Dell Laptop Hangs on Startup

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Finally the issue is fixed. As per @Moab's suggestion, i reseated the RAM and the HDD and reformated the HDD (removed all the partitions). After a fresh OS install it still did not workout.

The issue turned out to be due to power supply, the plug point to which the power adapter was attached had loose earthing, when i turn on my laptop without the power cord, it works perfectly fine. I guess the Earthing was the problem.

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Raghav Bali
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Raghav Bali

My mantra for life is Code.Click.Travel

Updated on September 18, 2022

Comments

  • Raghav Bali
    Raghav Bali about 1 year

    Mine is a Dell Inspiron 1564 installed with Windows 7 basic (64 bit).

    For over a year it was working fine. But now whenever I try to turn it on, it just keeps on waiting on the Dell startup screen (the blue progress bar is fully loaded).

    Today I even formatted my hard drive and re-installed Windows(partitions exist as they were, only C drive formatted) to see if it was a Windows issue but I still face the same problem.

    The bootup proceeds only after I press the F8 button, till then nothing happens. After pressing the F8 button, it starts up and works perfectly fine.

    Please provide some insights into this, it will be really helpful.

    Edit: When I run Dell diagnostic tools, it does not find any errors now. After the restart, the system boots up normally (I.e. without pressing any key) for a couple of time and then returns back to original problem.

    As per Dell website, Re seating the RAM and hard drive can help resolve this issue but in my case it did not help. Any clues?

    • Moab
      Moab about 12 years
      Re-seat your memory modules, it this does not help test your memory modules one at a time using Memtest86+...memtest.org
    • Raghav Bali
      Raghav Bali about 12 years
      The memtest in dell diagnostics did not reveal anything. I ran the complete test but it showed everything was fine.
    • Moab
      Moab about 12 years
      Starting to sound like something is corrupt in the Master Boot Record.
    • Raghav Bali
      Raghav Bali about 12 years
      Can you suggest any reliable tool to fix MBR?
    • Moab
      Moab about 12 years
      Problem is Dell uses a custom MBR, so if you use the fixmbr command to repair it this will break some of the custom Dell features such as the recovery partition. Dell does not provide a way to repair the custom MBR other than to perform a complete OS recovery.
    • Raghav Bali
      Raghav Bali about 12 years
      Thnx Moab. I ran a few more diagnostics and i fear its HDD that is causing the issue but I am not sure of it (n my accidental warantee also expired 2months back). Any idea if HDD can be replaced without going to the service center? Have done so for my desktop but never opened my laptop chasis
  • Joe Taylor
    Joe Taylor about 12 years
    He does say - "Today i even formatted my hard drive and re-installed windows(partitions exist as they were, only C drive formatted) to see if it was a windows issue but i still face the same problem."
  • Raghav Bali
    Raghav Bali about 12 years
    Won't the factory setting reset clean up my partitions? I have a lot of data in other drives/partitions and i cannot afford to remove my partitions
  • Raghav Bali
    Raghav Bali about 12 years
    I also thought the same, just that I was thinking that Windows loader might be waiting on something but the re-install proved I was wrong. I will try and search for disabling the dell load screen. Thanks
  • MadBoy
    MadBoy about 12 years
    Using Windows Recovery partition or alike won't solve this problem if you reinstalled machine and the problem still exists. Find the right settings in bios first. If you can't see what's the problem there's no sense to start doing more.
  • Raghav Bali
    Raghav Bali about 12 years
    @MadBoy What settings are you referring to? I could not find any specific one for which the system is waiting (till F8 is pressed)