I've simply run out of options.

And yeah, I could just take it to a shop, but I don't think I could afford that. Besides, I have some adult mods for skyrim installed which do show up on scans I can assure you (takes forever for avast to slog through all of them). I don't live in the most tolerant community here, so I don't want anyone seeing that. Also, the only repair shop in town is staples, which fixes your computer on the front counter in front of everyone! I am NOT going to let them scan my computer's files there even if they themselves didn't care.

I wonder, if I could get my files off by connecting that thing's hdd to this laptop through a usb cable? Staples was able to do that with my mother's previous laptop to recover her files, it worked just like my external harddrive here I was using to store my colletion of mods. I would need a special cable of course, but if nothing else it may let me get those files in mod organizer off the computer so I can take the thing out in public. Or if all else fails, I could format the drive and see if I could get ubuntu installed it. I tried to do that once on this laptop, but it literally told me I wasn't allowed to install another OS, even on another partition. I've been told I could still install it, even on a hard drive that's been formatted, but I've never done that before for obvious reasons so I know nothing about it other than that it completely erases the drive.

Funny enough, I do have to have an extra drive lying around. Its in a computer I got after my father died (he never got to use). However, it suddenly started booting directly into dos one day. Investigating, I found that specific model of computer is infamous for UNINSTALLING ITS OWN OS, seriously. Apparently those things came with windows 7 or xp originally, and if you try to install another OS on it (it had windows 10 on it when I got it), it'll uninstall its own OS after a few days thinking its a virus or something. Just saying this to explain why I've never thought about salvaging parts from the stupid thing before. I don't know what exactly causes that issue, all I know is the hdd/sdd (no idea which is in it) has no OS on it right now.

Yeah, I'm having all sorts of luck. Hopefully someone here can recommend me something to try that I haven't yet. I really can't imagine what else I can do. I've run every scan I have, and the repair functions the thing comes with aren't cooperating with me no matter what I do. All I've figured out from this is it can't be a broken cable or broken drive. If that was the case, then why would a system restore fix it? It then ran for about a week with no further issues. Should've used that opportunity to backup my stuff, but either way its obviously too late now.

[HeyYou]

Pull the drive out of the failed machine, put it in an external enclosure, take ownership of the user profile folders, and back the data up to another machine. (need sufficient space to do so......) After that, reinstall windows 10. Don't need to worry about the license key, as MS remembers your machine was licensend for 10. (even if it was an upgrade from 7, or 8...) Just make sure to install the same version that is on there now. (home, or pro.) After that, reinstall whatever else you want on there, and call it a day.

And when you reinstall 10, do the 'custom' install, blow away ALL partitions on the drive, and let windows installer recreate them.

Don't bother taking it to staples. They don't have any idea what they are really doing...... They used to be pretty good, with techs that had a clue. Not any more......

[InDarkestNight]

What precisely do you mean by the 'failed' computer? You mean the stupid HP machine that uninstalled its own OS, or the computer I used to play Skyrim on that now refuses to open the login screen no matter what I do?

As for staples, you don't have another option around here. Also, they do have ONE good technician there. Of course, the last time we asked for their help they kept ordering the wrong replacement power cable for my mother's laptop, and when they did finally get the right one IT WAS DEFECTIVE. Yeah, fun times. Oh, and to get my newest computer I had to go to another city, and they only had 2 options available, and ONE graphics card. I'm lucky I was able to find this one at all. Its actually rare for people to own a computer of any sort around here (even though you can buy laptops from walmart).

[binchickendreaming]

Have you considered building your own computer using PC Parts Picker?

[HeyYou]

5 hours ago, InDarkestNight said:

What precisely do you mean by the 'failed' computer? You mean the stupid HP machine that uninstalled its own OS, or the computer I used to play Skyrim on that now refuses to open the login screen no matter what I do?

As for staples, you don't have another option around here. Also, they do have ONE good technician there. Of course, the last time we asked for their help they kept ordering the wrong replacement power cable for my mother's laptop, and when they did finally get the right one IT WAS DEFECTIVE. Yeah, fun times. Oh, and to get my newest computer I had to go to another city, and they only had 2 options available, and ONE graphics card. I'm lucky I was able to find this one at all. Its actually rare for people to own a computer of any sort around here (even though you can buy laptops from walmart).

The machine that used to be your gaming rig. That's the one that has the data you want, isn't it?

[InDarkestNight]

I've been wondering if its even worth repairing. I mean, if I'm not gaming, why bother with it? I can access the internet on my laptop here, and even make programs all I need. I was wondering why I was bothering to turn the thing on. At least this thing uses up less power, so why not just use that?

Also, even if I was able to fix my machine and keep my files, how would I know the problem wouldn't just return? I"m thinking I could maybe re-install my OS without losing anything, but what caused the problem in the first place? A system restore fixed the issue the first time, but the restore point made on the very next day has the same problem despite it not appearing until days later. I did a boot-time scan and it found nothing. What could've have caused this? Why did it return? Why did my virus scanner find nothing? It almost looks like I'm infected with ransomware, but nothing's trying to extort money out of me. If I went through the trouble of re-installing windows 10 through this usb, how would I know the problem wouldn't just return? I ran every scan I could and came up empty. Of course, I've since realized that I was probably scanning the usb itself rather than my computer. Telling to scan my computer, it throws an error message claiming it can't find the drive. Wtf?

Even if I do get it running again, I may only have a finite amount of time to figure out what caused the issue to begin with. My laptop here is fine, so it couldn't have been an update. They're running the same OS. A system restore fixed it once, so its not a hardware issue. My most thorough virus scan came up completely empty. What else could it have been, and how could I know re-installing the OS would actually fix it permanently?

[RomanR]

If software side doesn't seems to be issue, then it's propably some HW component which gone unstable or is dying. For the start I would go to UEFI Bios to look if all seems alright (your HD is online or similar), and I would try to disable some integrated parts of MB which I don't need right now (extra USB controller, network, maybe even sound). If your CPU is overclocked, return it to original speed or disable all turbo modes. Same for RAM, if it's running on some XMP profile (mostly yes these days). Also is a good idea to run some RAM tests (MemTest86 for example, or integrated one in Windows at least).

It faced similar problems once, my computer was acting weirdly when starting and refused to recognise my mouse and keyboard. It was my Sounblaster X-Fi (responsible for long startup) and additional USB controller card (I was forced to unplug front-up ports).

 

 

[InDarkestNight]

Sigh, how many times must I say it? IF ITS A HARDWARE ISSUE, THEN WHY WOULD A SYSTEM RESTORE FIX THE ISSUE? The only thing that changed with the second system restore was the the restore point used was different. The computer worked perfectly fine for 4 or 5 days before the issue returned. How could that be a hardware problem?

That said, I've thought about trying my repair disc again now that I know I screwed up with the console commands, but honestly I don't really feel like trying it. I'm not missing the thing, I can do everything I've been doing for the past several weeks on this laptop here. Why then bother getting this overpriced hunk of junk working again? Maybe I will when I feel like giving one of my garbage games yet another chance, but I don't see that happening anytime soon. I've already made a backup of all the files on this thing, just in case the same happens with this. It did lock up on me, and then gave me the same blue screen of death. Fortunately, it turned back on normally and has been working fine since. Decided to run a virus scan (its rarely on when sunday comes around), but again it found nothing. I did find however that it was updating yet again. Guess that's the price I pay for virtually never turning this thing on. I originally bought it for my programming courses, and was planning on using it when I got my new job, but I decided NOT to get a job in tech after being taught what its actually like, so this thing's mostly just been sitting around rotting. That degree was the dumbest decision of my life.

[RomanR]

Well, if your Windows didn't suffer from some bad update, bad driver or malware attack, it's hard to imagine what software could render your system failing to even start. Your PC worked for some time, but in the end problem still persist. If your HW is OK, I would make a backup of your data and clean install, as HeyYou suggets. You can prepare a flash for installing Windows using MediaCreationTool or similar program. 

And yes, I'm propably too focused on HW side (as I'm a technician myself). Still, even best software can't run well on broken hardware.

[InDarkestNight]

If it is hardware, then what could it be? A system restore shouldn't be able to fix a hardware issue, even temporarily. It worked fine for days afterwards, I was only unable to fix it again because I didn't have the same restore point. Of course, since I don't have the original restore point, I admit I have no way to actually verify that.

Also, the thing does technically turn on; it just gives me the blue screen of death before it gets to the login screen. It keeps trying to clean itself, but it claims it cannot. I also haven't had much luck getting it to fix itself with the usb inserted that has a windows 10 installer on it. Why couldn't that use itself to repair the computer? The installer window that pops up does give a 'repair' option, but only the restore point thing really seems to do anything.

I do acknowledge that at this point, I need to just re-install the OS. I have no way to access the data on it btw, so unless re-installing windows 10 gives me the 'windowsold' folder, I have no way to save my data. I have heard its possible to use a hdd/ssd as an external disc, but the guy at staples claimed you needed a special cable to connect it (he did it for my mother's laptop to get her data off of it). Alternatively, I've been thinking of putting the drive from the non-functional HP into it and see if I could install ubuntu on it. Clearly I wouldn't have my data, I wouldn't even be able to use my old installers, but I wanted to try Ubuntu years ago but as I said windows 10 doesn't let you do that. Maybe this could give me an opportunity to finally try it out? Of course, I have no idea if any hardware in that thing is safe to use, but its not like its doing anything sitting there. Also, the hp is technically older than my current computer, though it was only actually used for a few weeks.