Vista frozen -Help needed please!

turbojunkie

I have a Sony Vaio VGN-NS130E running Windows Vista and I'm having problems. I was using the internet yesterday when everything froze and I had to hold down the power button to switch it off as Ctrl-Alt-Del wouldn't work. When I powered it back up it gets to the login screen as normal but as the desktop loads everything freezes again. All of my desktop icons and quick launch buttons load but only 3 notification icons load. Everything looks ok until I try to click on something. I can always tell the point it freezes by the hard drive light just flashing pretty much consistently once per second, not making any noise though.

I tried to power up in Safe Mode. It gets to the screen listing all the drivers, pauses for a couple of minutes and then just reboots itself in Normal Mode.

I have held down F8 as it starts and tried all the tests / modes etc but no luck. All tests done show the hard drive and CPU to be ok.

I held down F10 to get recovery tools but when I attempted to backup my hard drive onto an external one it failed after a couple of mins and still 0% complete.

Sometimes when the desktop is loading I get the following errors which I never had before:

RtHDVCpl.exe - Entry Point Not Found
The procedure entry point could not be located in the dynamic link library SHLWAPI.dll

Logon process has failed to create the security options dialog
Failure - Security options

htcUPCTLoader.exe - Entry Point Not Found
The procedure entry point ?cout@std@@1@A could not be located in the dynamic link library MSVCP71.dll

MSASCui.exe - Application Error
The application failed to initialise properly (0xc0000033). Click OK to terminate the application

qbupdate.exe - Unable to Locate Component
This application has failed to start because QBUChannel.dll was not found. Re-installing the application may fix this problem.

If anyone can help me I would appreciate it. I dont mind restoring everything back to factory but I would have to find a way of backing up all of my personal files first. If anyone knows of another way of starting in Safe Mode it would be a start. Thanks

200motels

turbojunkie wrote: »

I have a Sony Vaio VGN-NS130E running Windows Vista and I'm having problems. I was using the internet yesterday when everything froze and I had to hold down the power button to switch it off as Ctrl-Alt-Del wouldn't work. When I powered it back up it gets to the login screen as normal but as the desktop loads everything freezes again. All of my desktop icons and quick launch buttons load but only 3 notification icons load. Everything looks ok until I try to click on something. I can always tell the point it freezes by the hard drive light just flashing pretty much consistently once per second, not making any noise though.

I tried to power up in Safe Mode. It gets to the screen listing all the drivers, pauses for a couple of minutes and then just reboots itself in Normal Mode.

I have held down F8 as it starts and tried all the tests / modes etc but no luck. All tests done show the hard drive and CPU to be ok.

I held down F10 to get recovery tools but when I attempted to backup my hard drive onto an external one it failed after a couple of mins and still 0% complete.

Sometimes when the desktop is loading I get the following errors which I never had before:

RtHDVCpl.exe - Entry Point Not Found
The procedure entry point could not be located in the dynamic link library SHLWAPI.dll

Logon process has failed to create the security options dialog
Failure - Security options

htcUPCTLoader.exe - Entry Point Not Found
The procedure entry point ?cout@std@@1@A could not be located in the dynamic link library MSVCP71.dll

MSASCui.exe - Application Error
The application failed to initialise properly (0xc0000033). Click OK to terminate the application

qbupdate.exe - Unable to Locate Component
This application has failed to start because QBUChannel.dll was not found. Re-installing the application may fix this problem.

If anyone can help me I would appreciate it. I dont mind restoring everything back to factory but I would have to find a way of backing up all of my personal files first. If anyone knows of another way of starting in Safe Mode it would be a start. Thanks

You might have a serious virus, the one way to find out if you have is boot from either a USB or CD with a bootable antivirus installed on it. Have a look at this site.
http://www.avg.com/ie-en/avg-rescue-cd

Torqay

turbojunkie wrote: »

If anyone knows of another way of starting in Safe Mode it would be a start.

Your fist stop should be Windows Repair. Unfortunately, there are no legitimate ways to download a Vista Repair CD. You can easily create such a CD yourself, but you'll need access to a "working" computer with Windows Vista.

How to Create a Vista Recovery Disc

turbojunkie wrote: »

I dont mind restoring everything back to factory but I would have to find a way of backing up all of my personal files first.

A Linux Live CD (e.g. Ubuntu) and an external hard drive will do.

turbojunkie

200motels wrote: »

You might have a serious virus, the one way to find out if you have is boot from either a USB or CD with a bootable antivirus installed on it. Have a look at this site.
http://www.avg.com/ie-en/avg-rescue-cd

Thanks for the quick reply. I have always used AVG on my laptop. I just followed that link, created a CD and it's now scanning away. Looks like it'll take a long time.

Torqay wrote: »

Your fist stop should be Windows Repair. Unfortunately, there are no legitimate ways to download a Vista Repair CD. You can easily create such a CD yourself, but you'll need access to a "working" computer with Windows Vista.

How to Create a Vista Recovery Disc



A Linux Live CD (e.g. Ubuntu) and an external hard drive will do.

By pressing F10 when booting I can access Windows Repair without using a CD. It doesn't help me though unfortunately.

I am using the girlfriends laptop now and it's running Vista. I also have an external hard drive but no Linux Live CD. Is it possible to download and burn onto CD or something I need to buy? Is there much to this process?

Thanks for the help

Overheal

If you can wait 2 months Windows 8 will be out and you can pick it up for about $40. 8 is a leaner OS than Vista ever was; Vista was something they released just a little too prematurely and it never fully had all the bugs ironed out

200motels

turbojunkie wrote: »

Thanks for the quick reply. I have always used AVG on my laptop. I just followed that link, created a CD and it's now scanning away. Looks like it'll take a long time.



By pressing F10 when booting I can access Windows Repair without using a CD. It doesn't help me though unfortunately.

I am using the girlfriends laptop now and it's running Vista. I also have an external hard drive but no Linux Live CD. Is it possible to download and burn onto CD or something I need to buy? Is there much to this process?

Thanks for the help

Hopefully it will work.

Torqay

turbojunkie wrote: »

I also have an external hard drive but no Linux Live CD. Is it possible to download and burn onto CD or something I need to buy? Is there much to this process?

Download the Knoppix CD image here, create the CD (e.g. with ImgBurn). Connect the external drive to your laptop, boot the laptop from CD and copy your files. No big deal.

Torqay

Overheal wrote: »

If you can wait 2 months Windows 8 will be out and you can pick it up for about $40. 8 is a leaner OS than Vista ever was; Vista was something they released just a little too prematurely and it never fully had all the bugs ironed out

Why wait two months? You can download Windows 8 right now, all you need is a (free) MSN account. You can try it for 3 months and activate it later. However, if the OP nukes the recovery partition during the installation and Windows 8 is not to his likings, then what?

And what makes you so sure that Windows 8 will be bug free? Experiences with previous released "new" Windows versions clearly indicate that Windows 8 will be anything but.

Overheal

Actually I had a breezy time with Windows 7 release candidate, and the windows 7 launch.

You're right though, I'm being silly, you can try Consumer Preview now

I'm confident enough that I'm running 8 RC now on my tablet, and it's been wiped. I think the factory recovery partition is still there, but otherwise, I really have no intention of reverting to 7. So far the only "bug" I've encountered seems like a driver issue with my tablet - being a tablet. The orientation lock and physical "Start" buttons don't like to play nice after waking from sleep, but both are overriden by functions in the touch UI, so it's a minor issue. More Samsungs problem than windows. I would be able to install the driver I am missing, but their installers throw a hissy because they don't detect Windows 7. They still operate in the BIOS, and when I reboot, so it's not anything Im concerned about.

Torqay

Overheal wrote: »

You're right though, I'm being silly, you can try Consumer Preview now

Not the consumer preview, the real deal. Windows 8 RTM is available to anyone with an MSN account. After the 90-days trial period you can buy your activation online.

Overheal

Torqay wrote: »

Not the consumer preview, the real deal. Windows 8 RTM is available to anyone with an MSN account. After the 90-days trial period you can buy your activation online.

virtually semantic, but yes