Windows Startup Repair?

For you tech. pros,is this a scam or is it real?? I have an older HP tower with Windows Vista. It comes up on a black screen sometimes at startup.as an option.
Please dont use fancy computer terms,I probably wont know what you're talking about,thanks.

 

What do you mean "as an option?"

If windows crashes and the machine either reboots itself or you do a power boot (unplug it, or press in the power button until it shuts off), when you start it up again, you may get presented with a black screen that says Windows did not shut down normally" and then it will give you options like going to command prompt, or start in safe mode, or start windows normally. This would also happen if the machine was running and the power went out.

If you normally power down to either sleep mode or totally shut down, and this is happening frequently when you power up again, something's wrong.

You could try doing a System Restore back to the most recent restore point that was created prior to this starting to happen.

If it keeps happening after that, it may be a hardware problem.

But it's hard to tell from your post what you are actually seeing. You need to describe a sequence.

 

Basically it's the black screen you normally see if you hold in the start button to shut off. It gives you two options,Windows Start up repair or Start Normally in white. Should I be afraid to click on Startup Repair?

 

It sounds like you are turning the computer off or the power goes off to it before it completely shuts down, so that shows up the next time the computer starts because it did not shutdown correctly. This can be very bad for the hard drive.

If you select "start normally" and it works fine, I wouldn't worry about it, but if it keeps showing up after you turn the computer off by clicking start then shutdown (and letting it finish turning itself off), then you may want to allow it to do the start up repair.

 

Vista huh? it might be time to get a new computer, computer sales are down, you can get one dirt cheap.

 

Thanks guys,it works fine in start normally.

 

Agree with Shock. Default would be to choose start normally until that stops working.

Or, if you are actually shutting down normally and you keep getting it every time, then give the repair a try.

There's nothing terrible about continuing to use Vista, it's just that getting that black startup screen frequently isn't the greatest sign.

 

You can turn that off, but you'd need to mess with MSConfig, and I don't recommend YOU do that.

 

It might ask for your Vista DVD. If you don't have that or know where it is, I wouldn't click the restore button.

Back up anything of value to you on the computer now. Just in case...

 

OK I let the repair run and the computer started back up fine ,my main concern was that was these crooks who call you claiming to be Microsoft.were giving me this message.
Thanks to all for your help,I'm going to keep this clunker untill it totally breaks.

 

Those guys who call you claiming to be microsoft know nothing about your computer...UNTIL you fall for it and go the their site, then they'll seize control of your computer and force you to pay to get it back.

 

Select start normally.

worst case you pick the other one, it will slowly run some thing that seems to take forever and then prompt you to start up.

is not a scam, its just part of windows.

 

I'm afraid I agree. Vista ,7, xp,10 ,= 4 WINDOWS AGO
A 10 year old computer that's Damn good.