Stream laptop

[Rina92]

Laptop not working . Turn off and will not re start and says troubleshooting when it’s not. when I called HP they wanted to purchased window license to upgrade for my child. This was purchased due to school being on line. There is a pandemic . Parents are struggling with purchasing equipments  that are still under warranty . Little alone paying an extra $300 per John .   He said the issue was not up to me.. what kind of respond is that ??

[WAWood]

@Rina92 

I think you were SCAMMED -- for the following reasons.

First, your Stream would have come with a Win10 license already included and Windows already installed on the drive.  You do not need additional licenses to let additional people use a PC; instead, all you need to do is create user accounts for them.  The license is for the PC, not for the owner.

Second, I'm guessing you called an 800 number, and I'm guess you got that from the Internet.  Problem is, those numbers are KNOWN to be Scammers who take your money for stuff you do not need.  Those are not genuine HP support people.

Third,  ordinarily, when a laptop no longer boots into Windows, this means that the boot records (known as the BCD) have become corrupted due to a failing drive and running diagnostics confirms this to be the case. Folks then replace the laptop drive, use the HP Cloud Recovery option and a 32GB USB stick to make recovery media, boot their laptop from that media and do a full restore.

With a Stream, this is a much more difficult situation.

First, the Stream does not actually have a laptop hard drive. Instead, it has a memory stick configured to work like a "disk drive" -- so, it has a stick of EMMC memory instead of an HDD. This is very small, usually 32GB, so it is too small to do any major Windows Updates since Windows takes up nearly all of the "drive".

Second, the SSD, unlike the SATA SSDs in other laptops, can not be replaced by the consumer. So, when it fills up, you can't replace it with a larger one. And when it fails, you can't replace it with a new one.

Thus, you can try running diagnostics to test the drive -- but if it fails, you will have to take the Stream to a laptop repair facility to have them replace the SSD. You can not replace it yourself.

To check the drive you have to follow these steps:
1) Press Esc key repeatedly, several times a second, while rebooting the laptop. Do NOT hold the key down, just press it over and over.
2) Eventually, you will see an HP Startup Menu
3) Press the Function key for testing the hard drive (usually F2) and let it run.