BIOS message then black screen and flashing curser when booting

Hi all, trying to help my son who lives about 200 miles away.

He has a MSI z97 gaming 5 motherboard.

when he tried to boot yesterday, just the bios screen flashing up followed by black screen with flashing cursor at top left.

Pressing the space bar doesn’t move the cursor.

He tried changing to the internal graphics card, he changed the setting from [PEG] to [IGD] (integrated graphics display) in bios and moved HDMI cable from his pci express card to the internal HDMI port, same thing happened.

The MB has led error codes on it, which were displaying between 50 and 54.

The manual says “1D~2F,31,3F~4E,50~55 Early Memory Initialization”

so obviously suspected RAM.

I got him to remove both sticks from slots 2 and 4 and try one stick in slot 1 (also did this in the other 3 slots), went straight into bios, he selected the default bios but exactly the same problem.

He tried the other stick but it power cycled, never getting into bios. I got him to try the stick in one other slot, same thing, press power button, keeps posing off and on again.

so went back the first RAM chip, this went straight into bios again.

I got him to remove power and remove MB battery, again selecting default bios he gets flashing cursor and error codes between 50 and 54.

so I suggested he go to CEX and buy a couple of RAM chips (sent him screenshot of correct ones) as they’re only £4 each for 4GB.

He’s just put them into slots 2 and 4 (the manual recommended those for dual Chanel mode) has gone into bios and selected default, but sadly exactly the same thing is happening, it did initially show code 48 before going and staying on 50.

He tried changing from internal back to external graphics, same thing.

Any suggestions please, very hard to diagnose over the phone, don’t know the windows version as it won’t boot but he does keep it up date.

many thanks

Hi Paul,

1) No
2) Yes
3) He hasn't and hasn't got a caddy.

I think I'll send him a usb pen with Linux on it to see if he can boot into that

Don't know if it's relevant, he's just sent me a message, when he tries to boot of Gforce card the BIOS screen looks fine, when he tries with the internal graphics, it's got loads of red speckles as per the right half of the attached picture.

Thanks

Thanks Paul

I sent him two USB sticks, one with Linux and one with windows 10 installation on.

He’s just sent me a message to say when he swaps the boot device, he gets a message saying

“Reboot and select proper boot device, or insert boot media in selected boot device and press any key”

I presume this is a good sign in that either the boot loader needs repairing or at worst he needs a new C drive and reinstall Windows (all his data is on his D drive). His installation dvd is with me unfortunately so no way to get into command prompt to repair it, I’ll go through it with him when he receives my usb sticks tomorrow and will keep you informed.

If it works, I’ll make sure everything is up to date.

thanks for all your help

Try3 said:

Do post back to report what happens so that others can benefit in the future.


I suggest you make the always-annoying suggestion that he needs to check that he has put everything back the way it was before he started trying to fix the problem ...
... and then boot from either of the bootable USBs you sent him [I assume you booted from them to test them before posting them].


Best of luck,
Denis

Hehe that’s the trouble doing it long distance, he will tell me it’s back the way it was, hopefully it is, but no way of really knowing.

Booted my PC into Linux, and as far as the Windows install/repair screen, so both should be OK

I’ll keep you informed.

- - - Updated - - -

Paul Black said:

Hello @Ojustaboo,







In my opinion, that is always a good idea. It NOT only separates the OS and Data, but also makes it easier to JUST backup all your personal data.

<snip>

Many many thanks, very helpful info.

I installed his system about 6 years ago, I sadly think I had both drives connected when I did. If he needs to reinstall, I will make sure the D drive is disconnected.

- - - Updated - - -

Ok, boots into Linux fine.

tried booting into windows normally afterwards, no joy.

We get to the command line from the windows install stick, and can access both his disks fine.

bootrec /rebuildbcd worked totally fine

bootrec /fixmbr and bootrec /fixboot Both give access denied.

He’s in a meeting now but I’ve asked him to unplug one of the drives, boot into command line and check it’s his system disk not his data disk, and obviously if it isn’t, plug back in and remove other one, then phone back later, so that as per Paul’s advice, his data disk is totally safe.

will now Google how to get around access denied problem.

Didn’t want to play with diskpart with his data disk still connected, will go through What Paul said when I speak to him again.

will keep you updated

- - - Updated - - -

All fixed by doing the following from the command prompt

bcdedit /export C:\BCD_Backup

C:

cd boot

attrib bcd -s -h -r

ren c:\boot\bcd bcd.old

bootrec /rebuildbcd

Replied yes to a message along the lines of “do you want this written to your E drive”. ( E is his system drive)

shutdown , removed usb stick restarted and it went straight into windows.

many many thanks