Windows 10 Request help in resetting Asus X551C Laptop Running Windows 10

[wilspeak]

Hello, I am having trouble logging into my Asus X551C Laptop Running Windows 10. I keep getting a "We can't sign into your account sign out and the sign back in" error. After a few attempts at signing in and rebooting the computer, I tried to wipe and reset the computer. After a few attempts at trying to wipe and reset the computer, I received a "There was a problem resetting your PC. No changes were made" error. I then booted into Safe Mode and tried to make a few attempts wiping and resetting the PC with saving my files and a Full hard drive wipe, I received then a "Start up repair could not repair your PC. Log file C:\WINDOWS\System32\Logfiles\Srt\SrtTrail.txt" . I also ran 2 anti-virus programs and cleaned the PC during and before this whole process. Unfortunately I don't have any backups on the PC. If I get this problem solved the first thing that I am going to do is Back Up the PC. Can anyone help me wipe and reset my PC. Thank You all in advance.

PC . Thank You all in advance.

 

[BIGBEARJEDI]

Hi,
Looks like your laptop came with Win8 and you upgraded it to W10. That's not usually directly possible, so you would have had to perform a W8 to W8.1 upgrade first, and then a subsequent upgrade to W10. Unless you did a Clean Install of W10 from bootable media? Which did you do?

In any case, that computer is nearing 6 years old, and most likely you have experienced a hard drive failure, as modern hard drives in laptops (since 2009) are only designed to last 2 years before they fail! If you have not replaced that hard drive in that laptop, or paid a Tech to do for you, it is HIGHLY likely that the hard drive is failing or has failed and must be replaced!

This of course would explain why you cannot reset the PC, since no software on the planet can replace broken hardware!

To assist you, you will need to do Hardware testing of your laptop, specifically the Hard Drive and the RAM stick(s). However, since you stated that you do not have a backup of that Hard Drive, I would not bother testing it--as most likely it has failed. I would purchase a replacement hard drive of at least the same capacity or larger that came with your laptop instead. Specs state that your laptop came with a 500GB hard drive. These are available on amazon, ebay, and ebay for well under $80 US. Remove that Hard Drive from your laptop, first making certain that you have removed the laptop battery and the AC power adapter (MAINS) before doing so. Then set that old hard drive aside for data recovery at a later date.

Purchase the new hard drive, and insert that drive into your laptop's hard drive bay. Some newer laptops starting with W8 laptops make you remove the whole bottom case to get to the hard drive slot; so you may need to google up a YouTube video on how to do this. If you've never replaced a hard drive in a laptop before, I suggest you don't, rather pay a professional Computer Tech to do this for you. If you had made the Factory RECOVERY MEDIA that your ASUS laptops software recommended when you first opened the laptop up and removed it from it's box and turned it on, you can install your W8, and then repeat the upgrade process, or pay the Tech to do this for you. If you don't wish to repeat the W10 upgrade process, you can download the W10 bootable media (DVD or USB) from the Microsoft site as it is free from here: Download Windows 10

Once you get W10 working again on your laptop with the new hard drive, you can then take your old broken drive it to your local computer repair shop, such as Best Buy Geek Squad and pay them to do a data recovery on the old drive. If the drive is still spinning, they can most likely recover your data in the store. If it is not spinning, most likely you'll have to send it out to professional data recovery in Memphis, Tennesse and is very very expensive. Last Recovery I did on my son's failed external USB drive cost me $550 on a 750GB drive last May 2016. If you can't afford this, or you just don't have stuff that's on that old hard drive worth that kind of money; oh well, you learned a VERY expensive lesson about backing up your data to external media! Chalk that off to experience and lesson learned!

The good news is that at this point, you'll have your W10 working once again on your laptop and what's the first thing you are going to do with it? Make backups! That's right! I suggest you look at the free AOEMI Backupper program for folder/file backup, and Macrium Reflect, Acronis TrueImage, or EASEus TODO for Disk Image Backup. We have tested these programs extensively on W10. It's really best to do both, and the software is free. You just need an inexpensive external hard drive or USB flash drive, and a free Cloud storage account such as OneDrive or GoogleDrive or Dropbox.

Best of luck,
<<<<BIGBEARJEDI>>>

 

[wilspeak]

Hello BIGBEARJEDI, I will follow your instructions, what do you think about the link that I'm am posting >>>>How to fix Automatic Repair couldn't repair your PC - Troubleshooter THANK YOU

 

[BIGBEARJEDI]

You're welcome! Glad to try and help. I've seen all of these repairs, and those are the standard ones that many people try. It is possible that one or more of these will help. The big problem I see for your situation is that you are "working without a net" while walking on a tightrope 300 ft. in the air, so to speak. No backup on that laptop hard drive is a BIG problem. If you make a mistake, or even if you don't make a mistake and I'm right about you having a failing or failed hard drive; and I'll say it again "No software on the planet can fix Broken hardware!!".

Like I said, since given the age of your laptop *6 years* and it's highly likely that your hard drive failing is really causing this problem; attempting further software repairs on it WITHOUT BACKUP UP YOUR DATA, is very risky! The fact that you are asking about this again after I've already described the issues involved with attempting to repair that drive or even perform hardware testing on it, are making the chances of getting your stuff off of it lower and lower by the minute. I seem to be more worried about you suffering from Irretrievable Data Loss here than you are; so perhaps you don't have your entire life on that laptop?? Well, it's certainly your computer and your decision. But, if you were paying me money to fix your laptop, and brought it to my shop for repair, I would tell you the exact same thing.

I think you've lost sight of the big picture; and perhaps I am wrong. But having been in IT for over 35 years, I learned a thing or two about being cautious with people's data. I think your thinking is skewed. For $80 US or so, you can buy yourself a brand new hard drive and swap it out with your existing one that's most likely failing, and ensure the integrity of whatever data you currently have on it, that is NOT backed up!!! It's entirely possible you don't have that much money at the moment, and can't afford it or simply don't want to spend the money. But due to some poor computing habits (No Backups!); you are in a really difficult position. The common knee-jerk reaction that most folks have in your situation is to panic--and that is bad. Doing the right thing in your situation here, is Counter-intuitive since every thought you have right now is to get the laptop working no matter the possible cost, and that includes scrambling of your data which is NOT backed up anywhere? When people panic like this, they ignore that little voice in their head that's saying "what if this guy is right, and none of these software repairs work and all my stuff is gonna be gone forever?". Don't ignore that voice--follow my instructions to the letter, and you may yet save your stuff.

Well, I pretty much beat this to death, and most of the other Techs here would have done with you by now; but I'm trying to help you through this difficult time. Having a computer, especially since it sounds like this is your ONLY computer crash and not be able to boot is a very stressful time for most people who are not computer experts. I'm trying to both help you and to educate you. In the end it's up to you what you do and how you proceed. I just want you to understand the risks that you are taking. Of course, if you have nothing worthwhile on that laptop--and that's very unlikely-just reset or reinstall W10 and be done with it. If W10 won't reinstall, then your drive is shot and you'll need to replace it whether or not you wish to do hardware testing in order to ensure your drive's integrity.

Anyway, let us know how you get on.
Best of luck,
<<<BBJ>>>

 

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

If you have run Windows 10 and authenticated it you can just do a clean install?
You can get the installation media from...

Download Windows 10

Just make sure that you have your Microsoft account email and password so you can log in to your Microsoft account initially.

You can check that here...

Sign in to your Microsoft account

Download the ISO and copy it to a DVD, using ImgBurn...

The Official ImgBurn Website

To create a boot-able install DVD.

And start from scratch with a clean installation.

If it won't work then Bear is probably right about your hard drive failing.

If you need to get your data off of the drive first, use a Ubuntu disk to copy the data to an external drive or DVDs, or connect the drive to another PC using a USB converter and copy the data.

This should let you boot your computer from the DVD and extract your data.
The USB option will let you read your hard drive on another computer.

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When you have everything back up and running use EaseUS TODO backup to create a Disk Image of your C:\ drive.

I'd recommend that after getting Windows working that you use Drive Manager to partition the drive into two partitions.

Reduce the drive that Windows is on to about 150 Gigabytes and put everything but Windows and the basic software and swap file on the new partition, including all your data.

Then you will only have to restore the small C:\ drive if you need to recover your computer.

You can save the backup image to the second partition.

Mike

 

[BIGBEARJEDI]

Everything Mike said is good. But, I'd recommend that you keep the Backup Image File on a separate drive, such as an external USB hard drive; they are cheap; under $75 these days. If your main Hard Drive fails; i.e. the C: drive; then your Backup Image File may do you no good on a 2nd partition on a drive that's failed and unreadable. That's what we call a single point of failure. No Bueno! I keep my last 10 Backup Image Files on multiple external USB drives for just this reason. I am using a different program to create mine than Mike does; but I've tested the EASEus TODO and it works very similar to mine and is certainly Ok to use.

Just FYI.

<<<BBJ>>>

 

[wilspeak]

Hello BIGBEARJEDI, I tried to fix fix the C:\WINDOWS\System32\Logfiles\Srt\SrtTrail.txt PC Boot error. When that didn't work I tried clean install clean install win 10 from a USB Drive. That didn't work either. When I got to the part " where do you want to install windows" None of the 6 drives would allow windows to be installed. I have uploaded pictures showing the errors. Also I do want to install a upgraded HD to a SSD. Can you help me install the windows 10 ISO until I can get to upgrade the HD ? Thank You

 

[wilspeak]

Hello MikeHawthorne,
I tried to fix fix the C:\WINDOWS\System32\Logfiles\Srt\SrtTrail.txt PC Boot error. When that didn't work I tried clean install clean install win 10 from a USB Drive. That didn't work either. When I got to the part " where do you want to install windows" None of the 6 drives would allow windows to be installed. I have uploaded pictures showing the errors. Also I do want to install a upgraded HD to a SSD. Can you help me install the windows 10 ISO until I can get to upgrade the HD ? Thank You

Attached Files:

 

[bochane]

Remove all the partitions on drive 0 (use the Delete option in the install menu), create a new one (again an option in the install menu) and let the install process do the rest.