Really strange Win 10 problem. Ever run into this?

[NJW]

New SSD $80
Install Win 7 $250
Install Win 10 $80

I see you've mastered nudge theory!

 

[wavey]

Did you try a BIOS upgrade?
I had an ASUS laptop last week where the AMD graphics drivers would only work on W10 up to 1709, a BIOS update fixed it.

 

[Porthos]

I see you've mastered nudge theory!

Yes but time is money. I basically feel my "bench" time is worth $80hr. I can do 10 in an hour or less. Last time I did Win 7 it was 3+ hours. Even though I am flat rate except for data transfer that exceeds 40 gigs, I calculate Bench cost at the $80hr. Got to take into consideration heat/cooling of the workshop, electricity to run the computer and lights. Also have to cover the different costs for other things like webhosting and other monthly/yearly fees.

 

[ComputerRepairTech]

Deja Vu: https://www.technibble.com/forums/threads/intel-hd-graphics-driver-nightmare.81099/

 

[HFultzjr]

Hi folks,

I had a Toshiba laptop come in that wasn't booting. Was giving a black screen and eventually gave an error that the BCD was messed up. Pulled the drive and found it had a ton of bad sectors. I installed a new SSD, did a new Win 10 install of 1809 from a USB drive. Installed drivers and updates and rebooted.

After the reboot, it goes to the Windows logo with the white spinning circle, and then goes to a black screen. (no mouse cursor or anything, nothing on the screen at all, its as if its stuck between the boot process and showing the login screen or desktop)

What really strange, if I press the power button and put it to sleep, then wake it up, it works perfectly! I can log in and have no other issues, unless I restart or shut it down. When I boot it back up, it has the same issue.

Anyone run into something like this before?

Are you removing the USB Drive?
I recall something similar a while back that required I remove the USB after install 1st re-boot.
Even though USB was not 1st boot order.
Just pulled it when it started to reboot after install, then finished the process.

 

[Sky-Knight]

I'm going to parrot the BIOS update thing again... because I have an HP 15 on my bench right now that pulled this stunt. Windows 8.1 originally, upgraded itself to 10, I get it for "clean up" the thing is still running 1607. So I update it to 1803 and two reboots later the LCD doens't work. Plug in an external monitor, update the BIOS and reboot, and LCD is fine.

UPDATE YOUR FIRMWARE, make it part of your standard practices. These Intel Microcode changes are no joke... And this HP 15? It's based on an AMD APU, so even those are impacted!

Oh, and OS installs are flat rated at 1 hour, $80 for me. BUT, Windows 7 is now "out of support" for me, so if someone needs it, they'll pay for 3 hours. Too much time to get that mess going again, for what? 1 more year of support? Not worth it...

 

[HFultzjr]

Any of these help?

http://www.catalog.update.microsoft.com/Search.aspx?q=Intel+hd+3000+windows+10

 

[fincoder]

The OP is ignoring a likely solution: BIOS upgrade.

Yes it seems odd that a BIOS update could fix what looks like a Windows 10 graphics driver issue, but I've seen it happen. It's caused by a Windows 10 update combined with a driver in conjunction with a certain older BIOS version. The only problem is whether Toshiba has a BIOS update available for that model.

 

[Porthos]

Toshiba has a BIOS update available for that model.

Usually even the latest if newer than the one installed can fix things even if it is not "a real current"one.

 

[Sky-Knight]

I think there's something strange going on with the specter patches, MS does something, and Intel / AMD does something else, and back and forth. I've run into several units with extremely strange behavior that starts after an arbitrary windows update, and every single unit after a BIOS update goes out and stays out.

So basically, while I cannot say with complete certainty, I think there are incompatible combinations of firmware and OS going on here. I've seen screens go dark for no reason, I've seen SSDs stuck at 100% drive utilization, I've seen Windows BSODs, on one box the blasted optical drive wouldn't work. All of them resolved with a firmware update in the last year.

So regardless of anything else or even reason anymore, I firmware update first because at least I can get it out of the way.

 

[PcTek9]

There is definitely a lot of strange mojo out there right now.

 

[NJW]

Yes but time is money. I basically feel my "bench" time is worth $80hr.

Oh, I agree with what you say – Win7 takes forever, even with WSUSOffline doing the heavy lifting. My prices reflect the difference, too. It was just amusing to see the two prices presented for customer choice.

 

[Porthos]

It was just amusing to see the two prices presented for customer choice.

One of the posters said the customer should be able to choose and I let them. Home break/fix users do not care about updates and support, only how much it will cost them NOW.