black screen with blinking white line after the DELL logo

Hi,

It may be an issue with the operating system not functioning properly. As the system was affected by trojan, it might have corrupted the operating system. Let’s try the following steps and see if it works.

Drain the residual power from the desktop:

• Disconnect any external peripherals (flash drives, printers, external hard drives) from the rear and the front  computer
• Then remove all the cables including power cable, monitor, keyboard and mouse from the computer
• Press and hold the power button on the computer for 10 seconds
• Reconnect the power cable, keyboard, mouse and monitor cable only
• Restart the computer and check if the computer is functioning properly

If the above steps do not work, then try running the following diagnostics to check the hardware functionality of the computer:

To run the diagnostics:

• Power off the computer
• Restart the computer, tap F12 on the Dell logo
• Select ‘Diagnostics’ or ‘Boot to Utility partition’ from the boot menu (use ‘up’ or ‘down’ arrow keys to highlight the option, press ‘enter’ to select)
• Please refer to the link if any error code shows up http://dell.to/MNniAq

If the diagnostics pass without any error, then try booting to safe mode and check if the system boots to the desktop:

• Power off the computer
• Restart the computer, tap F8 on Dell logo 2-3 times
• This will take you to ‘Windows Advanced Boot Options’
• Choose ‘Safe Mode’ in the Advanced Boot menu (use ‘up’ or ‘down’ arrow keys to highlight the option, press ‘enter’ to select)
• When Windows finishes loading in Safe mode, check if the system is able to boot to desktop

If the system works in safe mode, perform system restore.

• Click on 'Start'
• Click on 'All Programs' then click 'Accessories'
• Click on 'System Tools'
• Click on the 'System Restore'
• Then click 'Next' on the "Restore system files and settings" window
• Then choose the restore point that you want to use(choose a date when the system was working good)
• After that click 'next' to continue
• Then click 'Finish' on the "Confirm your restore point" window to start the System Restore
• Then Click 'Yes' to the once started, System Restore cannot be interrupted. Do you want to continue? dialog box.
• System Restore will now restore Windows 7 to the state that was recorded in the restore point.
• Immediately after logging in to Windows 7 after the reboot, you should see a message that System Restore completed successfully
• Click Close

If system restore fails, I would advice you to take a complete back of the system and re-install the operating system.

Note: The above mentioned troubleshooting steps are only applicable to bring the computer from non working state to working state and does not include virus removal.

Please reply if you have any questions.

i was able to do the diagnostics without errors. i tried to restart and press F8 2-3 times but i still get the black screen with the blinking white line. what to do next. thank you, apu

If the diagnostics pass without any error, then try booting to safe mode and check if the system boots to the desktop:

Power off the computer

Restart the computer, tap F8 on Dell logo 2-3 times

This will take you to ‘Windows Advanced Boot Options’

Choose ‘Safe Mode’ in the Advanced Boot menu (use ‘up’ or ‘down’ arrow keys to highlight the option, press ‘enter’ to select)

When Windows finishes loading in Safe mode, check if the system is able to boot to desktop

If the system works in safe mode, perform system restore.

Click on 'Start'

Click on 'All Programs' then click 'Accessories'

Click on 'System Tools'

Click on the 'System Restore'

Then click 'Next' on the "Restore system files and settings" window

Then choose the restore point that you want to use(choose a date when the system was working good)

After that click 'next' to continue

Then click 'Finish' on the "Confirm your restore point" window to start the System Restore

Then Click 'Yes' to the once started, System Restore cannot be interrupted. Do you want to continue? dialog box.

System Restore will now restore Windows 7 to the state that was recorded in the restore point.

Immediately after logging in to Windows 7 after the reboot, you should see a message that System Restore completed successfully

Click Close

If system restore fails, I would advice you to take a complete back of the system and re-install the operating system.

Note: The above mentioned troubleshooting steps are only applicable to bring the computer from non working state to working state and does not include virus removal.

Please reply if you have any questions.

Hi DNLB1B,

To run the diagnostics, boot to your Dell drivers and utilities disc. If you need help booting to a CD, check your manual. It's best to perform the hard drive test from a different drive, in this case the DVD drive.

means the cd drive is toast

nothing happens when i put the dell drivers cd in. i still get the blinking line. i was able to go to BOOT TO UTILITY OARTITION and made a diagnostic and got thjis ERROR message : ERROR 0F00.137B. MSG:IDE device failed:blank media or no media is present in optical drive. test requires media with data ( resource CD,installation CD ). what does this mean.

Model number?

OS version including Service pack levels?

Removing the hard drive and replacing with new blank drive then Reinstall OS from scratch.

Install MSSE  Microsoft Security essentials

Then mount the old drive via usb aka DRIVE WIRE and recover the data.

what do i do to correct my pc's problem?

dell dimension 521 ( 2007 ) window vista. what is service pack level? any other ways i can reformat without getting the hard drive out? thanks

If you ran the diagnostics from the utilities partiition without a data disk in the optical drive(s), you'd get that error message. Put a data CD in the optical drive(s) and rerun the diagnostics from the utilities partition. I'll bet it passes this time.

ron, i 've put a cd and ran the diagnostic w/c was successful. no errors this time.

now back to my other question:

i was able to do the diagnostics without errors. i tried to restart and press F8 2-3 times ( see instruction that i followed below ) but i still get the black screen with the blinking white line. what do i do next. thank you.

If the diagnostics pass without any error, then try booting to safe mode and check if the system boots to the desktop:

Power off the computer

Restart the computer, tap F8 on Dell logo 2-3 times

This will take you to ‘Windows Advanced Boot Options’

Choose ‘Safe Mode’ in the Advanced Boot menu (use ‘up’ or ‘down’ arrow keys to highlight the option, press ‘enter’ to select)

When Windows finishes loading in Safe mode, check if the system is able to boot to desktop

If the system works in safe mode, perform system restore.

Click on 'Start'

Click on 'All Programs' then click 'Accessories'

Click on 'System Tools'

Click on the 'System Restore'

Then click 'Next' on the "Restore system files and settings" window

Then choose the restore point that you want to use(choose a date when the system was working good)

After that click 'next' to continue

Then click 'Finish' on the "Confirm your restore point" window to start the System Restore

Then Click 'Yes' to the once started, System Restore cannot be interrupted. Do you want to continue? dialog box.

System Restore will now restore Windows 7 to the state that was recorded in the restore point.

Immediately after logging in to Windows 7 after the reboot, you should see a message that System Restore completed successfully

Click Close

If system restore fails, I would advice you to take a complete back of the system and re-install the operating system.

Note: The above mentioned troubleshooting steps are only applicable to bring the computer from non working state to working state and does not include virus removal.

ron, i 've put a cd and ran the diagnostic w/c was successful. no errors this time.

NOW BACK TO MY OTHER QUESTION:

I WAS ABLE TO DO THE DIAGNOSTICS WITHOUT ERRORS. I TRIED TO RESTART AND PRESS F8 2-3 TIMES ( SEE INSTRUCTION THAT I FOLLOWED BELOW ) BUT I STILL GET THE BLACK SCREEN WITH THE BLINKING WHITE LINE. WHAT DO I DO NEXT. THANK YOU.

If the diagnostics pass without any error, then try booting to safe mode and check if the system boots to the desktop:

Power off the computer

Restart the computer, tap F8 on Dell logo 2-3 times

This will take you to ‘Windows Advanced Boot Options’

What happens if you boot from the Dell Windows Reinstallation CD (DVD) or another bootable CD (DVD)?

If you can boot from the Windows disk, you may have to run a Repair of the OS. The Repair shouldn't damage your personal files or any software you installed But that's why you've got your files backed up on external media, right..?

You can read this to get info about Repairing Vista.

i inserted both OS and Driver/Utilities reinstallation CDs and i still get the black screen with blinking line. after the DELL logo ( which only shows both F2 and F12 ) the black screen with blinking line comes up and nothing happens. i shut and turned on the computer with the CD in and still get the black screen.  i do not think the link you posted will help me . thanks, ron.

Try clearing BIOS:

1. Power off, unplug
2. Press/hold power button for ~15 sec
3. Open case and remove motherboard battery
4. Press/hold power button again for ~30 sec
5. Reinstall battery (right-side-up!)
6. See if it boots now with only mouse, monitor and keyboard attached

You're not making this easy!

Power off and unplug etc. Disconnect network/modem cable, printers etc.

Now strip it down to bare essentials. Remove all RAM modules except the module in slot 1 (closest to CPU); remove all PCI cards except video card.

Disconnect all drives except boot hard drive.  Do the "battery thing" again and see if it boots now with only mouse, monitor and keyboard connected.

Then repeat the process, swapping all RAM modules into slot 1 to see if you can ID a bum module. If they all work in slot 1, add a second module to slot 2, do the battery thing and see if it boots....

Always power off, unplug etc before removing/adding any hardware. And do the battery thing each time you change the hardware configuration so BIOS will see the changes.