Toshiba Satellite C850 endless boot looping Solved/Closed

Question

Good day, a friend has a weird problem. Her laptop is continuously booting. HDD checked; everything is fine. The machine came with Windows 7 Starter, but someone decided to upgrade to Win 7 Pro. Another techi says the motherboard needs to be replaced. When I opened up, I couldn't find any blown fuses or capacitors. There was fresh heat paste but a LOT of dust and grime on the fan. So much for work ethic.

I've transferred all her data to my external HDD and proceeded with a new install, hoping that Win 7 Starter would resolve the boot looping. Now here's the weird part: when the installation was finished, the Toshiba came on with an LG screen. And the OS disk is an original. When I restarted, the looping resumed. According to Speccy there is a Sandy Bridge motherboard but I couldn't get the exact model number before the machine reset itself.

Please advise.

ac3mark · Answer

What is the boot order set to?  Reset the BIOS to defaults.  Is it attempting to boot, then not going to a bootable device and restarting?

PooPaul · Answer

Ok, BIOS was set to default when I first started with the laptop. Initially it was set to boot from the hdd, but I changed that after spending hours to get out of the loop. It is now set to boot from CD because my last installation didn't finish (I was trying to get rid of the lg screen). The "hold down 0 and switch on" to do a factory reset, clearly doesn't work. The bios also doesn't have the option under boot, to do a recovery. Outdated perhaps?

ac3mark · Answer

No, typically you would have to boot into the OS shell to get to that, try hitting F8 during boot and see if it brings up options.  It may be the DEL key for your MB.

PooPaul · Answer

Bios definitely outdated. BUT here's the good news. I solved the problem. When I assembled the machine long after pumpkin time, I was so tired and fed up, that I forgot to put back the battery, and switched it on running on mains. Booted immediately. I thought it was just a fluke, so I restarted and even did a shutdown, leaving it for 10 minutes. No looping anymore. So instead of spending a packet on a new motherboard and still looping, my friend needs to invest in a new battery. Happy Friday to everyone, and thank you for trying to help. GB.

Toshiba Satellite C850 endless boot looping

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