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REALLY NEED HELP URGENT

by andre12345678910 Nov 5, 2011 11:58AM PDT

Well i have Windows 7 in my HP laptop. when i turn my laptop on it shows the HP logo and says "ESC to boot menu". If I let it run to windows, a white underscore keeps flashing for hours and hours in black screen and it wont start windows. If I go to the boot menu by pressing ESC the same underscore thing happens. please help me i just want to install linux and get rid of this.

help me ASAP

Discussion is locked

4 Posts
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Two possibilities
by Jimmy Greystone Nov 5, 2011 1:33PM PDT

Two possibilities fit that particular description:

1: Your OS install is completely toast and you need to reinstall

2: Your HDD has gone titsup and needs to be replaced

Since the second option necessitates an OS reinstall anyway, you may as well try that option first. Might get lucky, who knows. Otherwise, time to find out if there's any time left on the warranty to make a claim on the HDD. If not, well, it probably couldn't have happened at a worse time because retailers everywhere are gouging people on HDD prices thanks to the flooding in Thailand where most HDD's are made. So be sure to buy sooner rather than later if the OS restore doesn't do the trick, because it could be months before those factories are back up and going, and prices are likely going to only go up in the mean time.

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reply
by andre12345678910 Nov 5, 2011 9:55PM PDT

explain me how i reinstall my OS if i cant go to the boot menu with the underscore flashing.

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Re: boot menu
by Kees_B Forum moderator Nov 5, 2011 10:20PM PDT

From what I read on google the boot menu will let you choose between different installed OS'es. But it seems you only have either a corrupt Windows installed or a bad hard disk as Jimmy already said.

You reinstall your OS by booting from the Windows 7 DVD or the recovery DVD you made or the recovery partition. To boot from a DVD go into the BIOS setup to change the boot sequence. To boot from the recovery partition (if possible) there's another key to press.

For example, in http://www.computing.net/answers/windows-xp/my-computer-will-not-boot/166846.html it's F1 for the BIOS-setup and F10 for the recovery. But it may very well be different on your PC. How to do it exactly in your case should be mentioned in the user manual, if it isn't shown on the screen. Or HP Customer Service will be able to tell you if you tell them the exact model number of your laptop.

Kees

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By using
by Jimmy Greystone Nov 5, 2011 10:44PM PDT

By using the copy of the restore media you burned when you first got the system. You did make copies of the restore media for situations exactly like this, didn't you?

If not, then even with a new HDD you're going to have problems. So, if for some reason you failed to perform this rather important task, then you'll have to contact HP and hope that they still have restore media for your system. If not, then you're looking at paying for a new copy of Windows yourself, or running something like Linux.

Back to Windows 7 forum

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