Acer Nitro freezing on Boot but boots through F10

Hi.
Acer Nitro 5 AN515-43 on windows 11 - Clean Install.
It freezes with Acer logo and doesn't boot. But if I press F2 to get into boot menu and select either Windows Boot Manager or Boot USB and then press F10 to confirm my choices ,it then boots up!!
I'm addition randomly freezes once logged in.

PCDoctor toolkit - No problems even in Stress test.
Memory read test passed. No data in either of it's drives except windows update, Nvidia Studio driver and Edge browser.
Online queries suggested I change the hard drive which I have into a brand new hard drive - but no luck.
Also did the basic hard reset ( including disconnecting Battery and the Bios battery).
Bios driver updated. Memory removed cleaned and inserted back.

Can anyone explain why the laptop boots through boot menu only and any ideas what problem this is ?
Thanks and Regards
Katie

Enter BIOS Menu and Disable "Fast Boot" - see if that helps.

Also make sure Windows Boot Manager is top priority in the bios boot order.

The AI also suggested disabling Fast Boot.

• The Acer Nitro 5 AN515-43 uses InsydeH2O Rev. 5.0 BIOS, which always places Fast Boot under the Main tab (never under Boot).
• If Fast Boot is not visible, set an Administrator Password inside BIOS → Security tab; the option may appear afterward.
• Some users see it grayed out until “F9 – Load Defaults” is applied.

Click to expand...

Why it only boots if you enter BIOS (F2) first

This is a classic sign of a problem happening before Windows starts loading.
When you enter BIOS setup and then exit with F10, the laptop performs a different/longer hardware initialization sequence than it does during a normal boot.

Why it also freezes after login

This is the biggest clue that the issue is still at a hardware/firmware level, NOT a Windows installation or drive problem.

Freezing after login rules out:
- Storage
- Bootloader
- Drivers (mostly)
- Windows corruption

It points strongly to RAM instability, EC/BIOS firmware problem, or motherboard power delivery faults.

Click to expand...

Hi ,
Thanks to everyone for the ideas. Tried disabling fast boot.....no dice! It goes to diagnosing your PC and then connecting to network and then.....cannot repair.
Just so tired of re-installing Windows which it allows. Had some bit locker problem after a few installs - had the key! :)
All tests have been normal.
Will try another install

Katiesmyname said:

Clean Install.

Click to expand...

This brings up a red flag to me. Did the device boot normally before you clean installed?

Logged in suddenly but don't want to restart for anything!
PCDoctor - crash report

glasskuter said:

This brings up a red flag to me. Did the device boot normally before you clean installed?

Click to expand...

Nope. It started by freezing at the logo for no reason at all at a restart. Prior to that running great with video editing ,etc. Hard stop was essential and it led to the only way to start it was through boot menu. Then tried to mend through CMD , no luck and since one of the ideas was that the hard drive itself could be corrupt, it was decided that a clean install in a new drive the best idea.
It allows me to reinstall as long as I access it through boot menu and use the recovery USB. But reinstall is pointless because I need to restart for the updates anyways and then it's like greeting stuck in an infinite loop with no way out.

Just from what you have said, the BCD configuration or the drive that BCD resides on could be suspect.
One more question. Other than the system drive and your usb installation drive, when you did a clean install, did you have a second drive (of any kind) installed in your computer or did you remove all other drives before clean installing?

According to Acer, as I read the specs, that device has a total solid state drive capacity of 512gb. Is your new drive larger than that.
From your description, I would not have suspected this being a windows problem since it happens before Windows starts to load. I believe it's at the hardware/firmware level

Latest crash report on PCDoctor

glasskuter said:

Just from what you have said, the BCD configuration or the drive that BCD resides on could be suspect.
One more question. Other than the system drive and your usb installation drive, when you did a clean install, did you have a second drive (of any kind) installed in your computer or did you remove all other drives before clean installing?

According to Acer, as I read the specs, that device has a total solid state drive capacity of 512gb. Is your new drive larger than that.
From your description, I would not have suspected this being a windows problem since it happens before Windows starts to load. I believe it's at the hardware/firmware level

Click to expand...

Thank you glasskuter!
Completely agree. Regarding SSD it is indeed 500gb. The second drive has been attached in recent installs although I did try with just the new SSD as well. No change.
One thing - the times it's allowed me a decent entry into the windows has been after disconnecting the main battery and CMOS for at least five minutes.
I've tried various permutations of removing one memory and swapping,etc.
One last thing in addition to the smooth entry after the battery disconnect, I still get sudden freeze somewhere after signing into Windows.
Thinking of replacing both batteries next although Test report has suggested no problem.

Katiesmyname said:

Thinking of replacing both batteries next although Test report has suggested no problem.

Click to expand...

You might want to change the cmos battery and set bios to default if you have not done that, but before spending money on a new system battery, I would remove it from the equation. Most laptops can run solely on AC power with no battery installed.

Katiesmyname said:

It goes to diagnosing your PC and then connecting to network and then.....cannot repair.

Click to expand...

1) Please boot to the flash drive Windows RE



2) Run > startup repair > search for srttrail.txt (windows\system32\logfiles\srt\srttrail.txt) > post a share link