Windows 8 on older PC...need to boot into Safe Mode

Harry Ohm

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Hello everyone, my first post here.

To make a long story short, a USB video adapter that I was using with Windows 7 stopped working with Win 8, because the drivers are no longer compatible with the latest drivers for my older Nvidia graphics card (7900GS). So the manufacturer suggests on their website to try installing an older Nvidia driver thats still compatible with Win 8.

To make a long story short, the driver installed, the screen went black and stayed black from that point on. Panicked, I powered off the PC and thinking I could just get into Safe Mode and uninstall the driver, rebooted. Lo and behold I get a Boot Disk Failure error. So I then used the Win 8 install DVD to get to repair options, but the Automatic Repair does nothing whatsoever. I then started reading up and tried the usual bootrec commands to try and fix the issue but to no avail. Finally I booted Hiren's Boot CD,, and used the first Boot From Hard Drive option and the PC boots, but the screen stays black. The crazy thing is, the mouse cursor appears but the screen is black.

So I know Windows is working but for the video driver.

The solution is obvious - get to Safe Mode and uninstall the driver to get windows back to the default microsoft drivers.

Unfortunately, not so simple to get to Safe Mode as I am running Win 8 on an old Abit IP-35pro board without any of the UEFI goodies that newer boards have. I have tried the tutorials here but nothing seems to work.

When I try any of the bcdedit commands from the command prompt, I get the following:

"The boot configuration data store could not be opened. The system cannot find the specified file."

At this point I think I'm going to have to bite the bullet and just re-install Windows but I really do not want to have to do that at all. That's why I'm hoping someone here will be able to offer some suggestions or pointers.

I did read on one site that one person had run into this issue and what he did was to start the install DVD, and elect to install Windows, as opposed to going to the repair options, ignored the message about the existing Windows installation, then once the files were copied to the hard drive, canceled the install at the first prompt after files are copied and then went back into the repair options off the install DVD and restored from a system restore point.

Would this even work?
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8
Start to the install DVD; see if you can see system restore points. Try system restore to before you installed the new driver if you can.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Win7 Ult on DIY; Win8 Pro on MBP/Parallels; Win7 Ult on MBP/Boot Camp; Win7 Ult/Win8 Pro on HP
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
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    DIY Rig; MacBook Pro (MBP)/Parallels/Boot Camp; HP Pavilion dv6500t Laptop
    CPU
    Intel i7-2600K (sometimes OC'd to 4.8 GHz)
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    ASUS P8P67 Deluxe Rev B3
    Memory
    16 GB Corsair Vengeance
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    EVGA 570 SC
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    Gateway
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    Dual Boot:
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    Cooler Master 932 HAF
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    Logitech Cordless Desktop MX 5500
    Mouse
    Logitech Cordless Desktop MX 5500
    Internet Speed
    20 Mbps Download/2+ Mbps Upload
    Other Info
    Pioneer Blu-ray Burner/DVD Burner
Just some clarification, I got lost. Do you have a black screen when your monitor is connected to the USB video adapter?
 
Last edited:

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Win 8 (64) : Win 7 (64) : Vista (64) : Android JB 4.2 : iOS 6
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Acer AX Series & HP i-5 2400s
    Screen Resolution
    Main PC - 2x Sony PS3 3D LED Displays + 1x 22" Philips; HTPC - 47" HDTV w/ 17" LCD secondary display
    Hard Drives
    Internal- 1TB on each system; 1x120GB SSD on main PC
    External (network attached)- 1x2TB Seagate backup; 1x1TB ext. storage; 1x500GB,
    Other Info
    http://tinyurl.com/br4uxrk

    http://tinyurl.com/cwj93pj
Just some clarification, I got lost. Do you have a black screen with you monitor connected to the USB video adapter?

Yes. The monitor is connected. The PC boots up. I can see the cursor and move it around with the mouse. However the rest of the screen is black.

This happened right after I installed the Nvidia driver.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8
Your USB video adapter is not being supported by Win 8, so why don't you connect your monitor directly to your onboard display card while you are trying to fix your problem of uninstalling a driver?
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Win 8 (64) : Win 7 (64) : Vista (64) : Android JB 4.2 : iOS 6
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Acer AX Series & HP i-5 2400s
    Screen Resolution
    Main PC - 2x Sony PS3 3D LED Displays + 1x 22" Philips; HTPC - 47" HDTV w/ 17" LCD secondary display
    Hard Drives
    Internal- 1TB on each system; 1x120GB SSD on main PC
    External (network attached)- 1x2TB Seagate backup; 1x1TB ext. storage; 1x500GB,
    Other Info
    http://tinyurl.com/br4uxrk

    http://tinyurl.com/cwj93pj
Hello everyone, my first post here.

...Lo and behold I get a Boot Disk Failure error.

If this happens, don't let Windows 8 try to repair it, you need to use GWscan or similar utility that scans the entire drive. This has happened all too often on my machine, and it always means I have read element failure.

I don't know if this will be your case, but before you let Windows 8 do any Automatic Repair, you should do a full surface scan of the drive before anything else. Then let Windows 8 perform any Auto Repair it wants to do.

Also what 4thofjuly says is viable as well, make sure you plug in a monitor that does not need any special drivers. Maybe the USB port is detecting that hardware as if it were a hard drive and it is interfering with the mounted drives.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8 Pro with Media Center/Windows 7
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Asus M2N-MX SE Plus § DualCore AMD Athlon 64 X2, 2300 MHz (11.5 x 200) 4400+ § Corsair Value Select
    CPU
    AMD 4400+/4200+
    Motherboard
    Asus M2N-MX SE Plus/Asus A8M2N-LA (NodusM)
    Memory
    2 GB/3GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    GeForce 8400 GS/GeForce 210
    Sound Card
    nVIDIA GT218 - High Definition Audio Controller
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Hitachi 40" LCD HDTV
    Screen Resolution
    "1842 x 1036"
    Hard Drives
    WDC WD50 00AAKS-007AA SCSI Disk Device
    ST1000DL 002-9TT153 SCSI Disk Device
    WDC WD3200AAJB-00J3A0 ATA Device
    WDC WD32 WD-WCAPZ2942630 USB Device
    WD My Book 1140 USB Device
    PSU
    Works 550w
    Case
    MSI "M-Box"
    Cooling
    Water Cooled
    Keyboard
    Dell Keyboard
    Mouse
    Microsoft Intellimouse
    Internet Speed
    Cable Medium Speed
    Browser
    Chrome/IE 10
    Antivirus
    Eset NOD32 6.x/Win Defend
    Other Info
    Recently lost my Windows 8 on my main PC, had to go back to Windows 7.
try starting the computer in VGA mode from the safe mode menu. then uninstall drivers, then reboot..
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8 & Windows 7 Dual Boot
    Computer type
    Laptop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    HP G60
    CPU
    AMD Turion RM-70 Dual Core 2.0 GHZ
    Memory
    3 GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    Nvidia GeForce 8200M G
    Screen Resolution
    1366 x 768
    Mouse
    MS Intellipoint 5 button (love it!)
    Browser
    Chrome and Chromium
    Antivirus
    Avast Free & Malwarebytes
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