Cannot Get Past Windows 10 Loading Screen


  1. Posts : 13
    Windows 10
       #1

    Cannot Get Past Windows 10 Loading Screen


    Hi, I've had a really frustrating day trying to get my computer back up and running but I have very little technical knowledge to help me.

    I built the computer myself 4 years ago and it has been running fine in general; however, there have been times where it failed to initiate a boot when I pressed the main power button and I'd be forced to press the reset button to begin the boot sequence.

    Over the passed couple of days I had been receiving an occasional red screen warning about unauthorized changes I believe, but the computer still started. I know I should have taken note of the particular warning but, beyond reading it and failing to derive and significant meaning out of it I just hit okay the few times it appeared and everything worked.

    The computer has suddenly started taking a lot longer to boot up windows too, it went from maybe 40-45 seconds to close to two minutes on a couple of occasions in the past couple of days.

    Today, it refused to complete a boot. Here's what's happening, as best I can describe it. I turn on the computer and the Asus loading screen appears. I can enter my BIOS menu no problem and everything seems to be fine in there, there are no obvious warning signs, fans are working, CPU temperature is consistent etc.

    WHen it comes to loading my computer repeatedly comes to the windows loading screen, complete with little wheel turning, and stays there for 20 minutes or so. It then returns an error such as 'PNP watchdog error' (though there was another error brought up twice 'boot device not found'.

    Windows tries to launch automatic repair mode, same thing happens, 20 minutes with nothing changing and then tries to boot again and fails again. At no time do I get to a landing page or the option to launch in safe mode etc. just an endless cycle of failed windows loading, failed auto repair, and back to failed loading until I manually power it down.

    In trying to rectify the problem, my first hope was that it was my SSD boot drive. I removed it, cloned it on my laptop using AOMEI and tried the new SSD, unfortunately I got the exact same problem. I then settled to do a fresh install to fix the problem, made a flash drive from the laptop and then... it got stuck on the ASUS loading screen with the same little turning wheel underneath for 20 minutes before finally delivering a 'PNP watchdog error' back to me again.

    I'm at my wit's end and I'm hoping someone more knowledgeable than me can even tell me what the most likely problem is so I can go about fixing it as I'm completely out of ideas. If it's not the CPU, not the motherboard, not the SSD, and not the windows installation, what can it be? Should I remove the graphics card?

    Many many thanks to anyone who can shed any light at all for me.

    Ev
      My Computer


  2. Posts : 4,173
    Windows 11 Pro, 22H2
       #2

    If my understanding was correct, the system failed to boot even from the flash drive, correct?

    If that is the case, I would have to believe that there is a hardware problem of some sort.

    First - If that is not the case (that the system cannot even boot from the flash media) then I would start not by cloning your original drive, but by trying to perform a clean install on the other drive to see if a clean install will run okay. Obviously, that is going to require that the flash drive can boot okay as well.

    If true that you have problems with booting from flash drive, I would open up the system and reseat everything. This would include memory, all power connectors, etc. Basically anything not bolted down.

    I would also definitely verify that the CPU heatsink is on good and tight.

    You mentioned going into the BIOS and noted that everything looked good and temperatures were consistent. Aside from being consistent, are the temperatures reasonable or do they seem excesively high for a system sitting idle?

    One other thing to try - This will require some familiarity with BIOS settings. Skip if you are not comfortable with this. Go into the BIOS and note current settings (maybe snap some pics with a phone of the various screens )so you can easily get back to where you are you are should you need to do so. Then follow instructions in your user guide to clear the BIOS memory contents. Go back into your BIOS and there should be an option to set defaults. Choose this. Then modify any settings that you need to support your system or to run your preferences.
      My Computers


  3. Posts : 13
    Windows 10
    Thread Starter
       #3

    hsehestedt said:
    If my understanding was correct, the system failed to boot even from the flash drive, correct?

    If that is the case, I would have to believe that there is a hardware problem of some sort.

    First - If that is not the case (that the system cannot even boot from the flash media) then I would start not by cloning your original drive, but by trying to perform a clean install on the other drive to see if a clean install will run okay. Obviously, that is going to require that the flash drive can boot okay as well.

    If true that you have problems with booting from flash drive, I would open up the system and reseat everything. This would include memory, all power connectors, etc. Basically anything not bolted down.

    I would also definitely verify that the CPU heatsink is on good and tight.

    You mentioned going into the BIOS and noted that everything looked good and temperatures were consistent. Aside from being consistent, are the temperatures reasonable or do they seem excesively high for a system sitting idle?

    One other thing to try - This will require some familiarity with BIOS settings. Skip if you are not comfortable with this. Go into the BIOS and note current settings (maybe snap some pics with a phone of the various screens )so you can easily get back to where you are you are should you need to do so. Then follow instructions in your user guide to clear the BIOS memory contents. Go back into your BIOS and there should be an option to set defaults. Choose this. Then modify any settings that you need to support your system or to run your preferences.






    First - If that is not the case (that the system cannot even boot from the flash media) then I would start not by cloning your original drive, but by trying to perform a clean install on the other drive to see if a clean install will run okay. Obviously, that is going to require that the flash drive can boot okay as well.

    Thanks for the advice. I have since tried a completely fresh install as I have everything backed up anyway so repair isn't important. Now I am costantly getting 0x80300002 as an error code for why WIndows couldn't use that particular disk.

    The warning is as follows "We couldn't install windows in the location you chose. Please check your media drive. Here's more info about what happened: 0x80300002"

    I'm guessing at this stage it's a motherboard issue? I've tried across multiple disks, formatted them externally, formatted them internally, tried SSD and HDD and I keep getting the same error code. It looks like my computer can't communicate with the harddrives properly despite knowing that they're there.




    If true that you have problems with booting from flash drive, I would open up the system and reseat everything. This would include memory, all power connectors, etc. Basically anything not bolted down.

    I would also definitely verify that the CPU heatsink is on good and tight.

    You mentioned going into the BIOS and noted that everything looked good and temperatures were consistent. Aside from being consistent, are the temperatures reasonable or do they seem excesively high for a system sitting idle?

    One other thing to try - This will require some familiarity with BIOS settings. Skip if you are not comfortable with this. Go into the BIOS and note current settings (maybe snap some pics with a phone of the various screens )so you can easily get back to where you are you are should you need to do so. Then follow instructions in your user guide to clear the BIOS memory contents. Go back into your BIOS and there should be an option to set defaults. Choose this. Then modify any settings that you need to support your system or to run your preferences


    The temperature is 31 Cel, not fluctuating at all, which is what it's always been. I've checked and everything seems very secure. Heatsink is definitely on tight. Plugged out, plugged in where possible, and have reset all BIOS to factory settings, and still not getting any joy...
      My Computer


  4. Posts : 1,604
    Win 10 home 20H2 19042.1110
       #4
      My Computers


 

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