PC hanging forever prior to Password entry

I am trying to help a friend out, he's running W7HP 32bit anyway, recently when he starts his PC, it gets to the blue screen area (Not a BSOD) just before the time when the usual password entry prompt usually appears but instead it simply hangs there forever, with the status cursor (blue animated circle) revolving with the words: "Please wait...."

Firstly I figured he may have a large W7 update in the final stage of the install but usually there is white text giving the update progress/status. He claims that he has done nothing unusual or installed anything recently except for creating a Password recovery disk.

Could someone please run a few possibilities by me, as to why this might be happening?

I would appreciate it very much,
Thanks for your time & effort.

Thankyou, I'll look harder next time.