Help - Windows 10 black screen with hyphen in top left hand corner

Oddjob

Hi, when I switch my laptop on, I get a black screen, then the laptop logo flashes on for a few seconds then the screen goes black with just a cursor in top left hand corner.  I looked on Google for a solution but can only find how to fix black screen with cursor, they all say press control, alt, delete and task manager should come up but nothing happens when I do that.

I tried pressing F2 on the logo screen but nothing happened and the same when I pressed F12.

I think it happened after an update but not certain.

Any ideas please?

pbartlett

Google ' Windows 10 safe mode rollback update' and see if that helps

Oddjob

I tried that, it said to press F11, I did that but again, nothing happened.  I tried F12 again and this time I got it to come up with a Boot Menu  There is no open though to boot in safe mode.  The options are -

1: P1-Toshiba MK3263GSXN

2: P4-HL-DT-ST DUDRAM GT20N

3: Floppy

4: Realtex Boot Agent

Lower down on the screen it says   <Enter BIOS Setup>

Don't know what to do with that.

pbartlett

You are in to your computer bios you don't want to be there you need to be in windows 10 safe mode

ann_droid

Hi
Try POWER ON and press F8 to attempt to get to a repair screen.

You could actually have a dead/failed Hard Disk drive.

https://recoverit.wondershare.com/computer-problems/fix-toshiba-laptop-black-screen-on-startup.html


https://www.techradar.com/uk/how-to/how-to-start-windows-10-in-safe-mode
https://www.thewindowsclub.com/boot-windows-10-in-safe-mode

Swoosh84

Try restarting and pushing Shift+F8 on start up. Dependent on age of laptop this may take you to an options menu and allow you to boot into safe mode.

J

Oddjob

I'm not into anything at the moment, the power plug came out and the screen went off, I hadn't touched anything.

I have to go out so will have to try later but I couldn't get it to go into safe mode.

Oddjob

Swoosh84 said:

Try restarting and pushing Shift+F8 on start up. Dependent on age of laptop this may take you to an options menu and allow you to boot into safe mode.

J

Thank you, I have an appointment so have to go out, I will try this when I get back.

Swoosh84

Oddjob said:

Swoosh84 said:

Try restarting and pushing Shift+F8 on start up. Dependent on age of laptop this may take you to an options menu and allow you to boot into safe mode.

J

Thank you, I have an appointment so have to go out, I will try this when I get back.

No problem, with any computer problems a lot of it is trial and error:

- Try Shift+F8 to see if you can get into safe mode
- Try F11 next and selecting option 1, P1-Toshiba (this is your hard drive)

If neither of these works, it could be a hard drive failure, but given its shown up in the boot menu there is still hope. Next approach I would take would be a fresh install of Windows 10. You will need access to another computer though to download and put it on a USB drive. Alternatively, I see you have a CD rom on the laptop so if you have a Windows 10 install disk you can use this.

If they do work, update us here and we can advise on next steps.

J

A_Lert

This possibly means a corrupted Boot Loader. It can also occur if UEFI/BIOS settings are reset or changed, meaning Windows was set to do thing by method A and the computer is now trying method B so it doesn't work.

On another computer, create a Windows 10 installation USB stick. Boot your faulty laptop from this and choose Repair Your Computer . Attempt an automatic startup repair, and if that doesn't work there are some manual steps you can do.

https://www.microsoft.com/eb-gb/software-download/windows10

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/client-management/advanced-troubleshooting-boot-problems