BIOS Troubles

vc_wannabe · Post by **vc_wannabe** » Sat Apr 25, 2009 8:28 pm

I am trying to fix a friends computer. It is an Acer Aspire 4520 notebook. It will not boot into windows, it will either log on and go back to the log on screen or it will have the wallpaper come up with the busy icon showing for hours with nothing else on the screen. I created a BART PE cd to run anti-virus software, however I can not get it to run from the cd as it does not read the optical drive before the hard disk. I tried to go into the BIOS to change it. However there is a password on the BIOS and my friend can not remember what it is. I am at a loss at this point on what to do. If it were a desktop I would clear the CMOS. I do not know how or if you can on a laptop. It is running windows Vista home premium.

YARDofSTUF · Post by **YARDofSTUF** » Sat Apr 25, 2009 9:44 pm

Have you tried booting to safe mode to get into windows?

Post by **YeOldeStonecat** » Sun Apr 26, 2009 8:33 am

Last year there was some malware going around which caused that...we had several rigs on the bench with that symptom. Gotta yank the drive, slave it to another PC that's fully updated and fully protected with quality antivirus software...and scan/clean from that PC. Then you may have to go in and do a manual restore to a date prior to it getting hit...depending on how deep the malware got.