Pavilion 13t-s100 Laptop will not boot

[Llew99]

I purchased a HP Pavilion 13t-s100 Laptop almost 3 years ago and it has not beed used very much in that time.  It has now died completly - I have tried the HP recommended hard reset - by pressing and holding the power button. The only information I can get is the Prod number, manufacture date and the BIOS and Intel Chip reference. It is a dead computer which I think is very poor for a very lightly used 3 year old laptop. It's obviously out of warranty  and I now read in other forums that this seems to be a common problem with this model. I am prepared to put a new HDD in the computer if this will solve the problem but I want to know if I am wasting my time and money? Any comments? Thanks.

[CherylG]

It is hard to say from what little info we have if replacing the hard drive is what it needs but a no-boot is usually caused by the hard drive. The hard drive is also usually the most common failure in a laptop and  fairly inexpensive/easily replaced.

Have you been able to run F2 Diagnostics? Immediately after powering on start tapping the Esc key. This will open a menu where F2 System Diagnostics is an option. Tap F2 key and run the tests.

[Llew99]

Thank you for responding.

I have run F2 diagnostics - every System Test passed - but trying to boot goes no further.

Grateful for any help.

Thanks

[CherylG]

After tapping Esc to get the startup menu with F2- did you also have the option of F11 System Recovery? If so a system recovery following this guide may work.

http://hp.dezide.com/ts/start.jsp?guide=HPSystemRecovery.net&as=true&SFS=sdoc&section=ccweb

[Llew99]

There is an option of F11 System Recovery but this reults in a blue message - Selected Boot device Failed.. I can check all the low level info via F1, F2, F9 and F10 but F11 leads nowhere!

I think I have tried everything now - very disappointed that an almost 3 year old very lightly used laptop should fail - it's a Western digital HDD - so is the fault with HP or WD or both?

System Diagnostics indicate that the HDD is ok but the laptop doesn't boot - I am still wondering whether to try a new HDD - not an expensive item I know, but am I wasting my time and money and the problem is elsewhere?

Thank you for your help again.

[CherylG]

If it was my laptop I would replace the hdd. Wouldn't be the first time I have seen Diagnostics pass a drive and a new one fix the problem.

[Llew99]

Replaced the HDD - but now cannot install Windows from a Flash Drive. Could there be a problem with the BIOS? What is the most recent version for this Laptop - F27A? Installed version is F 1B - from 03/22/2016. Could this have become corrupted?

[CherylG]

Your Support page is HERE F.27 is the latest BIOS posted. Normally,if the BIOS is corrupted you won't get as far as you got-such as able to use F keys functions.

Could you clarify what happens when you try to install Windows? Any error messages? Are you able to even boot from it using Esc,F9? At what point does it fail?

[Llew99]

I have changed the Boot Order so that USB HD is at the top of the list.

When I Power up the Laptop the USB lights up but then a message appears:

The selected boot device failed - Press (ENTER) to Continue.

I installed Windows 10 on a new 16GB USB - the problem continues!!

It's exactly the same as for the old disk?

Thanks again.

[CherylG]

Are you using Esc,then F9 at power on? HP laptops will usually still default to trying to boot from hdd unless you use F9 to choose one time boot change.