Windows 10: Sometimes computer enters boot loop, other times I see black screen

Hello,

Recently, I think it was January, my computer started facing issues while booting. I could not determine the cause of the issue, but I have found a workaround that "fixes" it temporarily (once). Once I press the power button on my computer there are generally several cases of stuff that can happen:
1. Computer enters bootloop. Restart button does not work. The bootloop looks like this (there are two distinct boot failures):

• Computer turns on, there is no video output, stays for 12~ seconds, turns off
  
• Computer turns on, keyboard flashes, Gigabyte logo appears, black screen with mouse pointer appears, turns off
  
• Go to 1. This process repeats endlessly.

2. Computer turns on, but there is no video output, stays on until turned off by long pressing "on" button. Restart button does not work.
3. Computer turns on and windows successfully boots

The temporary fix that I found to work is to remove any number of RAM sticks. I usually remove one and just stack them until I'm left with two, then I put all of them back (I have 4 sticks). Any stick can be removed for this fix to work. Once the computer is turned on, it will stay on, there are no BSODs, it works flawlessly as far as I can tell. I keep it on until I'm forced to apply windows updates. I have tested the RAM with memtest, they checked out.

The other things that I have tried were:
- turning off fast boot (it seemed to work at first, but I think I was just lucky. This setting is still off)
- updating windows (I think this started to happen after one of January's updates)
- in-place upgrade of windows (How to perform an In-place Upgrade with Windows 10 Step-by-Step Guide - Microsoft Community)

At first I thought this might be PSU related, but after I managed to find the "fix" I have crossed out this possibility. I now suspect this could related to Spectre/Meltdown fixes. But I have no idea how to test that. I could be wrong on both.
If anyone have any idea what else I could do to try and fix this please let me know. I'm not sure what type of information I should provide, so I'll just list my hardware right now:

Code: Operating System: Windows 10 Pro 64-bit (10.0, Build 16299) (16299.rs3_release.170928-1534) System Manufacturer: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd. System Model: Z87-D3HP BIOS: F7 Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4670K CPU @ 3.40GHz (4 CPUs), ~3.4GHz Memory: 16384MB RAM Card name: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 770[/quote] Thanks to anyone willing to spend time with this issue.

:)

 

Windows 10 Starts then Black Screen

Upgraded to Win 10 from Win 7 on my HP. Computer boots up and I see my desktop but within 15 seconds, it goes to a blank screen (sometimes it flashes first). During the 15 seconds it is on, I can click on a program in the task bar, such as Chrome, and it
opens and functions. But task bar and everything behind the window is black.

I'm not sure this is the same issue as the others who have a black screen and it is the 'project to another screen' setting that is causing the issue because mine does boot and I do see my desktop albeit for a very short period of time.

Help - I need my computer!!

Thanks!

 

windows 10 start up lags

Hi,

I have Win 10.0 build 10240. I like the new program, but recently on start-up the Win 10 program seems to be in a loop and I get a black screen, then a brief flash of something and then back to the black screen. Eventually it will boot into Windows. Sometimes
it loops six or seven times before eventually booting into Win 10. This did not happen in for the first few month I upgraded to Win 10. Only within the last month has this problem started.

Will this go away with the next upgrade or do I need to do something to fix this problem?

thanks, Bruce

*** Email address is removed for privacy ***

 

Hi justasv, are all your RAM sticks identical in size and manufacturer? Have you tried swapping them around into different slots and checked the slots are squeaky clean? Additionally try booting with just one stick of RAM and doing a memcheck on each individual stick it may be that there is a dodgy stick in there that isn't showing up memtesting all of them at once..

 

Hi Soxmis,

The RAM sticks are identical in every aspect. I bought two sets (2x16) in one go.
I have memtested the RAM sticks individually and they are fine. I encountered the same issue by booting with any one of them (actually labeled them and changed to a different one once I encountered the same boot failure)
I have tried swapping them around and it makes no difference (the issue still persists).
Cleaning the slots was the first thing I did once this started, so it should be good in that regard.

I found that there's such a thing as bootlog - I turned it on. Not sure if it will be useful, but I guess it's worth a try.

 

Problems with booting before OS starts are always of HW/FW origin. Start by checking BIOS version and eventually re-flash it with same or newer version. Fixes for Meltdown may require BIOS update but that becomes important only after OS starts.

 

Please run this beta log collector using extract and post a zip into this thread for troubleshooting:
log collector v2-beta08.zip
In case the beta log collector does not work please use the DM log collector:
BSOD - Posting Instructions - Windows 10 Forums

 

I had something similar not so long back, took it to the virtual mechanic and he said the boot process had been corrupted, and fixed it.

 

Bios version is the latest (F7). I have not touched it in 3 years. I also did not apply any updates manually, everything that was installed came through windows update.

The beta log collector finished with errors, but the zip seems to contain plenty of info. Let me know if it's missing something.
Code: Listing installed software... Get-ItemProperty : Specified cast is not valid. At D:\_DATA\Desktop\za\resources\main.ps1:267 char:1 + Get-ItemProperty -Path "HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersi ... + ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: ) [Get-ItemProperty], InvalidCastException + FullyQualifiedErrorId : System.InvalidCastException,Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.GetItemPropertyCommand[/quote] Attachment 178703
Please also note that a few days ago I have experienced some BSODs because of COMODO (new windows version, old COMODO). But this is now resolved, so I hope it will not get in the way.

Corrupted how?

 

There were no mini or memory dump files.
The logs displayed BSOD with bugcheck 3B.


1) In the left lower corner search type: system > open system control panel > on the left pane click advanced system settings>
a) > under performance click settings > on performance options click the advanced tab > under virtual memory click change >
post an image of the virtual memory window into the thread
b) > under startup and recovery click settings > post an image of the startup and recovery window into the thread
2) free up space on drive C: so that there is 30 - 35 GB or more free space
3) open administrative command prompt and type or copy and paste:
4) sfc /scannow
5) dism /online /cleanup-image /restorehealth
6) chkdsk /scan
7) When these have completed > right click on the top bar or title bar of the administrative command prompt box > left click on edit then select all > right click on the top bar again > left click on edit then copy > paste into the thread
8) Make sure that there is no over clocking during the troubleshooting process
9) For any BSOD please post a new zip into the thread:
log collector v2-beta08.zip



Code: 2018-02-24 18:07 Windows Error Reporting Fault bucket , type 0 Event Name: BlueScreen Response: Not available Cab Id: 0 Problem signature: P1: 3b P2: c0000005 P3: fffff8026a4c2aa9 P4: ffffb3850eaa5b30 P5: 0 P6: 10_0_16299 P7: 0_0 P8: 256_1 P9: P10: Attached files: \\?\C:\WINDOWS\Minidump\022418-29046-01.dmp \\?\C:\WINDOWS\TEMP\WER-29625-0.sysdata.xml \\?\C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\Temp\WERA596.tmp.WERInternalMetadata.xml \\?\C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\Temp\WERA5D5.tmp.csv \\?\C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\Temp\WERA653.tmp.txt These files may be available here: C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\ReportArchive\Kernel_3b_b7908f9316b24ff37bdda54aa33cce10cdce23f3_00000000_cab_1840ac7c Analysis symbol: Rechecking for solution: 0 Report ID: 79f66163-8f1e-4807-8906-44e122c10b51 Report Status: 2049 Hashed bucket:2018-02-24 18:07 Windows Error Reporting Fault bucket , type 0 Event Name: BlueScreen Response: Not available Cab Id: 0 Problem signature: P1: 3b P2: c0000005 P3: fffff8026a4c2aa9 P4: ffffb3850eaa5b30 P5: 0 P6: 10_0_16299 P7: 0_0 P8: 256_1 P9: P10: Attached files: \\?\C:\WINDOWS\Minidump\022418-29046-01.dmp \\?\C:\WINDOWS\TEMP\WER-29625-0.sysdata.xml \\?\C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\Temp\WERA596.tmp.WERInternalMetadata.xml \\?\C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\Temp\WERA5D5.tmp.csv \\?\C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\Temp\WERA653.tmp.txt These files may be available here: C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\WER\ReportQueue\Kernel_3b_b7908f9316b24ff37bdda54aa33cce10cdce23f3_00000000_0358a652 Analysis symbol: Rechecking for solution: 0 Report ID: 79f66163-8f1e-4807-8906-44e122c10b51 Report Status: 4 Hashed bucket:[/quote] Code: Event[446]: Log Name: System Source: Service Control Manager Date: 2018-02-24T20:07:38.643 Event ID: 7026 Task: N/A Level: Information Opcode: N/A Keyword: Classic User: N/A User Name: N/A Computer: SIURBLYS Description: The following boot-start or system-start driver(s) did not load: cmdhlpdamEhStorClass[/quote] cmdhlp.sys COMODO Firewall Pro Helper Driver Comodo Discussion Board and Support Forums | Comodo Community registration

 

Code: Event[446]: Log Name: System Source: Service Control Manager Date: 2018-02-24T20:07:38.643 Event ID: 7026 Task: N/A Level: Information Opcode: N/A Keyword: Classic User: N/A User Name: N/A Computer: SIURBLYS Description: The following boot-start or system-start driver(s) did not load: cmdhlpdamEhStorClass[/quote] cmdhlp.sys COMODO Firewall Pro Helper Driver Comodo Discussion Board and Support Forums | Comodo Community registration [/quote] The COMODO driver BSOD is a non-issue - I fixed it already
Here's the requested info:





I used to have "Small memory dump", but I guess windows reinstall reset that option.
Code: Justas@SIURBLYS C:\Users\Justas $ sfc /scannow Beginning system scan. This process will take some time. Beginning verification phase of system scan. Verification 100% complete. Windows Resource Protection did not find any integrity violations. Justas@SIURBLYS C:\Users\Justas $ dism /online /cleanup-image /restorehealth Deployment Image Servicing and Management tool Version: 10.0.16299.15 Image Version: 10.0.16299.248 [==========================100.0%==========================] The restore operation completed successfully. The operation completed successfully. Justas@SIURBLYS C:\Users\Justas $ chkdsk /scan The type of the file system is NTFS. Stage 1: Examining basic file system structure ... 1127424 file records processed. File verification completed. 11876 large file records processed. 0 bad file records processed. Stage 2: Examining file name linkage ... 29425 reparse records processed. 1693194 index entries processed. Index verification completed. 0 unindexed files scanned. 0 unindexed files recovered to lost and found. 29425 reparse records processed. Stage 3: Examining security descriptors ... Security descriptor verification completed. 282886 data files processed. CHKDSK is verifying Usn Journal... 34325600 USN bytes processed. Usn Journal verification completed. Windows has scanned the file system and found no problems. No further action is required. 124022783 KB total disk space. 88604636 KB in 754265 files. 406304 KB in 282887 indexes. 0 KB in bad sectors. 1244015 KB in use by the system. 65536 KB occupied by the log file. 33767828 KB available on disk. 4096 bytes in each allocation unit. 31005695 total allocation units on disk. 8441957 allocation units available on disk.[/quote]

 

Please make the following changes:
1) Move the dot from custom size to system managed size
2) Check the box to Automatically manage paging file size for all drives
3) Change system failure write debugging information from Kernel memory dump to Automatic memory dump
4) Reboot
5) Recheck the settings for Virtual memory and system failure to make sure that they are reset to the above settings.
6) Indicate the progress made with increasing free space on the C: drive
7) What were the steps made to fix Comodo?

 

1-6)
Changed the settings to your recommended values and checked they persist after restart.
C: Drive has 32,1GB of free space

7) After a few BSODs windows booted to a system recovery screen. Since I did not have any restore points, the only thing I could think of was to rename the culprit driver in system32. Luckily windows ignored the missing driver on next boot. Once I booted into the system, I renamed the driver back. Then COMODO decided to update (to a version which works with the latest windows update). I then restarted, windows booted normally, and I uninstalled COMODO.

 

Please run the beta version of the log collector using extract.
Sometimes different browsers may need to be used.
log collector v2-beta08.zip
In case the beta version does not work please use the DM log collector:
BSOD - Posting Instructions - Windows 10 Forums

 

Not sure what you meant by using extract, or different browsers, but I ran the tool. It had the same warnings this time as well
Code: Listing installed software... Get-ItemProperty : Specified cast is not valid. At D:\_DATA\Desktop\KEK\log collector v2-beta08\resources\main.ps1:267 char:1 + Get-ItemProperty -Path "HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersi ... + ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: ) [Get-ItemProperty], InvalidCastException + FullyQualifiedErrorId : System.InvalidCastException,Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.GetItemPropertyCommand Listing installed Windows updates... Finding network information...[/quote] Here's the zip:
SIURBLYS (2018-02-27 22 43).zip