Gateway NE56R41U W8 Takes over 1 hour to boot

[Mista-J]

Hello - First time poster, but have used these forums for years!
I have this gateway laptop and am not sure what to do next.

When i power it up, it takes well over an hour to get to the log in screen. Once i get there, everything seems to function good.
I have Refreshed the system and applied all the updates - fully to Windows 8.1 and it still is not working properly.

My only attempt to access the bios did not work - i tapped F2 for a minute or so but that is a drop in the bucket when it takes 90 minutes to start!

any advice appreciated.

 

[Clayto1332]

Your hard drive might be going out. Back up anything important you have right away. Then try running a full scan using this utility:

http/www.majorgeeks.com/mg/get/western_digital_data_lifeguard_tools,1.html

 

[Mista-J]

The hard drive tests fine... read, write and smart.
any other thoughts?

 

[Clayto1332]

Does it take the same amount of time to boot when booting into safe mode? If it boots right up into safe mode that means you have a program booting up with Windows that is causing the problem.

 

[Mista-J]

it does take the same amount of time to boot into safe mode... ugh so frustrating

 

[Clayto1332]

Next step might be to reinstall Windows 8 if you are sure your hard drive is okay. You can find an ISO image of Windows 8 here (for now):

https/userscloud.com/rqk8hut8629o

Download and find an ISO burning program to burn. You should be able to UEFI boot to the dvd and go through the steps to do a clean install.

Needless to say, backup your stuff first and maybe find your network drivers from your laptop from the manufacturer beforehand.