Windows 8 VERY Strange Glitches and Problems

Zack

New Member
Hi, I have an HP Pavilion laptop with Windows 8. A couple days ago, I experienced very strange things happening to my laptop, and I fear I will have to buy a new one if I don't figure out how to fix it. I got this laptop used from Best Buy about 7 months ago. When I got it, it was full of viruses, and probably the slowest laptop I've ever had to deal with. But after cleaning it up, it works just fine.
Now just a couple night ago, before I went to sleep, it had to update before shutting down. So it did just that. The next morning, my desktop and other icons would disappear and reappear, and would exit out of any screen I was in. This would happen every few seconds, making the laptop pretty much unusable. But with the help of the trusty internet, I was able to put my laptop into safe mode, and put the laptop back to a restore point from a month ago. After that, pretty much everything went back to normal.
But now, every time I log on, along with every hour or so, I get a message that says I need to activate Windows in my PC settings. So I try to do it, but it just takes me back to the start menu every time. Also, all of my apps have small exes in the bottom right corner, I'm not sure if that would help my case. So basically, it won't let me activate Windows. If that isn't enough, I've seen the desktop flash a couple of times like it used to, but not NEARLY as often. Along with that, there's now small white text at the bottom right corner of my desktop that reads "Windows 8.1 - Build 9600." Also, when I try to do an automatic Windows update, an error occurs. That's a bit of a problem too.
Along with this all being very strange, I fear that my laptop is about to die on me. Do you guys think a factory restore can solve the problem? Any thoughts at all would be very appreciated. Thank you!
 
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This is indeed strange because normally you should not have to activate Windows 8.1. The product key is stored in the BIOS. But all the signs you get seem to point to an activation problem.

I would call Microsoft or HP and have them advise you. Going back to BestBuy may help too.
 
The small white text at the bottom right corner of your desktop sounds a bit like one of the pre-release versions that someone might have installed
 
1. Windows 8.1 - Build 9600 is a type of pre-install image that a company then puts onto the system and updates when it is sold to the customer.
a. Did you disable the secure boot feature before rolling the laptop back to this point by any chance?

b. The original screen flickering you experienced after the patch is most likely caused by an out dated graphics driver and I would have tried update my drivers before rolling it back that far… why so far by the way or was that the only backup point you had?

c. Factory restore is an extreme and you would then have a LOT of updates | adjustments to make which will probably bring you right back to where you are now unless you can discover the underlying issue.

2. What is the vender situation i.e. is this (second hand?) laptop under some kind of warrantee… are there other (later) points available to reset too and what else is installed on it?

a. You can download Belarc Advisor to get some of this info… it is a free program and can be found here. http://www.belarc.com/ba5.html?B
 
If you are thinking about getting a new laptop anyways, why don't you give factory restore a go? Could save you a few hundred bucks. If it didn't work, at least you have a solid reason to get a new one.

I can't suggest any fix. I haven't heard about this issue before. But if you have files to save, create a linux on stick (go with Ubuntu) and backup your files to external drive before restoring. Best of luck.
 
Hi

I'm with Bassfisher, back up any data on the computer that your don't want to lose and do a complete factory reset from the recovery partition.

The computer should end up just like it was when it was new.

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c03489643&cc=us&dlc=en&lc=en

If you still have problems after that, then I'd look at getting a new computer.
You can get a new laptop so cheap anymore that it hardly worth having anyone try and fix it at $100 an hour plus parts.

http://www.amazon.com/HP-Pavilion-1...id=1399139531&sr=1-3&keywords=laptop+computer

Mike
 
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