Stuck @ HP Invent boot sceen

[Hi.Im.New]

Hello ladies/gents,

Well heres the issue:

My father has an HP desktop and a few days ago it will only load up to the HP INVENT boot screen. At this point it gives you the normal options of:
esc - boot menu , f1 - setup, f10-sys recovery. No matter what i press nothing happens its just perm stuck there not doing a thing. I've tried basic stuff such as unplugging all the usb/mouse/keyboard ports and booting with just monitor plugged in and nothing. Guys basically I'm looking to be pointed into the right direction. Do you guys believe this is an OS issue or mboard issue. As always your responses are most appreciated.

thnx,
hiimnew

 

[KSoD]

Go into the BIOS first by hitting F1 and check the information there. Does it recognize the hard drive. Does it show the informatoin about hte PC. Then check the boot order. Does it have the CD first then the hard drive.

Then try with just a XP CD inthe drive see what happens. IF everything still fails then i would say that your hard drive is dead. The mobo would be fine since it at least posts and get to the BIOS screen. It would be the hard drive at this point.

 

[Hi.Im.New]

Mak,

When i press f1, esc or f10 ... nothing happens it literally freezes at the screen. Thats why i was confused about how to tackle the problem. As in most things this is a totally new issue and im not sure what to do. Should i try to get a boot disk and see if it boots off that. Another thing is it doesnt seem to beep at boot.

 

[KSoD]

Open up the PC and reset the CMOS by removing the battery inside for 30 seconds. See if that does anything.

 

[Hi.Im.New]

Mak,

Just tried that and still same result...ehhh not sure what to do, pls advise.

thnx

 

[carnageX]

Did you make sure to unplug the power cord from the PC? You'll need to do that as well as removing the battery; you may also want to look up the motherboard specs on HP's website to see if you have to short the CMOS jumpers in order to clear it.

 

[KSoD]

Run MemTest86 as well.

Memtest86 - Download Page

 

[EricB]

Go into the BIOS first by hitting F1 and check the information there. Does it recognize the hard drive. Does it show the informatoin about hte PC. Then check the boot order. Does it have the CD first then the hard drive.

Then try with just a XP CD inthe drive see what happens. IF everything still fails then i would say that your hard drive is dead. The mobo would be fine since it at least posts and get to the BIOS screen. It would be the hard drive at this point.

follow this first. you have dead hardware inside somewhere, most likely the hdd.

 

[Hi.Im.New]

Actually heres a very random update... So my dad being the knucklehead he is was attempting random stuff, had the computer running and took the power input to the cd-rom and removed it and then replugged it with another input from the power supply and restarted. It then booted fine...So he thought he randomly fixed it and in turn when he restarted it again, it goes back to the blue screen HP invent screen. So it must be some short somewhere im guessing, im so confused about this and why it worked for 1 boot that i really dont know what to say. ON a side note... EricB when i get to the boot screen, f1 esc f10 ... none of those are read at all the screen is froze and i cant get to my bios or anything... thats really the whole issue. If i could i would a been able to manuver, but ive never been in this situation. Anyhoo , advice is recommended the memtest86 ill try but im not sure if ill even be able to try it since it seems to freeze at the boot screen.

 

[EricB]

When your computer is at the boot screen it test everything in the backgroup. failing hardware will make it through a lot, but if you can't get past it, something definitely is dead. the few times that this had happen to a computer that I worked on it was the hhd and one time it was a pc modem