Windows 10: Lenovo IdeaCenter - Black screen, no mouse INCLUDING in Safe Mode

Hi-
I'm attempting to help a friend out with Windows 10 booting to black screen. He said this started last week, which makes me think it's an automatic driver update problem. I know black screens in Win10 are a thing, but so far all the fixes I've read about haven't worked. Here's what happens:

- Regular boot results in black screen, with no mouse. Win+P DOES give the display menu bar on the right side of the screen, but none of the options actually do anything.
- Safe mode has the same issue, except that the Win+P dialog doesn't give you any options since it's safe mode.
- Low res mode results in the same, except that the menu bar now appears more centered (thus confirming that "low res" is actually working, but nothing else)
- On failed boot, the boot manager says "Failed to start...soemthing" and to look at the log files in System32/logfiles/srt/... There, the files seem present but appear corrupted, i.e won't open in text editor properly.

I also found out he tried to do a "Reset this PC" with the "keep files" option, but this failed and he doesn't recall the specific error. Might this have borked his install?

All of his necessary data was saved through a Ubuntu Live USB -> External HDD, so all experiments are now fair game. I do have reinstall media, but I'd love to know what the real problem is before I do that.

Any thoughts?

R

:)

 

laptop black screen after Windows 10 update

I got an automatic update of windows 10 today and straight after got a black screen on my laptop.

I can access the computer via an external monitor but no results in extended display mode from my main laptop monitor.

When trying to use the safe mode either via the windows recovery setting or 3 times hard reboot, cannot access safe mode. Screen stays black and cannot even see mouse cursor.

I'm using a Lenovo Yoga 2.

Any ideas?

Thx

 

Windows 10 Black screen problem NOT AFTER INSTALATION

• No changes were made
• the screen is black with a reponsive mouse
• The screen becomes black with a functional mouse where the login screen should be
• Normal loading screen for windows 10 says "please wait"
• Everything works in safe mode
• No

 

rafaelsend,

Welcome to the forum!

Take a look at the following thread ad see if there a workaround for your problem.
Fix for windows 10 booting to a black screen
Let us know. Thanks.

 

Hi,
I've gotten my friend to try some of the fixes, so far no luck:

- Space + password + Enter -> No effect
- Win + P -> No effect
- Can't enter safe mode at all, so I can't do anything about potentially faulty graphics drivers either.

Thoughts?

R

 

Can you do the 3-fingered "salute" (ctrl-alt-del) in the black screen to pull up Task Manager? I've had this happen a lot under 8 and 8.1, even 10 a few times. Explorer was not loading and I was able to start it from within Task Manager.

But the lack of a mouse cursor makes this issue different, possibly. check for a cursor at the very limits of the black screen, if it is there but won't move, then the mouse driver needs to load, and can't until Explorer Shell comes up. Usually forcing Task Manager will allow you to start Explorer manually, except I don't know if it will get you past the Login Screen.

However, if the mouse is not present at all, it could be either the graphics driver is hung or the system is hung.

If you can get Task Manager to come up, you can even run Windows 10 setup from a DVD/Flash using File>New Task in Task Manager, and maybe repair the installation. Or, you can try running DISM from a command prompt. It does sound like a bad update, when I first started using 10, I got a GEforce update that caused this exact issue*

To fix that, I was able to use my Install DVD (I made from the files on my system), you can get to recovery options from that, and it will allow you to use System Restore. That's what fixed me. Try all of these, I think booting to a Windows 10 installer will get you in to what you need to fix this.

* (I posted about this when it happened and included my solution, don't know if I can find the post, I'll search for it. But there may be a tutorial with the same info. There was also a series of hotfixes that were causing a similar issue.)

 

rafaelsend,

See if you can use the following to launch Windows Automatic Repair.

Hold the Power Button until the computer completely shuts off.
Press the Power Button to turn the computer on.
As soon as you see the rotating loading circle, press and hold the Power Button until the computer shuts off.
Repeat this process 2 or 3 times until you see the Preparing Automatic Repair screen.

Let the computer boot to the Automatic Repair screen.
Click Advanced Options, and then select Troubleshoot.

From there, you have:
- Reset this PC
If you select Refresh your PC you can opt to not erase data, or, Reset your PC to erase all data and restore the system.
- Advanced options

-- System Restore < If you have created Restore Points!
-- System Image Recovery
-- Startup Repair < This may also be a good choice.
-- Command Prompt
-- Startup Settings

Let us know what works.

Thanks

 

Hi,
We can get into that menu without the power button hack.
- He's already tried "Reset this PC" before he called me, and he said it got stuck and did not complete successfully.
- He also doesn't have any restore points, we already checked on that.
- I believe startup repair either didn't find any problems or failed, but I can try that again when I see him next.

R

 

TRY COTTONBALL'S METHOD.

I'm pretty sure now, after reviewing my posts about my issue last year, you have something very similar going on, so if you can get to System Restore you should be able to fix it, if not, you'll have to "Reset this PC". It's like running "Erase all Contents and Settings" on an iPhone, or running Cydia Eraser on the same, it will hand you a fresh PC with a Windows 10 installation unmolested by updates.

I found the post about the updates that were bad that affected me. This page has my posts, but check the whole thread:

Cumulative Update KB3081444: Success! - Page 2 - Windows 10 Forums

My solution, my only option was to use my install disk to access System Restore and I was fortunate to have a restore point set that worked, right before I applied the bad update. That particular update prevented us from logging in to Windows, entering our passwords simply brought us back to the login screen. it was kb3081444, but this is a very old update, I don't know if it is pushed to new systems, we complained about this update all over the Insider group, and I think they dealt with it, superceded it at least.

If you can get rid of whatevever update is causing your issues, and identify them, then you can use this method to block certain updates, if in fact the method still works:

Windows Updates - Hide or Show in Windows 10 - Windows 10 Forums

Hmmm

In that case, you'll have to reinstall Windows 10 completely, Resetting your PC before trying a System Restore, probably deleted your restore points. So that's that.

You'll need an install USB or DVD, and you'll have to wipe your drive. So if you have a way to connect that drive to another PC to grab any personal data, do it. I've used Hiren's, connected to Wifi, moved my personal files to another PC on my Network, or, just attached a flash/external and copied my files.

When you get to the Drive options of Setup, hit "New" and create a whole new partition, this will delete anything that was preventing you from booting.

 

Yup, I have install media so that shouldn't be a problem, and we already backed up his data.

My only concern with completely starting from scratch is that I never quite know what to do with the Lenovo recovery partitions and all those things. His current partition map is pretty weird, he has about 3 tiny partitions on each side of the main ("C:") drive and I'm not sure how the system will react if I delete them all and start with a fresh drive...

Would I be correct in assuming that if I completely blank his drive, Win10 setup will create all the partitions it requires EXCEPT for the Lenovo Recovery one?

R

 

Wipe the whole drive, the Installer should create a new recovery partition. You could try to keep the existing partition, wipe all of the other ones, see what happens. But I just built a machine on an MSI MB and it created a WinRE recovery partition.

You might be able to boot to the recovery partition, have you tried that? Should be f11 or 12. Unless it is only accessible from within Windows 10. This is why I hate this new "fastboot" BIOS system, you can't GET to it if your system is hosed. Actually, I could not even boot to a CD or Flash drive until I set Legacy Boot and BIOS.

If you can get to the recovery, use that. If not, save the recovery and wipe the rest of the partitions. If the system comes up, immediately boot to the recovery as soon as you can get in to it, then it will restore all of the stock drivers and apps.

However, when I built this MSI system, after I installed Windows 10, it found all of the needed drivers and installed the apps specific to that system, all though Windows Update.

It's hard to know the best thing to do, when all else fails, wipe the whole drive. THEN you will be able to get into your BIOS and BOOT options for the MB. Because once Windows 10 is installed, you can't use F keys to get into those,

 

rafaelsend,

It appears that the IdeaCentre has three partitions, and the Recovery Partition allows the recovery of the initial operating system and software to the same state that it was when the computer was obtained.*However, it is my understanding the Recovery Partition can be removed to obtain more hard drive space.*

Have you looked at the following:
Clean Install of Windows 10 on Lenovo Desktop Computers - Lenovo Support

 

rafaelsend,

It appears that the IdeaCentre has three partitions, and the Recovery Partition allows the recovery of the initial operating system and software to the same state that it was when the computer was obtained. However, it is my understanding the Recovery Partition can be removed to obtain more hard drive space.

However, XweAponX may have a point, though. The installer might create a new Recovery Partition.
Lenovo is sort of 'unique' in some of its doings.

Have you looked at the following:
Clean Install of Windows 10 on Lenovo Desktop Computers - Lenovo Support

 

Hi,
Since we backed up his data, he gave the Factory Reset a try and says it succeeded this time. Hopefully it stays working.
Thanks for your input!

R

 

Thanks for the update.

Glad the issue is resolved (we hope)! *Smile