Windows 10 finally booted to desktop after 4 hours of freezing on boot. What do I do so that this doesn't happen tomorrow?

Anonymous
2024-07-25T02:30:12+00:00

My computer restarted overnight (assuming from an update) and froze on the boot screen where it shows the motherboard logo. It's also been freezing at the 'Preparing Automatic Repair' screen about 9/10 times.

I've tried resetting the CMOS by unplugging the power cord and holding down the power button, but it didn't help.

The few times I managed to access the troubleshooting tools and the command prompt I tried the bootrec /fixboot commands but I ran into the problem of "Path not found" at the attrib c:\boot\bcd -h -r -s step. On the final restart before I was about to plug in the bootable USB to reinstall windows, it booted to desktop with everything working as normal.

I feel like this is only temporary and I'll run into the same problem the next time it restarts. What do I need to check/fix so that this problem doesn't happen again? Or do I just need to bite the bullet and do a fresh install of Windows?

(I'm not sure if this was due to my fiddling around but I now have 2 recovery partitions on my C drive, and an addition EFI System Partition on an external HDD.)

Windows for home | Windows 10 | Performance and system failures

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  1. Anonymous
    2024-08-03T04:46:03+00:00

    This will probably be the final update. After a lot of swapping components back and forth I’ve narrowed it down to the CPU.

    Thanks for all your help troubleshooting.

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  2. Ramesh Srinivasan 87,965 Reputation points Independent Advisor
    2024-07-30T13:24:54+00:00

    Hi Pasqetti,

    So the hard drive is good.

    Great, thanks for the update.

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  3. Anonymous
    2024-07-30T13:21:23+00:00

    Small update with what I managed to complete so far.

    Memtest86 completed successfully with no errors

    Attached C: and D: drive to an older PC, it booted to desktop as normal. C: passed chkdsk with no errors

    Transplanted GPU into older PC, it booted without any problems.

    All that’s left is to test the CPU, PSU and MOBO

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  4. Ramesh Srinivasan 87,965 Reputation points Independent Advisor
    2024-07-29T14:03:53+00:00

    Hi Pasqetti,

    I can't say for sure, but you may be right. These issues require extensive testing, and service centers test by dismantling the peripherals, checking for bad/bulged capacitors, checking the voltages, or swapping the motherboard to narrow down the issue.

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  5. Anonymous
    2024-07-29T12:44:42+00:00

    Could even be a mix of both. I’m running memtest86 at the moment. If that passes do you think that the motherboard is the most likely culprit over the CPU, GPU or PSU since it froze even with the OS drive disconnected and booting from the USB?

    I did start seeing boot freeze issues after a breaker tripped at my house, but they weren’t as bad as it is now. I wonder if it damaged some of the components at that time.

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