Windows 7 boot-up

Question

My Dell laptop running Windows 7 will not boot. I get the Dell logo, and the blue bar at the bottom fills in, but that is all. I was able to run ePSA pre-boot assessment thru F10 and all passed except cd- rom drive, which is empty and unused. Help, thank you

Answer 1

Please answer as many of these questions as you can.  Maybe I can advise you.

1. Laptop or Desktop
2. Age of computer
3. make/model
4. What processor is installed
5. Operating system installed (e.g. Windows 7)
6. 32 or 64 bit? (Right-click on Computer, choose Properties)
7. Service Pack 1 (SP1) installed? Same place as 5 above.
8. Capacity of disk drive, how much is in use?  Pie chart shown in Computer
9. Model number of hard drive (click Disk in Device Manager)
10. If Windows has ever been re-installed since it was new, when was that?
11. Age of hard drive if not the original
12. How much memory is installed? (Right-click on Computer, choose Properties)
13. Please list ALL installed programs.....
14. What security software is installed?
15. Is your internet service wireless or wired?

Answer 2

It is quite possible that you can recover the data yourself.  it is neither difficult nor expensive.  I cannot guarantee this, but I have used it many times quite successfully.

First you will need a piece of hardware.  it is a small external drive controller to which you connect your old drive to. Then connect its cable to a working PC.  If you are in luck, the working PC will see the old drive as just another external drive.  You should then be able to navigate to your data and copy it to the working computer.

The fact that the computer will not boot on the drive does not mean the data is gone.  

The hardware can be bought for about $27 Cdn.  That's about $20 USD

https://www.amazon.ca/UGREEN-Converter-Adapter-2-5-3-5Inch-Supports/dp/B016JTH8FA/ref=pd_rhf_ee_p_img_10?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=D38G7H0Y5CCPMG2D6XJG

Please let me know if you do this successfully

Answer 3

Thank you so much for your offer of help, but the issue is now moot.

I decided to take my computer to a local repair shop.

They said that my hard drive had crashed. So I authorized a new install of Windows 10 and a new SS hard drive. 

Unfortunately I have lost all of my previous data. I have the old drive but I have been told that data recovery specialists charge about $1500 to try to recover data. Although my data is valuable to me, it is not that valuable, so I will try to rebuild what I can of my address book and other items through phone contact etc.

Again, Thank you for your offer.

Vincent