Blackest Screen of Death?

Hello you sexy, sexy smart people.

I'm not a tech noob by any means, but ... most of said experience is with XP. Ive beaten back a foe or two when proper error screens came in color, but I seem to have encountered a problem that the net hasn't addressed yet ... or it's just got me so frustrated I can't tell the difference between a hardware/software fail ...

Here are the facts:

HP Pavillion P6230y
W7 Home Premium x64
amd phenom II x4 810
8gb ddr3
ati radeon hd4200
750gb seagate h.d.
pci-e 16x dell monitor
stock keyboard and mouse
This is a stock desktop cpu, no equipment being changed in or out, no dual boots or separate OS installations.

For no apparent reason thus far, the machine cannot load past a white flashing cursor on a black screen. The load-up process inconsistently starts with 1. boot diagnostic screen 2. occasionally goes to a blue HP start (esc=boot drives; f9=diagnostic; f10=setup; f11=recovery) 3. raid devices 4. hangs at cursor, sometimes going black, then back to the cursor.

Surely there must be a way to fix this?

1. Start it in Safe Mode or Recovery Mode!
Tried, but hitting the f6/f8/ f11/del/f2/shift keys at start-up are unresponsive.

2. Run the diagnostic!
Fails when testing the boot path (if not further along, as well). Error code: "BIOHD-4 - Uninitialized/Corrupt Boot Structure Detected". Similar to this case, but ... Vista can be fixed?

3. Boot from a disc, run a chkdsk or fixboot!
Tested W7 home pre disc will not boot. Hitting 'esc' successfully brings up the boot menu, but goes straight to BSOD regardless.

4. Did you get into the BIOS Set-Up and make sure the disc drive is initializing before the HD?
Yes, and still the only way to prompt the "insert a disc/hit key to restart" screen is by deactivating the HD port. Not very useful, and I'm starting to get worried...

I don't hear any beeps or noises at start-up to indicate a hardware problem. But still ... Is this a dead drive? A fried motherboard? Software based?

I've been a loudmouth about how great Windows7 has been ... Experts, I implore you ... don't leave me yearning for previous OS's and that familiar blue screen!

Adam

Hi severed, thanks. I dig yr warlock, I've got a wh revenge bass (but that usually only comes out around halloween).

This machine was purchased from a big-box store, and as such came with no disc. Only the as-yet hypothetical "recovery console". I believe I also neglected to mention in the previous post that this machine has been cleanly working (more or less) flawlessly for over a year.

Initial booting was done with a ... 'procured' copy of w7 home premium x64. Tested and verified on another machine. As that's clearly not proper troubleshooting, I tracked down a friend with a full retail copy. Still goes to cursor, unless hd is deactivated. The disc drive does light up, sounds like it's moving. I will see if I can track down an appropriate HP version.

A corrupt mbr? I haven't taken any walks through the registry ... or is that located in the motherboard or CMOS?

Again, infinitely grateful for any help.

Thanks again, severed.

In the next few hours I will purchase an as-near-identical drive to swap into the machine. This seems like the next/only step. I'm not even opposed to wiping the drive and doing a clean install ... but I'm uncertain of how to do that without the capability to initialize from a disc.

And to answer possible forthcoming questions - Yes, everything seems to be mechanically connected properly, and No, unfortunately I don't have the system capability to boot from a USB either.

Sigh...

Hello Again.

Problem still unresolved.

A new, clean HD has been placed into the machine. Recognized by the bios, still going to the blackest screen of death. Interestingly, the old hard-drive was placed into an xp x64 machine as a second drive, and not only was it instantly recognized, but all of the data was perfectly intact!

I've tried a horde of w7 installation/reboot discs on both of these drives. Nothing recognizes/initializes. Just as I was about to give up (utterly), I accidentally placed an XP sp2 Dell disc into the machine ... and it boots for both drives.

Granted, this isn't very useful on a W7 HP machine. It runs through the common files for a few minutes until "starting windows", where it goes to a wonderful and familiar blue screen of death. Again, hardly unexpected, as this is a dell disc in an hp machine...

Which brings me to my final point. Regardless of whatever happened to this machine that's still undetermined, my biggest aggravation here is seemingly the dumbing-down of repair functionality. I'm not sure where blame for this lies, but common sense says it's shared ground between some of W7's less-than-admirable changes and what conceivably appears to be a fierce proprietary blockade on HP's part.

A proper OS repair/installation disc should have been included in the purchase, as the "recovery console" seems to utterly worthless. Does anyone else think I may have to break down and purchase an actual official "recovery disc" from HP specifically suited to this model?

-Adam

Hello again, the internet.

Problem still unresolved. Apologies for the delay, but my overnight-ed set of recovery discs from HP were lost for two weeks by FedEx. Should I ever fix this issue, I will be summarily be eaten by a flaming lion, being struck by lightning.

I suspected the 'suspect' drive wasn't the culprit when I plugged it in as a secondary and all the data was fine. Partially loading from it confirms it.

Furthermore, after installing a new drive and pulling install files from the 3 discs, it restarts & goes to the blackest screen with flashing cursor when attempting to load them(?).

I am currently trying to use this tutorial already provided by sevenforums to run a fixmbr/fixboot/fixanything ... but am ashamed to say ... I can't figure out how to boot to command prompt? I know DOS is gone (don't understand why...) but can't get past a wall of HP screens.

Basically, I boot on the 'old' drive - i am forced to shuttle between five frustrating discs. After finally getting to the menu which probably should have a 'boot' command on it, I'm left with 5 commands:
1. Run Computer Check-Up - Hardware Diagnostic Utility by PC Doctor (passed, useless)
2.Microsoft Start-Up Repair (goes through it, black screens)
3. Restore to a Previous State (inapplicable)
4. File backup program (inapplicable)
5. Reset & Erase Drive (nooooo thank you)

Am I missing something?

Well, well, well.

This issue has been solved. Determined to be a W7 problem, exacerbated by HP redtape.

After booting into BS proprietary HP recovery console, have your cat stand on alt + d - this will bring up the command prompt.

From there, delete the BCD, rebuild the BCD, run FixMBR, run FixBoot. Act like nothing ever happened while setting up a recovery partition...

3 cheers to SeveredSolo for his help. I truly appreciate your seemingly universal support for problems small and large. I owe you a drink!

Adam