My parents' old computer got pretty old, and the power supply went bad so we got them a new computer. It's an HP Pavillion Slimline with Windows 7 64-bit. They were using it with no problems for a while, then one day it wouldn't load correctly. It started up normally and loaded the profile and everything, but right when the desktop was supposed to load the screen went black and nothing happened at all. Ctrl+Alt+Del was also unresponsive. You could, however, still see the mouse and move it around. We took it down to Staples and the people there weren't much help. The only other thing I could think of was to completely reset the computer to factory settings. I did that after I transferred all necessary files to my USB drive in Safe Mode (which oddly enough worked), and the computer worked.

However, this same situation is happening again. This is complete crap. I am not going to reset the computer again because this shouldn't be happening. Can anyone think of what would be happening? If there's no direct reason, I'm just going to have them take the computer back.

P.S. - My mom has a habit of leaving their computer on over-night; could that be it (something to do with the power supply again)?

It can load in Safe Mode, but she hasn't installed anything. It ran fine for about a month after I reset it the first time. The only thing my mom has done recently is browse the web and listen to music on Pandora.

EDIT: I removed all of the standard applications after I reset it to factory settings.

Yeah, I already uninstalled it all.

Hmm strange. I know Windows has a tendency to do that, although from experience all I had was the desktop background, no taskbar and just the mouse cursor, then it hung there, and this usually happened after installing several stuff, not with a fresh Windows install. I wonder if the install CD they gave you was made correctly? Maybe they did something wrong while making them... else it could be an hardware issue, but then I think the computer would simply not boot at all or at least not make it past the Windows screen.

Wow, it looks like the problem isn't just restricted to Windows, it may be a hardware issue.

Will they refund it? How long have you had the computer for?

Yea, if multiple clean installs doesn't work, it's best to rma it. I wouldn't suggest replacing anything by yourself in a slimline computer because its so slim lol

Not to mention possibly voiding the warrantee.
I send my condolences to your parents. They must be confused/frustrated right now.