Accessing boot menu

My laptop (inspiron 17r 5720, a little over month old with windows 8 pre-installed) has been starting up, showing the dell logo and then gets hung up on a black screen. I'm asuming it has the no boot issue, a solution to which is helpfully provided by Dell here (http://www.dell.com/support/troubleshooting/us/en/19/KCS/kcsarticles/articleview?docid=595574) but the problem with this solution is, if the computer isn't starting up properly there's no way to access the boot menu or bios since the advanced startup options menu is accessible only if one can get to the login screen or the start screen, which obviously isn't happening if I'm getting hung up on the black screen of death. There's no option to access it on startup since the F2 and F8 keys don't work with windows 8 apparently due to the new improved super fast start up speed. The advanced startup options menu is allegedly supposed to appear if windows fails startup twice, but that hasn't happened for me.
FYI:
The F12 key does work. Boot mode is set to UEFI and secure boot is on. The only option I can highlight and get into is 'diagnostics'. (I've run the normal and advanced diagnostics tests. Repeatedly. My computer has passed every time.) I can't boot from a cd or USB drive because those options are accessible via the advanced startup menu. That I cannot get in to. For reasons previously stated.
I've disconnected all external devices from the laptop.
I've tried removing the battery and unplugging the power. And holding down the power button for 30 seconds.
I've even (unnecessarily) reseated the hard drive and memory.
I've been scouring forums and this is a known issue that apparently has no solution. I don't know what else to try now. I need to get into my computer, all my college work is saved there and some of it is due tomorrow. I've been trying to fix this thing for the past couple of days and I'm becoming increasingly frustrated with windows 8.