Laptop taking hours just to get to POST screen

[phawkhrua]

Hello,

Please note that I am NOT talking about the long Windows boot times encountered because of malware, registry problems, etc. This is even before the initial BIOS screen comes up.

An friend of mine had some problems with his Toshiba Satellite A305-S6905 laptop and took it to someone who re-installed Vista, but from the recovery partition (which he didn't know was there). Instead, he installed a pirated copy of Vista and didn't even activate it.

When my friend brought the laptop to me, he wanted me to get rid of the pirated Vista, install something legitimate and then set up anti-virus protection.

After I re-installed the original Vista from the machine's recovery partition, the machine started having problems starting up - most of the time, but not all of the time.

When the machine is turned on, the power light, "Satellite" light and touch buttons all light up but the screen stays black and nothing happens. However, if I just let the machine sit there like that, it DOES eventually (after a few HOURS) show the POST screen and then boot into Vista. The actual start-up and shut-down times of Vista are not slow, at all. The problem is only on power-up BEFORE Windows even starts - in fact, before POST even occurs.

I have even tried turning off hibernation, to see if it would make any difference, but it didn't.

Generally, I would suspect a hardware problem, but this was NOT happening until AFTER I had re-installed the legitimate Vista from the recovery partition.

One other difficulty is getting back into the BIOS setup, since I never know how long it will take for the POST screen to show and to have the option to enter setup, etc.

Any ideas?
Thanks!

 

[cbrunnem]

i had a problem like this once and it had to do with my external hard drive being hooked up while trying to start it because the boot sequence checked the usb ports first. so do you have anything hooked up to it?

 

[phawkhrua]

Nope. Have tried it with and without a USB, cellular modem. Didn't matter either way.

Have also tried what some people have said about removing the battery, etc., etc., etc., but when I plugged the power cord back in the machine still didn't start right away.

At first, it only seemed to be associated with "restarts" after having performed Windows updates (i.e. when I "shut down" instead of restarting, it would come up okay), but that may have been just coincidence, since it's still doing it, even when there are no updates in progress and even when I shut down.

 

[RetiredChief]

If you remove the Internal HDD and insert a win Install Disk in the DVD drive, Is post time still forever.

If this cures the long post time, You will probably have to wipe the disk and do a complete fresh install vs using the recovery method. Odd things happen when a Pirated windows is installed.

 

[phawkhrua]

No difference. Have also tried an external monitor and cycling through the ALT-F5 settings. Nothing.

In fact, I have also noticed that, after the last shut down that I did, I'm only getting the power lights but not the touch-button lights and the "Satellite" light only comes on for a second AND it has not booted since then.

Have also tried reseating and swapping the RAM - also to no avail.

UPDATE: Just now, all of a sudden, the machine booted up. Am almost afraid to turn it off. LOL! Problem still isn't solved, of course.

 

[Leopardson]

Hello,

Please note that I am NOT talking about the long Windows boot times encountered because of malware, registry problems, etc. This is even before the initial BIOS screen comes up.

An friend of mine had some problems with his Toshiba Satellite A305-S6905 laptop and took it to someone who re-installed Vista, but from the recovery partition (which he didn't know was there). Instead, he installed a pirated copy of Vista and didn't even activate it.

When my friend brought the laptop to me, he wanted me to get rid of the pirated Vista, install something legitimate and then set up anti-virus protection.

After I re-installed the original Vista from the machine's recovery partition, the machine started having problems starting up - most of the time, but not all of the time.

When the machine is turned on, the power light, "Satellite" light and touch buttons all light up but the screen stays black and nothing happens. However, if I just let the machine sit there like that, it DOES eventually (after a few HOURS) show the POST screen and then boot into Vista. The actual start-up and shut-down times of Vista are not slow, at all. The problem is only on power-up BEFORE Windows even starts - in fact, before POST even occurs.

I have even tried turning off hibernation, to see if it would make any difference, but it didn't.

Generally, I would suspect a hardware problem, but this was NOT happening until AFTER I had re-installed the legitimate Vista from the recovery partition.

One other difficulty is getting back into the BIOS setup, since I never know how long it will take for the POST screen to show and to have the option to enter setup, etc.

Any ideas?
Thanks!

Haha, this happened to me on a totally different computer. Sounds like your VISTA recovery killed your old BIOS when it ran, which is exactly what happened to mine.
It caused a loop in the BIOS which caused over 9000 errors it had to get past before it could go to POST.

You'll have to update or repair your BIOS.

How to do that depends on what motherboard you have and what kind of ports you have. I suggest you search the internet on how to do it in your case.

 

[phawkhrua]

Thanks for the suggestion, Leopardson. Tried this yesterday, but it still hasn't changed things. Great idea, though.

 

[Spencer76]

Hello, did you find a fix for this?

I have the exact same problem. The laptop takes a long time to get past POST, once past post its fine. Restarting is fine - its just once the laptop has been turned of it takes ages to get past post.