Computer Won't Complete Boot Sequence

jclast

I'm at a loss.

My PC won't boot. And I've never had a PC not boot like this one is. I make it past the motherboard splash screen. Then I make it to the Windows boot screen. Following that, the PC starts over at the motherboard splash screen. Same results in Last Known Good Configuration, Safe Mode, and Safe Mode with Networking.

Anybody else ever experience this? If so, is there a solution that's not "reinstall Windows"?

Thanks, all.

ultraexactzz

You might have a Power Supply problem, which causes power to reset after heating up a certain amount. Do you have a bad fan, perhaps?

Does it always cycle at the same spot in the boot, or does it crash quicker the second time around, and then the third, and so on?

jclast

Always the same spot.

And it worked fine for about a month prior to this.

Kyanilis

I had a problem exactly like this, it'd get to the windows boot and then just restart (I was on my old laptop), turned out the solution was simple: I unplugged everything in my usb ports and it decided to boot just fine.

I think I did narrow it down to just the iPod causing the problem, but give it a shot, assuming you have anything in your usb ports anyhow.

jclast

I do. My printer and mouse are both USB. I'll go check that and report back.

jclast

No change when all USB devices are unplugged.
Additionally, the temperature never gets above 42 C / 75 F.

jclast

I've also eliminated both RAM pairs as the culprit. If I've got bad RAM, I've got more than one stick of it. Since last night.

ultraexactzz

If it's not USB, and it's not RAM, and it's not a cooling problem... I don't know.

It could be a short in the power supply - but, short of replacing it, I don't know how you'd diagnose it.

Do you have a boot floppy or something you can run a system check with? You might be able to bypass Windows altogether, if it's indeed a problem with Windows (or the part of the HDD Windows is on). Your Hard Drive may have come with a floppy for just such a situation (bad hdd prevents boot).

A problem with the CPU itself would prevent you from booting as far as you can now, so it's not that. The only other suspect would be the motherboard - again, you'd get some sort of error message. Maybe some odd BIOS setting is to blame.

Did you make any changes to your system shortly before this started? Any software? Was your antivirus up to date?

kaliyama

Sounds like mup.sys - google it if you want to know more, but long story short, repair your windows installation...

jclast

I installed and used PhotoShop 6.0 yesterday. I haven't changed the BIOS settings since I built it a month ago.

At this point I'm going to try reinstalling Windows. Failing that I guess it's time to buy/try a new power supply.

EDIT: researching this "mup.sys" first.

supabeast

Try downloading a Linux live CD, boot from it, and run it for a while. It it works, you need to reinstall Windows. if it doesn't, your hardware is hosed.

Sarcastro

Yah, sounds like a harddrive prob. Sometimes the boot sequence can't find where Windows is stored to bring it up. A boot disk sounds like a great idea, as does a windows repair install.

mrcheesypants

I have this same problem with my laptop. I sent it back and got the HDD replaced but I still get this problem. Generally I just keep turning it off and turning it back on until it boots right. If you can find a better solution, please post.

jclast

I disabled mup, and then it just hung in a different place.
I then did a repair install, which seems to have worked (posting from the aforementioned PC now!).

My new problem is that I need to reinstall SP2, and my IE won't open.
Any ideas?

jclast

Downloading IE6 now.

See, I upgraded to IE7 before my PC took a shit. When I repaired the installation, it rolled back to what's on the CD (no service packs). IE7 is only compatible with SP2. This means I can't run IE to upgrade to SP2 because my version of IE requires SP2.

It would be funny if it weren't so maddening.

Hopefully IE6 will let me upgrade to SP2 again.

StephenB.2006

If you haven't already, please make some backups of any crucial data or anything you can't replace. Then, if upon re-installing Windows something goes horribly wrong, you'll not be hosed. If it's a failing drive or even just a corrupted file system, those backups will be handy.

jclast

I've already copied everything off of it that I need, but thanks for the tip.

Canada is 1337

I have nothing to add, except that as of last week, I have the same problem on my computer at home and am looking forward to using the help from this thread to fix it.

jclast

Even though it didn't work for me, if you want to try disabling mup what you'll need to do is this.

1.) Boot from a WinXP CD
2.) Go into the recovery console (like a command prompt)
3.) Type "disable mup"
4.) Reboot and hope it works.

Failing that, a repair installation seems to have done the trick for me. Now I'm in process of running Windows Update. My CD was from 2002. I have lots of updating to do.