Windows 7 fails to start, startup repair and safe mode don't work

Hi!

A few days ago, when I turned on my laptop, it said "Windows failed to start. A recent hardware or software change might be the cause." I tried solving the problem via installation disc and Repair your computer, but Startup repair doesn't seem to do anything (ran it twice), System restore can't find a point from which to restore and Refresh your PC also doesn't do anything. By the way, every operation in Repair your computer takes really long, about one or two hours.

Also, I can't get into safe mode as pressing the f8 (or f5) button ends in beeping and command prompt starts with x:\sources instead of c:\windows so safeboot minimal/network doesn't work.

I've also tried using explorer.exe to copy the most urgent files to usb flash drive but it doesn't show the files from c:.

Any ideas?

Thanks and best regards.

There are indications that you are having a hard drive problem. That would explain the long repair times, as it keeps running chkdsk, and also the inability to see C:. Defaulting to X: rather than C: is fine as long as you can navigate to C:. I would use a diagnostic disk (such as GSmartControl, Seatools, or the drive maker's utility) on the drive, or pull the drive and run diagnostics on it on another machine via USB adapter.