Solved After a Restore get black screen on signing in

I was playing around stopping One Drive and trying to set up my Documents to be just like my desktop. I cannot remember the details of what I was doing other than I ran a recent restore to get back to where I started. On doing so, the computer brings up the login screen. On entering the pin, it opens to a black screen with pointer. I can bring up Task Manager with CTRL ALT Delete. From there I can run programs via Run new task there. Programs such as Word, Firefox, Chrome, etc. work fine. I even used winver.exe to get the Windows version.

How can I get back to my normal desktop?

Thanks,

Jeff

Computer: HP Spectre x360 2-in-1 Laptop 16-f2097nr

Did you image your system prior to messing with onedrive and user folders. If so restore the image.. I believe the reason you are getting a black screen is because you did not deal with onedrive properly. A system restore will not correct anything in your user account. It affects only windows files. Since I have no idea all that you actually did, I can only tell you how you can get back into a working Windows account.

FROM OLD ACCOUNT
Open the run command by pressing Win Key+R. type ms-settings:home and OK. Alternateky from 'run new task' your can enter that command to get to settings.
1. (Windows HOME) Turn off device encryption if it is currently on. Turn On or Off Device Encryption in Windows 11 Tutorial
(Windows PRO) turn off standard Bitlocker. Turn Off BitLocker for Drive in Windows 11 Tutorial
Note: If you are asked for your encryption key and you do not have it, it should be stored in your MS account
2. Create a new local account
Settings>Accounts>Scroll down and click on Other Users.
Select add account>select I don't have this person's signin information
In user name box name the account and assign a password.
Very Important- Make the new user an administrator. Once account is created, to the right of the new user name click down arrow. Select Change account type.
Click arrow to right of standard user and select Administrator.

Also from old account run a new task for explorer.exe
If your files are there, COPY them and then PASTE them onto external media (you must copy and paste so that you won't have permission issues.)

If your files are not in your user account, Log in to Onedrive on the web using your MS account. Sign in - Microsoft OneDrive
Hopefully your files are still there. Download all the files into your downloads folder and then copy them onto external media.
(Depending on what you did to get into this situation, there is a chance your files will be gone from both your user account and Onedrive. If they are, look in Onedrive 's recycle bin). If they're not there, then I do not know whether or not Microsoft can help you recover them.

Restart and log into the newly created account.

FROM YOUR NEW ACCOUNT

Once you are logged into the new account you can delete the old account. Copy the files you saved into your new account user folders.
Also in the new account disable Onedrive from auto-starting or it will nag you to setup onedrive..

1. Right-click the Windows Start button from the bottom of the screen & select task manager
2. in left pane Select “startup apps” Find Onedrive in list of startup apps, RIGHT click on it and disable.

Delete your old account.

glasskuter said:

FROM OLD ACCOUNT
Open the run command by pressing Win Key+R. type ms-settings:home and OK. Alternateky from 'run new task' your can enter that command to get to settings.

Click to expand...

Running ms-settings:home from 'run new task' comes back with a File System error (-2147219200). Therefore, I cannot do "Settings>Accounts>Scroll down" etc. As a side note, I tried this from my desktop following the same procedure and it works for that computer.

glasskuter said:

Also from old account run a new task for explorer.exe
If your files are there, COPY them and then PASTE them onto external media (you must copy and paste so that you won't have permission issues.)

Click to expand...

explorer.exe does not work from run new task. However, I just use browse from the new task box as the file explorer

What files do I need to copy? Most of my important files are on Dropbox or Google Drive.

Now there is my users account JeffF folder. Should I copy that?

glasskuter said:

If your files are not in your user account, Log in to Onedrive on the web using your MS account. Sign in - Microsoft OneDrive
Hopefully your files are still there. Download all the files into your downloads folder and then copy them onto external media.
(Depending on what you did to get into this situation, there is a chance your files will be gone from both your user account and Onedrive. If they are, look in Onedrive 's recycle bin). If they're not there, then I do not know whether or not Microsoft can help you recover them.

Click to expand...

I logged into One Drive files were in the Recycle Bin. I just restored them.

Not sure what to do next.

Thanks,
Jeff

Should I attempt to Undo the System Restore that I tried and ended up with the black screen? It appears that I can do that from run new task.

So are you saying you were able to backup your personal files? Correct? Preserving your data is the most important thing. Remove your external media and set it aside.

As far as undoing system restore, yes, if that option is available you can try it.

If you were successful in backing up your data,, before you reset or reinstall windows, we need to prove if the problem is just your user account or Windows in general. The way to do that is to create another account to see if the black screen problem is in that account as well. I'm trying to prevent you from having to reinstall Windows here.

Since you are unable to get into settings to create a new local account, let's see if you can enable the hidden administrator account.
From 'run new task' type C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe
If the command window opens type net user administrator /active:yes
(note the space)

Restart. You should see a new account named Administrator on the login screen. Select it and allow it to create its desktop. If a new desktop is successfully created (and it's not black) let's see if we can create your new local account from there. Report back if you cannot enable this account in this manner. If you can, proceed on.

1. (Windows HOME) Turn off device encryption if it is currently on. Turn On or Off Device Encryption in Windows 11 Tutorial
(Windows PRO) turn off standard Bitlocker. Turn Off BitLocker for Drive in Windows 11 Tutorial
Note: If you are asked for your encryption key and you do not have it, it should be stored in your MS account
2. Create a new local account
Settings>Accounts>Scroll down and click on Other Users.
Select add account>select I don't have this person's signin information
In user name box name the account and assign a password.
Very Important- Make the new user an administrator. Once account is created, to the right of the new user name click down arrow. Select Change account type.
Click arrow to right of standard user and select Administrator.

Restart and login to this new account. Before we go any further report back if this was successful.
Also please let me know if you are working with Windows 11 Home or Pro.

Are you facing a black screen with only a cursor visible on your Windows computer? This video offers a detailed walkthrough of the troubleshooting methods you can employ to fix this common issue. We will explore several potential causes and provide step-by-step instructions to help you restore your screen functionality. Join me as i tackle this problem and get your system back to normal.

glasskuter said:

As far as undoing system restore, yes, if that option is available you can try it.

Click to expand...

I tried this but it did not work. I think from what I saw that the original Restore attempt never worked anyway.

glasskuter said:

Since you are unable to get into settings to create a new local account, let's see if you can enable the hidden administrator account.

Click to expand...

I was able to successfully create a new local account by following suggestion from Freebooter using netplwiz by running new task from Task Manager. It went through the whole set asking one to be patient while it set it up. Unfortunately, it opened to a black screen with cursor.

glasskuter said:

Also please let me know if you are working with Windows 11 Home or Pro.

Click to expand...

Windows 11 Home.

FreeBooter said:

This video offers a detailed walkthrough of the troubleshooting methods you can employ to fix this common issue.

Click to expand...

I ran Dism /online /cleanup-image /restorehealth followed by sfc /scannow The later step did mention some corruption. A
As I mentioned to glasskuter, I was able to create a new local user but got black screen with cursor yet again. A cbs.log was created. It is 7 mb, apparently too large to upload.

Winlogon was already set to explorer.exe.

JeffFinnan said:

On entering the pin, it opens to a black screen with pointer. I can bring up Task Manager with CTRL ALT Delete. From there I can run programs via Run new task there. Programs such as Word, Firefox, Chrome, etc. work fine. I even used winver.exe to get the Windows version.

How can I get back to my normal desktop?

Click to expand...

If you run explorer.exe from the Task Manager it will bring up the desktop. Whether it stays there after a reboot is open to question, maybe, maybe not, but at least you'll have the desktop back for a while, maybe permanently. Try it and see.

Bree said:

If you run explorer.exe from the Task Manager it will bring up the desktop

Click to expand...

Yeah, I have tried running explorer.exe from new task box from Task Manager. There is a delay as though it is starting up. Unfortunately nothing happens.

JeffFinnan said:

Yeah, I have tried running explorer.exe from new task box from Task Manager. There is a delay as though it is starting up. Unfortunately nothing happens.

Click to expand...

Then I suggest an in-place repair install.

glasskuter said:

Also from old account run a new task for explorer.exe

Click to expand...

Bree said:

f you run explorer.exe from the Task Manager it will bring up the desktop

Click to expand...

I ran this multiple times while watching the processes in Task Manager. Windows Problem Reporting and Service Host: Windows Error Reporter are at the top for a moment.

JeffFinnan said:

I ran Dism /online /cleanup-image /restorehealth followed by sfc /scannow

Click to expand...

JeffFinnan said:

I ran this multiple times while watching the processes in Task Manager. Windows Problem Reporting and Service Host: Windows Error Reporter are at the top for a moment.

Click to expand...

When SFC and DISM fail to fix things, an in-place repair install should get everything working again.

Bree said:

When SFC and DISM fail to fix things, an in-place repair install should get everything working again.

Repair Install Windows 11 with an In-place Upgrade

This tutorial will show you how to do a repair install of Windows 11 by performing an in-place upgrade without losing anything. If you need to repair or create a new recovery partition or having problems with the Windows 11 operating system on your PC, and the usual solutions will not fix it...

www.elevenforum.com

Click to expand...

Unfortunately, went through all this and still came back with black screen.

Did you follow all my suggestion at my video guide?

JeffFinnan said:

Unfortunately, went through all this and still came back with black screen.

Click to expand...

Bree said:

When SFC and DISM fail to fix things, an in-place repair install should get everything working again.

Repair Install Windows 11 with an In-place Upgrade

This tutorial will show you how to do a repair install of Windows 11 by performing an in-place upgrade without losing anything. If you need to repair or create a new recovery partition or having problems with the Windows 11 operating system on your PC, and the usual solutions will not fix it...

www.elevenforum.com

Click to expand...

I stand corrected. I was working on trying some other options. The computer was acting very sluggishly. I went to restart it. The notebook was set to update some things. Went through the usual update and restart screens. Lo and behold, it opened up the usual desktop. At first glance, most things seem to be working.

Thanks Bree.

Jeff