hmm...well if you can boot into safe mode, I'd boot into safe mode with command prompt. (One of the boot options when you press f8) and do a chkdsk on the main drive. My just got done working with my friend's computer who had issues with his hard drive, and he had trouble booting windows, so I half wonder if the drive itself is kicking the bucket. If it is you will want to stop using it immediatly, buy an enclosure for the drive, or a 2.5" to 3.5" drive adapter and throw it in a pc and pull off anything important that you can. Again assuming if that is the problem. If you have another laptop, try switching out the hard drives to see if it will boot off of the other drive. My only other thought is that maybe something on the computer is shorting out, in which case a warrenty would probably fix that.

I'm not sure they can switch hard drives without it messing with the warranty though, if it's internal. I know I had a problem with my laptop, restore had worked but I had to run it twice and they warned me to not open the pc whatsoever incase I had to send it in. The only thing I could remove was the battery but nothing under the sticker.

I surely wouldn't mess up the warranty

I'm not a professional and I have only a little knowledge from assembling my own and working on my own so I can't be of further assistance. I myself would send it in but maybe someone here will know something more?

But I would still not mess up the warranty.. Warranties can be pricey and so can the repairs.

Xts

What you are experiencing is a common problem that I and other 5100 owners have had. It is apparently caused by a defect in the motherboard that causes the computer to stop recognizing the hard disk and display the blue screen with broken white lines. It then shuts down, reboots, and usualy displays an error message indicating a fixed disk error and then freezes. I usually have to press and hold the power button until the computer "hard" powers down, then press and release the power button again and allow the computer to boot up normally. After this it usually runs fine. This error seems to mostly happen while playing games or doing anything grahics intensive.

Unfortunately everyone I have communicated with who has experienced this same problem, has no idea how to fix it and Acer tech support likes to pretend that they are unaware of this issue with this model, even though it has been a known issue for quite some time now and I know many people have reported it to them.

As for the black screen on bootup, I have experienced this a couple of times. I found that if I was just patient and waited a few minutes (sometimes as long as 5 to 10 minutes) the screen WILL eventually come on all by itself. Fortunately for me this problem is a rare occurance. Try just being patient and see if it clears itself up. If it doesn't then you most likely have a bad screen or a bad graphics card which is another known issue for this model.

Hope this helped.

MK1505