Windows 10: Stuck In Diagnostic Startup

I messed up my computer and need some real expert help to straighten this one out. Any assistance / suggestions would be appreciated. Details are below:

MY SYSTEM:
Dell E6400
Upgraded from Win 7 to Win10 Pro (so directories after c prompt show old folders and Win10 upgrade folders)
4gb Ram

The computer was really working good until I made the following System Changes:
Took the following steps:
1. Went to: All Apps Menu
2. Then: Windows Administrative Tools
3. Then: System Configuration
4. Under General Header
5. Then: Selected “DIAGNOSTIC STARTUP”
6. Then: Clicked APPLY and SAVE
7. Then: I shut down the computer and restarted it.
Now only the background will load when I boot up, no login will appear and nothing will load. See PROBLEM below.

Before I made the change, the computer startup was perfect as follows:
1. Start Computer
2. Windows 10 logo
3. Background Picture
4. Click on screen to show password logon
5. Logo on and desktop appears.

PROBLEM: Computer process now after the change:
Start Computer
Windows 10 logo
Background Picture only (scenic background)
Click on screen to show password logon
The background stays on (scenic picture) but dims when I click to try to get the logon bar. Only picture on screen – no
words or images
Cannot do anything else
After a minute the screen brightens and I can click on it again to try to bring up the ‘logon PW field’ and it (scenic background picture) dims again.
When I have the blank screen no commands are recognized (Win + R, Win + X etc…)

Note:
The only way I can get to C prompt is by using the Win10 installation thumb drive. I tried to do a repair using the
Installation app on thumb drive but it failed and told me it could not make the repair.
I can reach the BIOS via F12 on start up.
The system now may not be recognizing any startup files
I can email screen shots of the directories visible after the C: prompt if it’s useful.

I believe I somehow may have disabled the default start-up instructions and correction wills need to be made via the C: prompt.

Does anyone have recommendations on how to restore the 'set-up'?

Thanks.

:)

 

Windows 10 stuck in diagnostic mode at startup

Hi,

Follow these steps to do a Clean Install.

If you do a Clean Install then it would be activated with the Digital Entitlement.

Start fresh with a clean installation of Windows 10

Start fresh with a clean installation of Windows 10

Clean Install Windows 10

Clean Install Windows 10

Hope this helps.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rob Brown -
Microsoft MVP <- profile - Windows and Devices for IT : Bicycle - Mark Twain said it right.

 

Windows 10 stuck in diagnostic mode at startup

I will apologize in advance for this lenghty description, which is necessary because my issues are nearly impossible for me to explain and I'm going insane!!

I was recently attacked by the backdoor:Win32/Floxif(from infected CCleaner update), which was caught and quarantined by Malwarebytes and Defender and was successfully removed. Unfortunately, it had already wreaked havoc on my system. The more I troubleshot,
the worse it got. Locked me out of control panel, and wouldn't even let me open file explorer! My system slowed down more and more with each attempt and restart. Eventually, it became a real challenge to even log in to my user account-- I had to type my password
as fast as i could because it would flip back to lock screen. 4-7 attempts and my desktop would finally appear and take 5, 10, 20, 30 minutes, progressively, to load completely! At some point, during startup, I got the spinning wheel of diagnosing problems/Attempting
repairs, ending up at the blue screen telling me there was a problem. I navigated to advanced settings, etc. on and on only to be stuck in the restart/diagnostic mode endless loop. I can no longer even get my desktop to load, luckily I have an iPad so I can
get online to search for a solution!

Resetting--unsuccessful. Recovery--unsuccessful. My machine is a ASUS Vivo PC(Piece of Crap), but all I use it for is streaming video, backing up phone, pictures, music, etc. and all of the files stored on it are backed up on other devices, wiping it clean
is fine with me. I'm thinking that startup in safe mode w/networking and downloading/clean install of Windows 10 is the answer-- but can't even get that accomplished because I can't even get past the ever-spinning wheel of "Attempting repairs!"

HELP ME PLEASE!! I'm seriously ready to use my Glock to "fix" it permanently

 

Solved as follows:
Reached Safe Mode by powering off two times then getting Diagnosing PC mode.
Then - Auto Repair
Then - Advance
Then - Troubleshooting
Then - Advanced
Then - Selected number 4 Safe Mode
Entered Safe Mode and reached the System Configuration and found that ALL of the startup applications and drivers were indeed turned off. I turned all back on, saved and rebooted. All is good now.

I hope this helps someone else.

Also go to: You Tube:

 

Bizguy,

Welcome to the forum!

Thank you for posting what you did to solve the problem.
It may help others in the future!!

Have a great week!

 

Thank you sooooooo much, you saved my bacon man!!!!

 

You helped me too! Thanks very much

 

Thanks Bizguy - solved my issue too. Much appreciated!

 

Hi all,
I'm facing the same problem on a surface pro4 with windows 10. I don't know how to get diagnosing pc mode! Can you help me? Thanks!

 

Hi, I got into this pickle the same way as the author.
To get cured on a surface / surface book.
When you power on keep holding power button for 10 seconds. This crashes the boot and after several attempts it enters diagnosing mode as per video in YouTube link.
Phew

 

Top man. Thank you!*Smile

 

I'm in this same jam but cannot find "Diagnosing PC mode"

 

Bizguy's solution helped me in that exact same situation, so many thanks. However, please allow me to mention one caveat. With the Creator's Update, the steps/options are no longer as Bizguy indicated in the original solution. Now one has to click troubleshooting and advanced options to finally reach a page with 6-7 options in which the 5th one is startup settings where one can choose to 'Enable Safe Mode'. (I'm writing from memory, so I might be a bit off, but that's the gist of it.)

 

Startup Settings was entirely missing from my advanced startup menus. Turns out, my computer needs a special driver to access the (SSD) hard drive. It was a big pain, but here's what I did. Maybe it'll help someone:

• I made a recovery USB stick on another computer (actually, I used a Windows install USB, which has recovery disk built in).
• Got my SSD's driver from computer manufacturer's site. I think it ended up being part of the "Intel Rapid Storage Technology Driver", in my case. I was just spit balling and got lucky finding it.
• Copied driver installer to USB stick.
• Booted off the stick and open the recovery Command Prompt.
• Found the driver install exe (drive letters are all swapped around) and run it from the command prompt
• Then, I could see my actual hard drive. It's letter was F: instead of the usual C:
• Used bcdedit /set {default} bootmenupolicy legacy to enable the old-school f8 boot menu. Perhaps "{default}" will be a different identifier for some folks (you'll have to google it).
• Booted with F8, select Safe Mode, boot that way
• Opened msconfig.exe and disable Safe Mode.
• Restarted into normal mode.

That wasn't fun.

Everyone, please report the "missing login prompt in diagnostic mode" issue via the Windows 10 Feedback app. There's already an issue in there that you can up-vote.

 

Had the same problem.

I found the simple solution is to plug the internet into the computer using an ethernet cable. Then the login screen appears. (I had to press SHIFT and the power button on my laptop AND I had to have an ethernet to USB cable!)

I tried using a bootable usb windows 10 drive as well without success in finding safe mode I did see the option of restoring from a restore point and a new install.

Suggest everyone makes a provision for this sort of occurrence.

ENABLE SYSTEM RESTORE AND ENABLE THE F8 BOOT MENU OPTION

To enable the start-up boot menu option by pressing F8 do this....

OPEN command prompt as administrator and type:

bcdedit /set {current} bootmenupolicy Legacy

note, to undo above command (bcdedit /set {current} bootmenupolicyStandard)

=========Alternative==========
bcdedit /set {bootmgr} displaybootmenu yes

bcdedit /set {bootmgr} displaybootmenu no

Now you can get to the old boot menu as windows starts