My Win 8 Dell Vostro 3500 won't boot up!!!

BenEadir

Hi all,

My 3 year old Dell Vostro 3500 ('upgraded' to Win 8 at the start of the year) has been overheating and crashing from time to time when my son plays games or watches YouTube etc on it. I tried blowing out the dust from the fan etc but it doesn't seem to have made any difference.

Yesterday it overheated and crashed again but now it won't boot up at all.

When I power it up I initially get the normal Dell boot up screen but then the screen goes blank for a few minutes and eventually a blue Windows icon appears. That stays on screen for a few minutes and the machine reboots and does the same again. If left on it just cycles through this two step process continuously. Any suggestions apart from binning it??? :eek:



Then this



Cheers,

Ben

looking_around

A tray cooler.
NEVER continue using a laptop that's crashing due to heat..or you will damage components.
Perhaps a new fan/heatsink...
But get a tray cooler or something.

Can you try going in through safe mode. (keep pressing F8) .. it might be software issue.

Could try reformatting also ..

BenEadir

looking_around wrote: »

Can you try going in through safe mode. (keep pressing F8) .. it might be software issue.

Could try reformatting also ..

Thanks,

F8 did nothing in afraid. How do I reformat when it won't boot???

Ben

hearny

You need to repeatedly tap F8 as soon as the Dell bios screen disappears, if you see the windows logo you missed it.

It should give options for safe mode, try that also if Repair My Computer is there try that.
First thing I would do is run a chkdsk on it.

Reformatting the drive will wipe all your files so do not do that without a backup.

BenEadir

hearny wrote: »

You need to repeatedly tap F8 as soon as the Dell bios screen disappears, if you see the windows logo you missed it.

Thanks Hearny,

Tried that several times without any joy. As soon as the Dell Bios screen disappears I hit F8 repeatedly for about one minute but on each occasion the blue windows icon appears rather than an option to boot in safe mode.

It's not looking good

Ben

looking_around

try it as soon as you turn on the pc ...just keep tapping ..

You can re-format quite easily, by placing the OS disk in the DVDplayer and choosing Boot (F12) from DVD.
It should go straight to disk then and give you re-install options.

but if you want to keep files, connect the harddrive to another computer via usb so you can back up your files first.

BenEadir

looking_around wrote: »

try it as soon as you turn on the pc ...just keep tapping ..

No joy trying F8 as soon as it powers up either I'm afraid and I don't have a bootable CD as Win 8 was a download

Looks like I'm proper fcuked as they say.

Ben

looking_around

can you borrow a bootable disk from someone, your local tech shop? even a win 7?

Can sort out the legal OS.. after it actually works by re-downloading the win 8?
(actually did you not have to set up any recovery disks?? )

Just pay a local tech shop to re-install win 8 for you .. shouldn't cost too much ..most tech shops charge bout €40-60€
I myself would only charge 20-40..but I'm doing it from home and don't have overhead fees.

I don't think there's anything physically wrong with the Harddrive just something went wrong with the OS last time it crashed. They can test this as well by connecting it to another PC anyway.

If you do pay to get it sorted..invest in a cooling tray too!

BenEadir

looking_around wrote: »

can you borrow a bootable disk from someone, your local tech shop? even a win 7?

Loaded an old Win 7 disk and booted from that. Chose the "Startup Repair" option and it's been running for over 3 hours. It says it might take over an hour but 3 hours????

How long will I give it?

Ben

looking_around

sounds a bit long ..specially if there's been no changes. Don't go for repair as that will try to repair the OS ..and the os was win8. So just try a fresh instal of the win 7.
Once that instals you can see about re-installing the win8. But you want to reformat the harddrive and do a clean install.

Please tell me you are keeping the laptop cool though?

BenEadir

Cheers Looking Around,

Before I reinstall Win 7 and lose all the stored apps and data (not a major issue) should I not try to create a Win 8 bootable USB drive a la http://www.tricksage.com/2013/05/make-windows-8-bootable-usb-step-by.html

Would that 'repair' my win 8 installation? Would that be better than installing Win 7 etc?

Ben

looking_around

you could...but I thought to create a boot disk/usb.. you would need a working OS.
..Most new computers now. Pretty much get you to create your own. (where as they use to come with the PC's).
I take it you never did create recovery disks?

BenEadir

looking_around wrote: »

I take it you never did create recovery disks?

The machine originally had Win 7 on it and Win 8 was installed from a download. I don't recall being asked or offered the option to create recovery disks.

Ben

hearny

You are better off handing it into a local computer shop to be honest.

You need to deal with the overheating as that will potentially stop any repairs and cause more damage if it shuts down at a crucial time.

You can try to setup a windows 8 disk like the one in the link if you have access to a working machine.

If you have access to a sata to usb caddy / adaptor I would first take out the hard drive and connect it to another windows machine and run a chkdsk /r on it.