17 R5, can't boot past Alienware screen, can't load Diagnostics

Hi @Michaelspacejam  welcome to this user to user discussion forum. This is not Dell Support. 

Please remove all external connections except for the ac adapter, and perform a hard reset. 

When your 17 R5 splash screen appears, POST must have completed with no diagnostic lights or beeps, and the video screen works. Press and hold down F12 to enter boot menu fails, but does press and hold down F2 allow the BIOS menu to open? Does the ac adapter diagnostic light remain on when plugged into laptop, and does the battery charge? Do the LED lights work, especially during POST? 

After the third attempt to boot into Windows 10 has failed, the Windows Recovery Environment menu should automatically appear. When trying to Repair Windows, do not delete your files. 

Please click on Kudos to say thank you for response from user that is not employed by Dell. Please share an update on progress, so that other users derive benefit from your experience. Thank you. 

Will the system POST correctly if you remove the storage drive (hard drive or SSD)?  It's not that uncommon for a bad SSD to cause the symptoms you're seeing.

"Please remove all external connections except for the ac adapter, and perform a hard reset. "

Did this with no movement foward.

When your 17 R5 splash screen appears, POST must have completed with no diagnostic lights or beeps, and the video screen works.

"Yes there were no beeps or anything"

"Press and hold down F12 to enter boot menu fails, but does press and hold down F2 allow the BIOS menu to open?"

Yes the Bios menu opens. but I can not run diagnostics at all.

"Does the ac adapter diagnostic light remain on when plugged into laptop, and does the battery charge? Do the LED lights work, especially during POST? "

AC and batter seems to charge fine. I dont know what the "Diagnostic light" means, if you mean the alien power button light, then its a blue color.

After the third attempt to boot into Windows 10 has failed, the Windows Recovery Environment menu should automatically appear. When trying to Repair Windows, do not delete your files. 

Will not boot Windows what so ever, Will not boot from USB will not run diagnostics just stays on a black screen forever.

Hi @Michaelspacejam  thank you for sharing your update. 

The 17 R5 is not giving any diagnostic indicators that something is wrong, so the laptop should be in good working order, but the M.2 OS(C:) boot drive is not detected. 

Try reseating the M.2 OS(C:) card in its PCIe socket. Avoid touching the M.2 card's electrical connectors with your fingers. Using a bright light, check to see if there is an accumulation of internal dust and debris on the M.2 card and/or PCIe socket electrical connectors. Clean with a lint free cloth, no water or solvents. 

If boot problem persists, swap out the M.2 OS(C:) boot drive and replace it with a different drive. If similar to my 17 R5, it came from the factory with a M.2 SATA card, and hopefully this was retained when upgrade to NVMe card was undertaken. As part of your disaster Recovery Plan, you might have created a standby clone of the OS(C:) boot drive, to swap in if the boot drive becomes unrecoverable. Get a new or used M.2 card with the windows 10 operating system preinstalled and swap this in as the replacement OS(C:) boot drive. 

Please share an update on progress, so that other users derive benefit from your experience. Thank you. 

I am going to give this a try when I get home, but I already replaced the M.2 I also was trying to boot off a usb and it would do nothing

Hi @Michaelspacejam  thank you for sharing update. 

Troubleshooting No Boot is always problematic. It could be a simple fault such as debris or loose contacts shorting in one of the ports. 

So I tested all this out. New m2, no m2 no drive, everything made sure there was no line or blockage. Just stays at the Alienware screen and does not move forward

Hi @Michaelspacejam  BIOS stores the F12 Dell ePSA Diagnostics in a hidden partition on the OS(C:) boot drive. If the boot drive is not detected, there is no ePSA Diagnostics in the F12 boot menu. 

Are you trying to start it in diagnostics mode by keeping the “Fn” button pressed down and pressing (and letting go of) the power button?

if I remember correctly you need to keep Fn button pressed until colored bars appear. It’s been a while though, so I may not be remembering correctly even though I’m sure the above is the process to get into the diagnostics.  

 The ePSA is a pre-boot hardware diagnostic. It doesn’t matter if a storage drive is currently installed in the device. The diagnostic will still be available. 

Hi @Michaelspacejam  thank you for sharing update. 

Everything but the BIOS has been tested, but ePSA Diagnostics is not available when it should be. Perhaps the BIOS install has been corrupted, and thereby Boot into the Windows operating system is not possible. Pease try  How to Recover the BIOS on a Dell Computer or Tablet | Dell US.  

Please share an update on progress, so that other users derive benefit from your experience. Thank you. 

@Michaelspacejam  have you tried crimsons solution yet? Recovering the bios seems like the only way.

but if you can disconnect the cmos battery and the laptop battery then hold the power button for 30 seconds. Then leave the laptop alone for 15 minutes and then plug in the battery. Leave the cmos unplugged so when it turns on you can tell if it’s a bios issue and it doesn’t give an error message.

I did take the battery out and do this but nothing worked. I am trying to get time this weekend to try that bios update using a USB but nothing has worked so far.

You also left the CMOS unplugged?

@Michaelspacejam​ let me know please! if u could fix it.