So I'm putting this up on this part of the forum because I am uncertain of the problem that I am having with a computer belonging to a friend. He owns an Acer aspire 4720z, and believe me he would like nothing more than to burn the thing because its a piece of junk, but money is tight. It has windows vista on it to make matters worse. The problem RIGHT now is that once you start up the computer and log in, all you get is a black screen and the mouse. I can't even get to task manager on this thing to try to run some programs. Safe mode is no different. I tried a system restore for two days AGO (which is as far as it would let me), but that did nothing. I ran a memory DISK scan, and it came up clean. That's really all I've been able to do with it. I'm afraid that it is a hardware problem, but i have no way of knowing because theres so little that i can do with this computer. Any suggestions?Try doing a fresh OS Install. Is there data on the hard drive that you absolutely NEED to salvage? If so in this case it would be best to take it out and slave it to a working computer to backup your data first.Good idea. I just don't know if my friend has his OS backup discs still. That and I can't access the hardrive at all, so how would I be able to pull any of the files?You can use this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817392032&nm_mc=OTC-Froogle&cm_mmc=OTC-Froogle-_-External+Enclosure-_-Vantec-_-17392032


Take the HDD out, put it into an enclosure, and then plug the enclosure into a working PC to salvage the files.hypothetically could i use my windows 7 os for his computer? mines a dell but i dont think that would matter in this case.A Dell Win7 DVD will not work on an Acer...
You would be asking for alot of headaches...

Another Data Retrieval Option...