It's a dreadful way to start a day - you press the power button on your computer and nothing happens.

Few computer problems are more frustrating than when your computer won't boot. There are many reasons why a computer won't turn on and often very few clues about what might be the problem. The only symptom is usually the simple fact that "nothing works" which isn't much to go on. Add to this the fact that whatever is wrong could be an expensive part of your PC to replace - like the motherboard or CPU. Do not fear because all may not be lost! Here's what you need to do: 1. Read #1 below (it'll make you feel better). 2. Pick the best troubleshooting guide (#2 - #9) based on how your computer is acting or #10 if your PC stops at any point because of an error message. Note: All of these "computer won't start" troubleshooting guides apply no matter what Windows operating system you have installed on your hard drive, including Windows 7, Windows Vista, and Windows XP. Steps 1 through 5 even apply to other PC operating systems like Linux.

1. Don't Panic! Your Files are Probably OK

When faced with a computer that won't start most people tend to panic, worried that all the data on their PC is gone forever. It's true that the most common reason a computer won't start is because a piece of hardware has failed or is causing a problem but that hardware isn't usually a hard drive, the part of your computer that stores all of your files. In other words, your music, documents, emails, and videos are probably safe - just not accessible at the moment. So take a deep breath and try to relax. There's a good chance you can figure out exactly why your computer won't start and then get it back up and running.
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2. Computer Shows No Sign of Power

Original celerayted Try these steps if your computer will not turn on and is showing no sign at all of receiving power - no fans running and no lights on the computer case. Important: You may or may not see a light on the back of your PC depending on the kind of power supply you have and the exact cause of the problem. Note: Don't worry about the monitor yet. If the computer is not turning on because of a power issue then the monitor certainly can't display anything from the computer. Your monitor light will likely be amber/yellow if your computer has stopped sending information to it. How To Fix a Computer That Shows No Sign of Power

3. Computer Powers On... and Then Off

Original celerayted Follow these steps if, when you turn your computer on, it promptly powers back off. You'll probably hear the fans inside your computer turn on, see the lights on the front of your computer turn on or flash, and then it will all stop. You won't see anything on the

monitor and you may or may not hear beeps coming from the computer before it shuts off by itself. Note: As in the previous scenario, don't worry about the state your monitor is in. You may have a monitor issue as well but it's not possible to troubleshoot it quite yet. How To Fix a Computer That Turns On and Then Off

4. Computer Powers On But Nothing Happens

If your computer seems to be receiving power after turning it on but you don't see anything on your monitor, try these troubleshooting steps. In these situations, the power lights will stay on, you'll likely hear the fans inside your PC running, and you may or may not hear one or more beeps coming from the computer. This situation is probably the most common in my experience working with computers that won't start. Unfortunately it's also one of the most difficult to troubleshoot. How To Fix a Computer That Turns On But Displays Nothing

5. Computer Stops or Continuously Reboots During the POST

Use this guide when your computer powers on, shows at least something on the monitor, but then stops, freezes, or reboots over and over again during the Power On Self Test (POST). The POST on your computer may look like the screenshot to your left or may instead simply show your computer maker's logo. Important: Don't use this troubleshooting guide if you encounter an issue during the loading of the operating system, which occurs after the Power On Self Test is complete.

Troubleshooting Windows related reasons why your computer won't turn on begin with #6 below. How To Fix Stopping, Freezing, and Reboot Issues During the POST

6. Windows Begins to Load But Stops or Reboots on a BSOD

If your computer begins to load Windows but then stops and displays a blue screen with information on it then try these steps. You may or may not see the Windows splash screen before the blue screen appears. This kind of error is called a STOP error but is more commonly referred to as a Blue Screen of Death or a BSOD. Receiving a BSOD error is a common reason why a computer won't turn on. Important: Choose this troubleshooting guide even if the BSOD flashes on screen and your PC restarts automatically without giving you time to read what it says. How To Fix Blue Screen of Death Errors

7. Windows Begins to Load But Stops or Reboots Without an Error

Try these steps when your computer powers on, starts to load Windows, but then freezes, stops, or reboots over and over again without generating any kind of error message. The stopping, freezing, or reboot loop may happen on the Windows splash screen as shown to the left or even on a black screen, with or without a flashing cursor. Note: If your computer won't start and you see a blue screen flash or remain on the screen, you're experiencing a Blue Screen of Death and should use troubleshooting guide #6 above.

Important: If you suspect that the Power On Self Test is still going on and that Windows has not yet started to boot, a better troubleshooting guide for why your computer won't turn on might be #5 above. It's a fine line and sometimes hard to tell. How To Fix Stopping, Freezing, and Reboot Issues During Windows Startup

8. Windows Repeatedly Returns to the Advanced Boot Options Screen

Use this guide when nothing but the Advanced Boot Options screen appears every time your restart your computer and none of the Windows startup options work. In this situation, no matter which Safe Mode option you choose, your computer eventually stops, freezes, or restarts on its own, after which you find yourself right back at the Advanced Boot Options menu. This is a particularly annoying way in which your computer won't turn on because you're trying to use Window's built-in ways to solve your problem but you're getting nowhere with them.
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Repair your computer in Windows 7

2Share Learn about: How to use Repair Your Computer and Launch Startup Repair options in Windows 7

Looking for Windows XP version of the article? Click here then. Looking for Windows Vista version of the article? Click here then. When you cannot even get into Safe Mode, then most probably there are some errors or missing files on your hard disk that prevent Windows 7 from starting correctly. This article covers two similar options in Windows 7's Advanced Boot Options menu and Windows Error Recovery menu - Repair Your Computer and Launch Startup Repair. Repair Your Computer is a set of tools for recovering from Windows errors - and Startup Repair is one of those tools.

Three ways of launching computer repair

You can run Repair Your Computer from hard disk; or if your computer is unable to start from hard disk (for example, bootmgr is missing), you can launch it by booting from Windows 7 DVD.
1. Launch Startup Repair offered at computer startup

The Launch Startup Repair option is offered automatically after Windows 7 detects that it failed to start the last time. If the failure happened just once due to power failure during Windows startup, you can ignore the offer by pressing Arrow Down key on your keyboard to select Start Windows Normally instead and then pressing Enter key. Otherwise, you should use Launch Startup Repair (recommended) option.

Move down to Startup Repair section.

2. Repair your computer in Windows 7 Advanced Boot Options menu

To access the whole set of tools, you need to open Advanced Boot Options menu right before Windows 7 starts. After you power on your computer, you might see some fullscreen logo or black screen with gray texts such as "AMI", "Intel", "Testing Memory", "Hard disk", etc. Press F8 key on your keyboard repeatedly right after you see such screen disappear. This will open Windows 7 Advanced Boot Options menu. If you see some Select Boot Device menu instead, press Esc key to hide it and then press F8 key again a few times. Use arrow keys on your keyboard to select Repair Your Computer and press Enter key to

confirm your selection.

Move down to Repair your computer section.

3. Repair your computer option using Windows 7 DVD

If Windows 7 will not start from hard disk no matter what, you can boot your computer from Windows 7 DVD. If your computer does not boot from DVD, check this article to change boot order. If you can't find your Windows 7 DVD, you can borrow one from your friends - any version of Windows 7 DVD has Repair Your Computer option. You can also download a copy of Windows 7 Enterprise 90-day trial DVD from Microsoft

TechNet (this requires logging in with Windows Live ID) using your friend's computer and burn the ISO image to DVD with Windows 7 Disc Image Burner or CDBurnerXP. After you boot your computer using Windows 7 DVD, a black screen appears with gray text "Press any key to boot from CD or DVD". Press some key on your keyboard (Space and Enter are the most common ones ) within 5 seconds to launch Windows 7 from DVD.

Windows will load some files from the DVD, this takes time. You will see Windows 7 logo after this is complete.

Install Windows dialog appears. Don't worry, this will not overwrite your documents or settings. Select your preferred settings from Time and currency format and Keyboard or input method boxes. I suggest you leave Language to "English" here to better understand this

article. Click Next to continue.

Now you will see a big tempting Install now button. Do not click it! computer in the lower left corner instead.

Click Repair your

Windows 7 will then look for its installation(s) on hard disks. This might take a few minutes.

In most cases, Windows 7 will find its installation. Click Next to continue. If you see nothing listed here, your computer has a disk controller that Windows 7 is not able to detect by default. Click Load drivers instead, insert the CD, floppy disk or DVD that came with your computer or disk controller and load appropriate drivers from there. Your Windows 7 installation will then be located.

Move down to Repair your computer section now.

Using Startup Repair in Windows 7

Startup Repair will start checking your hard disk condition and files needed to launch Windows 7. This takes several minutes to half an hour.

If a problem is found, Startup Repair will try to fix it. This usually takes a few minutes.

In case problems were fixed successfully, Startup Repair offers to restart your computer immediately to see if your Windows 7 starts normally now. Usually it does! In rare cases, Startup Repairs launches again and does some more fixing. Let it finish its

job and Windows 7 should start normally after the next restart.

In case Startup Repair was unable to locate or repair problems, you will see the following screen. You can click Finish to close Startup Repair and then try some other method of restoring. Or you can click View advanced options for system recovery and support to see

the full set of recovery tools.

After an unsuccessful repair, Startup Repair suggests using System Restore for fixing your computer. If Startup Repair was your first step in fixing Windows 7 problems, I suggest you click Cancel here and try other repair tools first. If you've tried all other tools already, click Restore button. Please remember that this System Restore operation cannot be undone - you will not lose your documents, e-mails, pictures, videos and other personal data, but some programs might be removed during System Restore. Read our article about using System Restore.

After clicking Cancel, Microsoft asks to send some information about the problem to their servers to help creating solutions for such situations. This will not send your personal information to Microsoft, just data about your computer configuration and problems not

repaired. If you are really concerned about your privacy, click Don't Send. If you would like to help Microsoft a bit, click Send information about this problem (recommended).

Using Repair your computer in Windows 7

After launching Repair your computer from Windows Advanced Boot Options menu or from Windows 7 DVD, System Recovery Options asks for keyboard input language. Select the layout you use and click Next.

Next, select your User name and type your Password. Click OK. This will log you in to your Windows 7 installation.

Step 1 - Startup Repair

If you have not yet tried Startup Repair, you should use this option first. Move up to read about Startup Repair.

If this solved Windows 7 problems, you can skip the rest of the article.
Step 2 - Windows Memory Diagnostic

If Startup Repair did not solve your problems, and you have not used MemTest86+ for checking whether your computer's memory modules are fine, try Windows Memory Diagnostic. This will ensure that Random Access Memory (RAM) modules do not cause

computer problems. A faulty module is the most common reason for computer crashes and lockups. Please note that this check will take at least 30-40 minutes to complete!

Click Restart now and check for problems (recommended) in Windows Memory Diagnostic dialog.

After your computer restarts, Windows Memory Diagnostics Tool will launch automatically. The test will easily take 40 or minutes. If your computer crashes or hangs during the test, you should replace memory modules in your computer. Consult the computer reseller and the manual that came with your computer for this. Check the Status column from time to time. If it says "No problems have been detected

yet", your computer's memory is working fine. After the lengthy test is complete, your computer will restart. In case the Status was "No problems..." before the restart, you should access Windows Advanced Boot Options menu again using F8 key and select Repair your computer again.

In case Windows Memory Diagnostic detected problems in memory modules, you should replace memory modules in your computer as soon as possible - the faulty module(s) can easily recreate the problems and in the long run you will definitely experience data loss! Consult the computer reseller and the manual that came with your computer for replacement of memory modules.

Do not use your computer or try other recovery options until the memory modules have been replaced!
Step 3 - System Restore

The next step is to try System Restore from System Recovery Options menu.

Please note that this System Restore cannot be undone. While you will not lose any of your documents, pictures, videos, e-mails, etc, all programs installed after the selected Restore Point will be deleted. You will have to reinstall them. Read more about using System Restore in this article.
Step 4 - other options

In case nothing helped, you must restore the whole image backup of your computer. You do have a backup, don't you? If you are using Windows 7 built-in backup, you can click System Image Recovery in System Recovery Options menu and restore the image. If you are using Macrium Reflect Free Edition, read this article about restoring disc image using bootable rescue CD. In case you do not have a backup, you can use Puppy Linux to copy your documents, pictures, videos, music, etc to a flash drive or external hard disk. After copying is complete,

reinstall Windows 7, copy your rescued files back to your computer and do make backups this time!
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Fix Windows 7 Does Not Start or Fails to Boot After Force Shutdown
October 14, 2009 - 23:00 | Publisher Team Some users running 32-bit (x86) version of Windows 7 may face error where computer does not start up or cannot boot up again after computer is forced shut down. When user tries to restart the computer, the startup process stops at a black screen which infamously known as Black Screen of Death (BSoD). Computer is considered as forced shutdown when user presses the physical Power button on desktop or notebook computer to turn off the PC without properly shutdown the operating system via Start Menu Power Menu. Sudden shutdown can also happens when electricity is cut off, such as in the case of electricity current trip out or electrical power failure and outage. The Windows 7 unable to start or boot up error may also happen in a rare scenario where the power goes off when the computer is entering hibernation, especially in desktop computer where computer is entering sleep mode when the power button is pressed because hybrid sleep is enabled by default. The Windows 7 does not start problem occurs because of the following conditions:
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Data Execution Prevention (DEP) is disabled either in the BIOS or in the operating system. The system is configured to enter hibernation or to enter hybrid sleep mode when the power button is pressed. The language version of the operating system that you are running is a double-byte character set (DBCS) language. For example, you are running a Chinese, Korean, or Japanese version of Windows 7 on the computer.

Microsofts KB974719 provides a workaround to resolve the issue. Just insert a Windows 7, Windows Vista, or Windows Server 2008 installation DVD into the optical drive, and boot up the computer by using the DVD-drive. Then, reboot and start the computer in normal mode. For user who has a a Windows Preinstallation Environment (Windows PE) disc for Windows 7, its also possible to use the WinPE disc to start the computer. To avoid and prevent the problem from reoccurring, download and apply the following KB974719 hotfix update package to fix and patch the OS: