Win10: Can't boot, can't repair, can't launch safe mode

[Craig R]

Have had a weird problem at the weekend getting the blue screen of death.

It tries to do a start-up repair, then says it has been unable to do so.

If I try to launch in safe mode, or any of the other launch options, I get caught in the same loop.

If I try to repair, it fails. If I try a system restore, it fails due to an unknown error.

I managed to get it to boot eventually by using the "reset this PC" option where it put a fresh install of Windows on, meaning I need to reinstall everything. Thankfully before I started to do this long and painful process, I powered off and back on, and found that I was right back in the same loop again failing to start windows.

I've did another PC reset, got in again, and instead of shutting down last night put it into to sleep mode. When I woke up my PC had already woken itself back up and was again hanging on the blue error screen.

When startup repair tells me it couldn't repair my PC it says there is a log file in: E:\Windows\System32\Logfiles\Srt\SrtTrail.txt

I don't even have a windows folder on my E: drive, it is on the C: drive. Why would it put it in there?

So confused. Anyone know what the cause of this could be? I've checked the health of my SSD C drive and it has been given the all clear.

 

[Orcvader]

Full system specs? Returned any overclock settings back to stock?

Could be faulty memory? Did you run a mem test?

And it does rarely happen, but checked the SATA mode in BIOS in case it flipped to something else like IDE/RAID instead of AHCI? Or whatever you had it set before.

 

[Craig R]

i5 3570
16gb DDR3 Ram
Gigabyte motherboard
1 x 250gb SSD
2 x 1tb drives
Nvidia GTX 1070 gpu
Gold rated 650w PSU

Nothing overclocked

Did a memory check last night before the latest fail. Didn't show any errors.

I'll check the bios when I get home, although I'm not sure what it was set at to begin with.

 

[Craig R]

I ended up getting a brand new motherboard, processor and RAM, and doing a clean install of windows 10, removing all user files, starting totally afresh.

All looking good. Run the latest windows update. Reboot and boom, straight back into the blue screen of death error C000021A. Checked the hard drive for errors, nothing showing up. Completely baffled, it's pretty much a completely new PC, how the??

 

[Hades]

I had something similar with my daughters PC at the weekend. It would sit at the blue Windows 10 loading screen with the little spinning circle. I tried a Linux Live USB stick which also failed to boot but did give me a clue. A lot of the errors it was throwing were related to SATA devices. So I tried the Linux USB boot with each of her hard drives unplugged in turn. It booted when I unplugged one of the SSD's, indicating it was faulty. I then tried connecting that SSD to another machine and it failed to boot. So the SSD was clearly FUBAR.

I replaced her SSD and reinstalled everything. It now runs fine.

Yours could be the same. Are you able to try a different hard drive/SSD?

 

[Craig R]

I had something similar with my daughters PC at the weekend. It would sit at the blue Windows 10 loading screen with the little spinning circle. I tried a Linux Live USB stick which also failed to boot but did give me a clue. A lot of the errors it was throwing were related to SATA devices. So I tried the Linux USB boot with each of her hard drives unplugged in turn. It booted when I unplugged one of the SSD's, indicating it was faulty. I then tried connecting that SSD to another machine and it failed to boot. So the SSD was clearly FUBAR.

I replaced her SSD and reinstalled everything. It now runs fine.

Yours could be the same. Are you able to try a different hard drive/SSD?

Seems like it's about the only thing left that could be causing it (it does the same when I disconnect the GPU and just use the on-board graphics), however it's weird that it works fine up until running the latest Windows 10 update.

 

[wolfie138]

seems a very common issue if you google that error number. i'd recommend you go looking/asking on tenforums.