# [SOLVED] Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup



## Stokes52 (Nov 4, 2007)

Hi all, I have a problem that I hope you guys can answer.

When I start up my computer, it goes through its normal startup process, it shows the Windows XP Pro logo and the welcome screen and it even loads my Windows XP desktop. Then, about 5-10 seconds after Windows XP loads, I get a black screen, (However Windows is still running), and then in another 10 seconds my computer reboots and starts the process over again.

Strangely enough, I can reboot in Safe Mode (Which I'm using now), and I can reboot in VGA Enabled mode, both of which work perfectly fine. Also, suspecting maybe my video resolution or something got messed up to something my monitor or video card couldn't handle, tried upping the resolution in VGA mode, and of course it worked fine, so that isn't the problem.

I've been searching around the internet, and many people have indicated that bad video card drivers might be the problem, so I've uninstalled my GeForce 6800 GS video drivers and reinstalled them, with no luck, which I'll explain some more. When I uninstalled my drivers, windows loaded up normally, everything okay. Then, I proceeded to reinstall my drivers and reboot, my problem was back to normal, black screen 5-10 seconds after XP starts. This seems to indicate my video drivers/card is the problem, but if reinstalling them doesn't fix the problem, what will?

Also, I have been using my GeForce 6800 GS for over a year now with no problems, so I KNOW it works on my system. I've tried everything I can think of and now I'm beginning to wonder if my video card has died on me, but if that happend wouldn't I not be able to see anything? Either way, I don't wanna dish out at least another ~$200 for a video card if that isn't the problem


One site I found seemed to outline my problem exactly but you need to PAY to see the answer! :upset:
http://www.experts-exchange.com/Operating_Systems/WinXP/Q_22100373.html


Any help would be appreciated, I've done everything I can think of...


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## Old Rich (May 31, 2007)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*

Hello . . and welcome to the forum . . the solution there was using the "next to newest" drivers . . which version are you using? It it's in the 160 series, try the 140 series to see if the problem persists


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## Stokes52 (Nov 4, 2007)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*

Tried reinstalling both old and new drivers, tried installing it using their installers, tried installing it using automatic "Found New Hardware", tried installing it manually from "Add New Hardware", tried it on old and new drivers, still same problem.

I can boot into Windows normally if no driver is installed, but as soon as a restart my computer with a driver installed it goes back to the same problem: Stays in windows for about 10 seconds, black screens, restarts.

Also, if it helps at all, its a PNY Verto Nvidia GeForce 6800 GS, and I think the driver numbers are different from your examples, because I see driver versions 61.76, 77.30, 77.77, and 81.95,(All of which I tried to install) so I'm not sure what you mean about 140 and 160 series. The gist of it was "install old drivers", but like I said, that didn't seem to work.

Thanks for the quick reply


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## Old Rich (May 31, 2007)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*

Try one of the newer nVidia drivers from the nVidia download site


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## Stokes52 (Nov 4, 2007)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*

Well... the plot thickens...

I installed those drivers, and as usual, upon restart it loaded XP and blackscreened a few moments later, however this time it took about 20 seconds to load everything (For the hourglass cursor to go away) before finally it black screened. This was a little different so I left it alone and let it do its thing and I managed to just barely see a blue screen which dissappeared after about 5 seconds but I was able to read some of it and it said something similar to(not exactly, it was too fast) "Windows was stuck in a continuous loop and was shut down to avoid system damage, the problem seems to be in the file "nv4_disp", if this is the first time you've seen this message, restart..."(And here the blue screen went away and my computer tried to restart, back into its loop, so I couldn't read the rest).

I did a search for nv4_disp, and a lot of files came up, most of them had last been modified in 2004 or 2003. Some were found on the installation CD that came with my card, (Which is still in the drive), some were also found on my hardrive in my C:\Nvidia\ folder, and it looks like there are a few that are simply copies or shortcuts of each other.

The extensions I saw were .cat, .dll, .dl_, .inf, and one .PNF, with the beginning of all of them being "nv4_disp".

My guess is either these are other drivers that got installed with my CD, (The CD that came with my card doesn't just contain drivers for my card, it contains drivers for all of the company's cards, or at least more than one). OR, they are leftover drivers from my old old Nvidia Geforce 4 video card that I used to have installed oh so many years ago. Not sure why they would be there though, since I've reformatted / reinstalled windows at least once from that time, and I KNOW they've been uninstalled, and like I said, I haven't had any problems / conflicts till just today.

Just brainstorming, so I doubt any of my above assumtions are correct... Any other thoughts would be great


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## Bookworm99 (Jun 5, 2007)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*

It sounds - to me - like something in your startup items is causing this... 

Boot into Safe Mode, go to Start > Run and type in 'msconfig' (no quotes). One of the tabs should say startup, click it. Uncheck anything not from Microsoft; unless it seems absolutely nessescary to have it. Reboot, and see if it works.


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## t-mpg (Oct 15, 2007)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*

Perform a syscheck in safe mode.

Put in your windows cd. in safe mode start a command terminal and trype sfc /scannow

hope that works for you.

(By the way that just reinstalls any missing or corrupted system files.)


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## t-mpg (Oct 15, 2007)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*



Bookworm99 said:


> It sounds - to me - like something in your startup items is causing this...
> 
> Boot into Safe Mode, go to Start > Run and type in 'msconfig' (no quotes). One of the tabs should say startup, click it. Uncheck anything not from Microsoft; unless it seems absolutely nessescary to have it. Reboot, and see if it works.


That isn't very good advice. It's pretty easy to do more damage than good from there, and anyway thats normally a fix for a speed issue, or stopping certain malware processes from running.


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## Stokes52 (Nov 4, 2007)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*



> It sounds - to me - like something in your startup items is causing this...


Well, yeah... I think the evidence points to the fact that whenever the video card loads up, everything stops working. Thats why I can log into Safe Mode and VGA mode, because it doesn't use the higher processes of the video card. When I try to log into regular windows, everything loads up fine for a few seconds till, (I suspect), it loads up the video card drivers. Then it crashes.

Thats my take on what the problem is, but I'm hardly a tech guy, so thats just my interpretation of whats going on based on common sense, not any actual hardware knowledge.

I'll take a look at those two suggestions above, but I'm not going to go unchecking everything I see because that really just doesn't make sense and it doesn't actually fix the problem because disabling a bunch of things, (If it works), just tells you ONE of those things isn't working, it doesn't actually tell you whats wrong.

Anyways thanks for the replies guys!


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## Stokes52 (Nov 4, 2007)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*

Okay so I put my Windows XP Proffesional CD in, ran cmd.exe and typed in "sfc /scannow" and it said:

"Windows file protection could not initiate a scan of protected system files. The specific error code is 0x000006ba [The RPC server is unavailable]"

Not sure if I did that right... Either way, I don't think windows being corrupted is the issue, although you never know. Its always something to consider I guess...

Keep those solutions coming guys, I need my computer back! :tongue:


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## Bookworm99 (Jun 5, 2007)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*

OK. Well, I'd agree, by now it seems pretty obvious that there's nothing wrong with Windows in particular. The only other thing I can suggest, if you don't want to at least try disabling the Startup items, is to uninstall all your NVidia drivers. Can you give us a list of the items that appear in the startup area?


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## Stokes52 (Nov 4, 2007)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*

Here's my startup items list:


> SOUNDMAN
> hpztsb04
> hphmon03
> Hpi_monitor
> ...


*This file is weird, there is no text for command or startup item but there is a location:HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run



Also there is a startup item that is NOT checked, but it looks kinda suspicious to me, the name is "pokapoka79" and the command is C:\WINDOWS\\\etb\\pokapoka79.exe and the location is SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run. I dunno just looked weird to me is all



Also, I tried uninstalling anything and everything related to Nvidia, their folders, support programs, everything, and then reinstalling the Nvidia drivers from the web. Same error.

I'm beginning to wonder if its a hardware problem with my Video Card, but the reason I'm skeptical about that is the problem is so consistent. Most hardware problems are intermittent, with it working here and not working there, or it simply not working at all, but my problem is 100% the same every time any drivers are installed, and it works 100% when drivers are not installed. Doesn't that point away from hardware and more into a software problem or could it mean that only a small part of the video card is broken, which is why I can still *use* it in safe mode and stuff?


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## dai (Jul 2, 2004)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*

in the device manager uninstall the video card
reboot tapping f8 and choose vga mode
when windows finishes booting
disable a/virus
install your drivers
reboot the computer
as far as your startups go i would recommend all ms and anti virus
the rest are just slowing down you boot speed
you can always start the rest as you need them instaed of auto starting on boot
go into services and start your rpc server


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## Stokes52 (Nov 4, 2007)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*

Sorry, internet was down for a few days. Anyways, I fixed the problem, oddly enough, by just reseating the card, uninstalling drivers, and reinstalling them from the CD, over and over till once it actually worked.

I'm really stumped. If it didn't work the first time, (or the second time), why would it work after the 3rd or 4th time? haha.

Anyways thanks so much for all your guys help, it got me off on the right foot to get my problem fixed.


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## dai (Jul 2, 2004)

*Re: Windows XP Pro - Blank Screen After Startup*

for future reference
as for what was posted above
unticking all the boxes gives you a fast check if it is one of the items causing the problem
you find out which one by reticking the boxes one at a time until the problem reappears
then if you no longer need that item you uninstall it
if you do you reinstall and if it still causes a problem you leave it unticked and start it manually as you require it
glad to see you have it fixed probably a dirty contact and putting it in and out of the slot cleaned it up


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