System hanging and unable to start in "safe" mode - FUBAR

[Morgan]

Hi,

Running Vista Home Premium on a Dell laptoop. When I turned on yesterday
evening, Windows looked like it was starting up ok ("Resuming Windows")
except that instead of the normal screen where you pick your user to login,
the screen just had my son's background picture. The mouse worked ok but
there was no icons or anyway of progressing. I thought maybe my kids had left
too many sessions logged in - which I have noticed almost hangs the PC
before. Tried "ctrl alt del" to log out users but no reaction. In fact no
matter what I did, the stupid Ferrari picture remained.

Assuming some download may have caused this, I thought I would start in safe
mode and look to either uninstall or restore to a previous backup point. When
I manually turned off and on and held F8 on reboot, I just came back to the
same screen. I was however able to use the F2 and F12 keys on reboot to
access system setup etc. I also tried rebooting with the system disk in the
drive - but again got the stupid picture (sensing my frustration here? Gone
right off Ferraris)

The last thing I am aware of that was downloaded was an adobe flash update.
However the PC was rebooted once after that and worked.

If anyone has any sort of suggestion I would be most grateful. The only
thing I can think of now is to put my sons fingers in a vice but not sure
that will solve my PC issue (though it may reduce my frustration level)

 

[Mick Murphy]

1. Right when you power on the computer start tapping the F8 Key to get to
list including Safe Mode; don't hold F8 down, tap it!

Start>Programs>Accessories>System Tools>System Restore.

Also, look on your keyboard and make sure there is not an F Lock Key in use!

You have the proper Vista DVD, not Dell recovery disks?

If 1 does not work, alter your boot order to make the CD/DVD drive 1st in
the boot order; put disk in drive, reboot, and do a startup repair and/or a
system restore

Cheers!

 

[Morgan]

OK

Had been holding down F8 - will try. Yes I do have the proper Vista DVD but
just realised about the boot order - stupid but by the time I was trying that
I may have lost reason and logic

Appreciate the suggestions

Morgan

 

[Morgan]

Mick,

You are a gentleman - I hope something good happens to you in this life....
can you tell your suggestion worked

Appreciate the help.

Many thanks
Morgan

 

[Morgan]

Thanks DellCA

Actually while I have a dell person - I have an inspiron with problems as
well - seperate laptop (yep - really having a good time). It shuts down at
random intervals and after chasing my tail on software, ran a program
monitoring chip temperature. They were regularly getting into the mid 50's C
and then the PC would fall over.

You don't happen to know where the temp should be (think it is in 40-50
range). Looks like I have a hardware problem.

Thanks
Morgan