Laptop stuck at startup after clean install.

Hey guys,

Here's an odd one for all you helpful folks.

Whilst my sister and family were away this weekend I offered to install Windows 7 Home Premium (x86) on her Toshiba Equium L40-10U laptop.
It was previously running Windows Vista Home Premium, however as it was infested with all kinds of nasties I figured I would kill two birds with one stone.

Anyway, I downloaded the ISO from Technet and burnt it to DVD, updated the BIOS on the laptop (worked fine) and proceeded to install Windows 7 (fresh, not upgrade, completely wiped and started from scratch).

Everything went fine, went through setup and logged on, Windows Update kicked in, perfect.
Had a play around and the machine was running like a dream, so I started installing stuff. As I didn't require ANY extra drivers I installed the RTM version of Microsoft Security Essentials first. I then moved on to Spybot - Search & Destroy etc.

When I restarted the machine it started to boot and got to the Starting Windows screen, however the Windows animation didn't appear, I waited, and waited, and nothing. Restarted again and it went to the Startup Repair option, did that, found nothing, restarted, and again it was stuck at the Starting Windows screen.

I rebooted and tried for Safe Mode, which very weirdly failed, it said loading and again just sat there.

Failing that I figured either bad install and/or bad burn. Re-dwonloaded ISO, burnt new DVD, reinstalled. Did the same again.

I decided I would give it a quick clean just to be safe, so I gave it a blast with some compressed air. Tried again, installed fine, Windows Update fine, first restart and it was dead again.

I have since tried installing without letting Windows Update connect, no joy, I then ran CrystalDisk to check the HD and that reported as all fine.
I'm going to leave it running Memtest overnight/overmorning and see what that says, whilst I download Windows Vista in the hope that if all else fails I can revert to that.

So, can anyone shed any light on this or offer me any help?
I apologise in advance for my lenghty/random post, I'm very tired and I know she'll demand a working laptop tomorrow as they 'can't do without the internet'...

Thanks in advance everyone.
BTW. Feel free to move this if you feel it is more relevant elsewhere.

Specs are as follows as it is not my machine:
Celeron M 1.6GHz
2GB RAM
80GB Toshiba HD
Intel GFX

Hi dazeon

1) Can you remove the drive.

2) install as slave to a PC runnig windows.

3) delete all partitions & format.

4) Then you will be installing on to a nice clean drive.

Thanks for the reply mate.

I've already done that though, several times, under Windows 7 setup.
Deleted the partitions and formatted the drive.
I don't want to remove the drive for fear of making matters worse.

I hate typing on the Touch HD.

Thanks mate, I'll give that a go.

I was/am worrying it was hardware related, especially as it's not mine and I'll get the blame...

Saying that it would seem odd that it would perform a clean install perfectly then boot and do Windows Update etc. if there were an underlying hardware issue.

Hopefully that might work as it was completely full of viruses, malware and junk.

I really must sleep now as it's 07:00 in the morning here, but please feel free to send me any fresh ideas or any more advice. :)

Sorry, I forgot to say that yes, I do have the full version of Windows 7.
It's a full version from my official Technet account.

Hi there

As I KEEP pointing out on these forums - before doing ANY work on a running PC - BACK IT UP. Even if has nasties etc at least you can give the machine back in the state you got it in.

Now the easy way to see if the HD is broken / needs formatting or whatever is just to create an ISO ( You've got a working machine) of either any live linux Cd distro or something like GPARTED.

Now boot from the live CD. If this boots then at least the machine is OK.

Try and re-format the HDD totally. If Gparted / Linux doesn't see your HDD then you need to open up the machine.

BTW most linux systems can format a disk with NTFS as well.

Using GPARTED to re format the disk is a good idea in any case as its based on an underlying Linux system so any pre-existing viruses etc on the hard disk will be removed. If you use a Windows based solution to clean the disk you might not get rid of everything. These viruses will just be data to a linux system and will be wiped by re-format the disk as the linux full format will essentially write Binary zeros on every sector. -- Don't do a QUICK format.

Incidentally in most laptops its very simple to change the HDD - they just unplug with no prob at all --space is a bit tight but its usually a simple job.

I replaced my stupid 80 GB drive with a nice faster 500GB drive. They only cost around 50 GBP / EUR.

Cheers
jimbo

Yeah, my bad, I really should have made a backup. I have no excuse really as I have a WHS.

I'm currently wiping the HD with Deban, so I'll see how that goes then try a Linux Live distro.