"Press ESC key for startup menu" getting stuck on HP screen after installing new graphics card.

[nnarverud]

I know it's lengthy, but I've only typed so much to explain in the greatest possible detail my issue:

If you have the same problem as me, a possible (and temporary) solution is in BOLD below!!!!

Okay, so firstly here is my hardware:

PC Model Number: h8-1234

Stock Gigabyte Motherboard

Stock 1TB harddrive running Windows 10

GeForce GTX 970 SSC    <--- yes, both of the PCI-E power cables are plugged in

700W Power Supply

Running BIOS in Legacy Mode, with safeboot turned off.

The Graphics card is connected to my monitor via HDMI cable

Now I will describe my problem in extreme detail:

My old graphics card (Nvidia GeForce GTX 550ti), has never failed me, and always booted up just normal.

I just recently purchased a GeForce GTX 970 SSC with hopes of upgrading my system to play next-gen games.

After buying the card, I properly seated it into the computer and plugged in the PCI-E power cables from my 700W Power Supply. Upon booting up, I get the HP blue screen that says press ESC for startup menu, and pressing escape does not do anything whatsoever. The screen will sit there and after about 10 seconds you will hear a BEEP from the computer. Nothing will happen, and the computer will sit for a good 30 seconds, then another beep. Still nothing happens. I wait ANOTHER 30 seconds, and it beeps one final time, and then you start hearing the fans whirl on the graphics card, and the computer LOOKS like it's about to start up.... but it just gets to a blinking-cursor black screen, and it'll stay there FOREVER until you force shutdown the pc.

Now, this will always occur, and no matter what I cannot get to my startup menu, boot menu, BIOS settings, or anything unless i put in my old graphics card. HOWEVER I did find a method to fix the issue. When I turn on the computer, I mash the escape key until I get a black screen with my system specs at the top in plain white text. The computer will do the beeping thing with long pauses after each single, short beep. On the third beep it will get to that blinking cursor screen, BUT if you mash the enter key, then press escape right afterwards, it actually boots up, and you can see the windows logo. The computer will work absolutely normally with zero errors whatsoever. The only downside to this is that I cannot boot from external USB, enter my BIOS settings, nor let windows automatically restart my computer for updates (because it will get to blinking cursor screen forever; I have to manually start it back up using the method above in order to continue the update)

Game performance wise, there are no issues whatsoever. Everything works as if my computer handles the card perfectly fine, I can make use of all 4GB of DDR5 VRAM from the card, and i can run next-gen games at 1080p ultra settings with perfect 60fps. My computer just hates the card.

Now, I know what you're thinking, it might be an issue with the card, right? Well, it isn't and I'm sure of it. Last month I purchased a 980ti from amazon (ikr overkill), and the computer had the same exact problem booting up, yet I did not have the patience to try and fix it, so I wound up returning the card, thinking it was broken. My brother's 540 works like a charm, along with my original 550ti, but the 980ti did not work, so by my logic it must've been broken.

The 970, however, I had hope for, because it was not a totally overkill card like the 980ti. Yet, it had the same problem at boot, it's just that I had the time and patience to figure out that that EXACT method above actually gets the computer to startup normally, without any problems; so, with confidence I can say that the 980ti would've booted up if I knew what to do back then. The coincidence that both the amazon card and the 970 from best buy are BOTH broken is just highly unlikely, and so I have no idea what my problem is. But, seeing how my computer works fine with 3D accelerated graphics, yet I can't get to my dang BIOS screen or startup menu now really confuses me.

So what I've concluded is that next-gen cards boot up fine into windows with a bit of troubleshooting, but I cannot access the startup menu, nor the BIOS settings using my method to start it up; i would need to put in my old 550ti to do that. I don't know why this happens and I would really like a fix to this, thanks 🙂

[Mumbodog]

Try a hard reset, power down then unplug power cord, hold the power button in for 15 seconds, plug in and power up, any difference?

[AchillesAskew]

This is exactly what happened to me when I tried to install a Zotac Geforce 970 card.  

I upgaded the power supply to 600w.

My specs:  desktop h8-1280t

3.6 ghz i7-3820

Pegatron motherboard 

How in the heck you managed to find your temporary "fix" I have no idea, but it also works for me - mashing escape right when the computer turns on (but not before), then waiting until that black screen with white system specs, then mashing both escape and enter sometimes works to boot normally.  

I have checked with HP and there are no bios updates for my computer.  The fact that it wont start, but magically mashing buttons in some arcane sequence makes it work is infuriating.  Has anyone found an answer to this?

P.S. I assume that everthing is connected correctly on the geforce 970 card because, once it boots, I can use computer normally.

[nnarverud]

---

@AchillesAskew wrote:

This is exactly what happened to me when I tried to install a Zotac Geforce 970 card.  

I upgaded the power supply to 600w.

My specs:  desktop h8-1280t

3.6 ghz i7-3820

Pegatron motherboard 

How in the heck you managed to find your temporary "fix" I have no idea, but it also works for me - mashing escape right when the computer turns on (but not before), then waiting until that black screen with white system specs, then mashing both escape and enter sometimes works to boot normally.  

I have checked with HP and there are no bios updates for my computer.  The fact that it wont start, but magically mashing buttons in some arcane sequence makes it work is infuriating.  Has anyone found an answer to this?

P.S. I assume that everthing is connected correctly on the geforce 970 card because, once it boots, I can use computer normally.

---

I'm glad it worked for you!

The only reason I bothered to post here to the HP forums is because I could not find a fix ANYWHERE I looked. I accidentally found the solution when attempting to boot from my flashdrive (it has a linux OS on it), and in the process I had to mash escape in order to get to the boot menu, which insted wound up fixing my problem to begin with. I found out you just had to press enter and escape quite a bit after and the windows logo would startup. Overall, the problem hasn't been much of an issue for me since this "temporary" solution works, the only downside is that it takes a good 45 seconds to get to the windows boot screen.

I still haven't learned much about the problem, but from what I have gathered, the problem is related to the power supply. The other day I put my old GPU in older computer I have, but I powered it with my current computer's power supply (using an unused PCI-E cord). I started both computers at the same time, and I mashed escape on the first computer. The second one booted up as per I expected, but when the first one studdered to start, the second computer's display turned off for a good 5 seconds, before coming back online. When this happened, the older graphics card actually turned off briefly, as if the power supply in the first computer "hiccupped".

[AchillesAskew]

Interesting.

 I noticed that when I used the power supply cord provided by the new 600w power supply, your fix did not work.   It just went to a blank dark screen.

When I switched to my old ac power cord from my old power supply, the fix worked.  The new power supply cord is a higher voltage than my old one.  

So far, my computer is fine even when I put it on sleep mode.  But, eventually I will have to do a restart either because of an update, power outage, or just dumb luck.  If so, and the fix doesn't work, I will reconnect all connections and start from scratch again.  

I looked around and read that it may have to do with the ram memory, and may be fixed by unplugging and reinserting the memory.  I have not messed with that as of yet.

Again, THANKS for your fix and for putting it on the web so it can help others!

 If I find anything definitive, I will post here.

[nnarverud]

---

@AchillesAskew wrote:

Interesting.

 I noticed that when I used the power supply cord provided by the new 600w power supply, your fix did not work.   It just went to a blank dark screen.

When I switched to my old ac power cord from my old power supply, the fix worked.  The new power supply cord is a higher voltage than my old one.  

So far, my computer is fine even when I put it on sleep mode.  But, eventually I will have to do a restart either because of an update, power outage, or just dumb luck.  If so, and the fix doesn't work, I will reconnect all connections and start from scratch again.  

I looked around and read that it may have to do with the ram memory, and may be fixed by unplugging and reinserting the memory.  I have not messed with that as of yet.

Again, THANKS for your fix and for putting it on the web so it can help others!

 If I find anything definitive, I will post here.

---

Thanks! And yeah I saw quite a few threads saying that the RAM was not installed properly, but that is very unlikely considering my computer works flawlessly when I put in my old graphics card. It's just whenever I have the GTX 970 inserted I get the problem again.

Good luck!