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Question

PC won't start

Mar 7, 2016 2:01PM PST

Hello,
My PC won't start after a power outage. it's a Dell desktop running Windows 10. At the Dell logo screen it says "diagnosing your computer" then after some time it goes to the automatic repair screen that says "Restart" and "Advanced options" When I click on "restart" it just goes back to the same screen that says diagnosing your computer and I'm back to square one. When I click on "advanced options" a screen comes up that says "Choose an option". Nothing happens when I click on the options listed and then eventually the screen goes to a blue blank screen and still nothing. I hope I gave enough information for someone to try and help me. Thanks for reading.

Discussion is locked

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Answer
Small world.
Mar 7, 2016 2:51PM PST
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Thank you
Mar 7, 2016 4:08PM PST

Thanks for the reply! I will try making a USB, I do have windows 10 on another computer but it's an HP laptop is that ok? Also, will all the photos and stuff be lost once I do the recovery? Thanks again!

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In my brother's machine, it was a wipe out.
Mar 7, 2016 4:23PM PST

That's why we did the other OS boot first so we could copy anything out before we repair.

HDDs and PCs and now smart phones are too unreliable to use without backups. In the case of PCs we often have a second chance to get the files out. Do not repair this before you save your files.

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is it ok to use my HP laptop?
Mar 7, 2016 4:28PM PST

If I'm not worried about losing anything will it be ok to just start the repair?

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It would be best to have made the media on the target
Mar 7, 2016 4:32PM PST

But here you have a dead PC so why not. We know the license in W10 is vastly different. That is and I must not duplicate the web here, it's a hash of the machine up in the cloud so license is not an issue here.

ADDING NOTE WITH MOD EDIT: Set aside a lot of time for this work. Here I used some USB 2.0 16GB stick and the creation step took about 4 hours. That was on some i5 powered Dell with HDD and I think the stick speed was a factor. But 4 hours I had my recovery W10 stick. The recovery on my brother's Dell took about 2 hours. An all day affair.

I worry that this may tax folk to the breaking point.

Post was last edited on March 7, 2016 4:34 PM PST

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I agree
Mar 7, 2016 4:54PM PST

But it's actually my mom's desktop, I haven't had a desktop myself since Windows XP lol. will I be doing any damage if I start the recovery without saving files first? That part looks kind of advanced for my skill level and it looks like I would need a CD drive which my HP doesn't have.

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Well....
Mar 7, 2016 5:03PM PST

We only lose what we don't backup. In the most recent case and priors the drive is wiped clean. This is your choice or maybe not. If the OS is blown like it was on my brothers, only the full recovery brings the machine back.

I don't want to upset you but given the history of the PC, hard drives and more, why do folk not have their stuff on backups today?

It's only getting worse from my view. I see a new smart phone with 256B of storage. I bet folk will load that up without backup too.