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laptop only boots after pressing f10

Have a laptop when starting up, I get a blank black screen and constant loud short beeps.

But if I hit the F10 key while starting up for the bios boot menu; and select the Hard Drive to boot; the computer goes right into windows xp, as if nothing is wrong.

any help would be appreciated.

thanks.

workga

Have you checked the manufacturer site to find out what the beep codes mean. From what you wrote down sound like you should go in the bios and set your hard-drive as primary boot device.

mattK--

ASKER

thanks, hard drive is set as the primary boot device. and I can find no information from the manufacturer's website. Does this sound more like a hardware failure or a problem with bios or possible OS?

Joshua1909

Could you post the model number of your laptop, and also what the beep code pattern is (like short-long-long-short or whatever) Or is it only short consistent beeps?

The beep code actually provides us with information as to what's actually wrong (we can use beep codes from the manufacturer to tell what the codes mean, eg, if it was a Dell and the beep code was: beep, beep, beep-beep then we could tell there was a processor problem).

What happens if you don't hit F10, do you get errors, or does the screen just go black?
Does it move past the black screen if you leave it for a few minutes?
You don't have a USB drive, floppy disk, iPod or anything plugged in when you're trying to start up?

nobus

here a list of normal beep codes, but it may vary per model :
http://www.computerhope.com/beep.htm

r2r

Boot Priority might had been change, check your BIOS

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asmodeusnz

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asmodeusnz

Also, make sure no keys are stuck, this happens a lot in laptops.