Laptop frozen at splash screen (Sony Vaio)

[francisroyston]

Hi - I wounder if anybody can help.

My daughter has been given a Sony Vaio laptop (faulty) and it will not load past the Splash Screen.

I can sometimes get into the BIOS by hitting the Esc key and it will sometimes load the Windows screen but then freezes at that point.

Anybody any ideas what could be the problem?

Thanks
Francis

 

[Route44]

Can you disable the splash screen in the BIOS?

 

[francisroyston]

Hi - Thanks for your reply.

I have real problems getting into the BIOS, only been able to get into it a couple of times in them same number of days (but I will keep trying).
By hitting the 'Esc' key I can always get to the POST screen but it hangs there.
Sometimes hitting F10 gets me to the Boot Options and if I opt for Boot with Hard drive it will start loading Windows. At this point it will usually freeze but on occasion it has got me into Windows.

 

[francisroyston]

Sony Vaio Frozen

HI - As I type (on another computer) I have manged to get into Safe Mode.

I have just been mooching around in Safe Mode and had a look in the event viewer. I notice there is an Event ID 7026 'the following boot start or system start drivers failed to load' and then it lists 13 files i.e. AFD, Intelppm, IPSec.

Could these be missing important drivers?
I can also see that Windows XP Service Pack 2 is installed - should I load Service Pack 3?

 

[Route44]

Yes and yes to your questions (but hold off on SP3 at this point). I am wondering if the OS has been corrupted OR that the harddrive itself might be physically damaged.

Find the make of your harddrive and go to the manufacture's website. They will have a free harddrive diagnostics utility that you can burn to a CD. Take the CD and place it in the laptop drive and reboot. The diagnostic disk should engage. Make sure you do both short and long tests.