Windows being very strange.

[HeroRareheart]

Earlier today I turned on my PC and after signing into Windows 11 I tried to open Discord and edge and nothing happened, I tried again after a few minutes and again nothing. I just said "screw this" and shut it off then went about my day. Now it's the afternoon and I went to turn it on only to encounter a similar issue, couldn't open discord however edge opened fine. I tried to open settings and it won't open, I tried all other programs and nothing would open. I tried opening task manager with ctrl+shift+escape, using the ctrl+alt+delete menu, and searching for it then running it that way but nothing happened. I tried to sign out and see if I could access the second account I made on the PC but it was stuck signing me out until just now, about 10 minutes, and the local account just isn't there anymore, maybe I deleted it and forgot. I've got no idea what's happening but given that my files are backed up to my NAS or not on the SSD with my Windows 11 install I'm thinking of clean installing but if that doesn't help I'd like guidance on where to start looking for a possible hardware failure. Given that I've plugged in failing HDD's before and seen it cause other random system processes to lock up and some of the HDD's in my system are getting old, and full, my gut says to start there.

[Dillpickle23422]

6 minutes ago, HeroRareheart said:

Earlier today I turned on my PC and after signing into Windows 11 I tried to open Discord and edge and nothing happened, I tried again after a few minutes and again nothing. I just said "screw this" and shut it off then went about my day. Now it's the afternoon and I went to turn it on only to encounter a similar issue, couldn't open discord however edge opened fine. I tried to open settings and it won't open, I tried all other programs and nothing would open. I tried opening task manager with ctrl+shift+escape, using the ctrl+alt+delete menu, and searching for it then running it that way but nothing happened. I tried to sign out and see if I could access the second account I made on the PC but it was stuck signing me out until just now, about 10 minutes, and the local account just isn't there anymore, maybe I deleted it and forgot. I've got no idea what's happening but given that my files are backed up to my NAS or not on the SSD with my Windows 11 install I'm thinking of clean installing but if that doesn't help I'd like guidance on where to start looking for a possible hardware failure. Given that I've plugged in failing HDD's before and seen it cause other random system processes to lock up and some of the HDD's in my system are getting old, and full, my gut says to start there.

As you mentioned, that sounds like a failing hard drive. Only thing you can really do now is to make sure you have a recent, working backup, and maybe order a new drive. Do icons/start menu load in? How long does it take to do normal, trivial taskts, like opening the calculator or chrome (it it'll even open at all)?

[bmx6454]

9 minutes ago, HeroRareheart said:

I'm thinking of clean installing

i would just start with that, and worry about a hardware issue if there is still a problem. don't see much sense in worrying about hardware before ruling out a more likely, less severe issue.

[HeroRareheart]

1 minute ago, Dillpickle23422 said:

As you mentioned, that sounds like a failing hard drive. Only thing you can really do now is to make sure you have a recent, working backup, and maybe order a new drive. Do icons/start menu load in? How long does it take to do normal, trivial taskts, like opening the calculator or chrome (it it'll even open at all)?

Up until just now it'd load windows just fine after booting and signing in but now it sits at a black screen with a mouse pointer after booting. as far as how long tasks took after a few minutes tasks would just NEVER finish. I'm hoping the main SSD isn't dead so I'll be unplugging all the HDD's and seeing if I can boot with just the SSD before doing anything more.

[HeroRareheart]

1 minute ago, bmx6454 said:

i would just start with that, and worry about a hardware issue if there is still a problem. don't see much sense in worrying about hardware before ruling out a more likely, less severe issue.

I'll start with unplugging all but the boot drive then clean install if it still acts up.

[bmx6454]

3 minutes ago, HeroRareheart said:

I'll start with unplugging all but the boot drive then clean install if it still acts up.

one more thing to add, if you do install windows fresh, make sure to leave them disconnected until after you finish. if you have any other drive other than the one you are installing windows to connected, windows will usually put some of the files on different drives. that way, if the other drive starts having issues, or you remove/format it, it can brick your windows install. not sure why they do that, and not sure if that stopped with win11, but happened to me every time on win10.

[HeroRareheart]

2 minutes ago, bmx6454 said:

one more thing to add, if you do install windows fresh, make sure to leave them disconnected until after you finish. if you have any other drive other than the one you are installing windows to connected, windows will usually put some of the files on different drives. that way, if the other drive starts having issues, or you remove/format it, it can brick your windows install. not sure why they do that, and not sure if that stopped with win11, but happened to me every time on win10.

I've had that happen. If Windows boot manager is on another drive it'll use the instance of Windows boot manager already on that drive rather than make a new instance on the new drive.

[HeroRareheart]

@Dillpickle23422 @bmx6454 Yup still acts up with the SSD, time to clean install.

[bmx6454]

39 minutes ago, HeroRareheart said:

I've had that happen. If Windows boot manager is on another drive it'll use the instance of Windows boot manager already on that drive rather than make a new instance on the new drive.

yes, but it will also put some files on if you don't and/or never have had windows on the other drive. it's honestly strange, and i was never able to find an answer as to why it does that lol

[HeroRareheart]

2 minutes ago, bmx6454 said:

yes, but it will also put some files on if you don't and/or never have had windows on the other drive. it's honestly strange, and i was never able to find an answer as to why it does that lol

Well that's news to me, what the hell m\Microsoft.