My computer crashed earlier today. Restart button didn't work so I held down the power button to turn it off then booted it again. Tried to 'start Windows normally' and ended up with the Startup Repair tool. It ran for two hours, I got impatient and turned it off and on at the wall. It's now back at the Startup Repair tool...

Should I let the tool do its thing? How long is too long? Should I be looking for a computer repair shop?

 

I'd say give it like max 2 hours if you want to be really patient. Take a look at your HDD activity LED on your case to see if it's actually doing anything. If it doesn't work, insert your windows install medium, boot from it, click next and at the bottom should be an option called "repair your computer". Chose that, then chose something along the lines of "system restore" and see if you have any restore points that are recent enough for your taste.

If yes, chose and and see if it'll work. If not, either try to get into safe mode or create a linux live system on another pc to recover any data you might need and don't have a backup for and then do a clean install of windows.

 

Turns out it was a virus. Ransomware, malware, spyware, keyloggers. The whole shebang. $250 and 24 hours later and I'm reinstalling everything. It's like looking at your old familiar couch but knowing you have to rework the arse groove back into it.

On the plus side, there's a chance that it was the viruses that was causing my games to crash and giving me enormous cases of the shits. So that might be a thing of the past now.

 

Mongolian midget clown incest porn. It's niche, I grant you, but I thought I had found a semi-reputable site.

 

$99 ransom, $150 for the tech guy. I got it to him about four yesterday arv, and it was ready to go just after midday today, so it was a quick turn around.

 

Apparently it had to be paid in order so the PC could be set up anew. The ransomware was blocking access to the factory reset option or something.

 

Which is why MS should damn well give a hard copy of a disk or flash drive. That way, you can Nuke 'n' Boot the computer then reload windows.

 

Wouldn't a new hard drive have solved the issue? I'd pay twice as much for a hard drive rather than pay a ransom.

Unless the virus was good enough to affect the MOBO bios and shit.... if so then damn.

 

If you were okay with data being erased, you could just reinstall windows without paying. Also it might have not been encrypt even. Always check on Linux machine beforehand