Acer Swift SF314-41 Stuck on start up screen and "Preparing automatic repair"

Please help, my laptop is:

Acer Swift SF314-41 Series

Model number N17W7

when I power on it is stuck on loading screen, I read some other forum questions and it was suggested to hold down the power button 3x times. After doing so the screen stayed the same but now the words "preparing automatic repair" come up. I have let it sit, charger off. Everytime I turn it on its one of the 2 aforementioned screens. I've tried ALT + F10, F10 and enter.

When I press F2 immediately this screen comes up.

Any advice appreciated! If I can't save the laptop I need the files at least.

Thanks,

Heather

[Edited the thread to add model name to the title]

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Puraw

https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/698384/stuck-on-start-up-screen-and-preparing-automatic-repair

Hi Heather,

In a situation like this don't unplug the power adapter. I assume you already tried Alt+F10 after you boot as soon as the Acer logo shows? If that did not start the Windows Recovery OS, your bootloader on the boot drive is missing or corrupted. You need to boot with a Windows USB Recovery flash drive. Consider bringing the laptop to Acer Services in your country to reset the system to factory defaults for a small service fee or try this:

If you don't have a Windows Recovery USB drive (highly recommended) make one now on another PC with the same Windows version as your laptop: Insert a 20+GB flash drive in the USB port of the second PC, boot to Windows and type Recovery disk in Search, it will take about 40 minutes to make it. Insert this recovery stick in your Swift laptop USB port and boot to BIOS with F2, move to the Boot screen and if the USB drive is at the bottom of the Boot Devices move it to the top with F5/F6, save settings on exit and reboot normally with the USB drive still inserted. You will get the blue Troubleshoot menu (WindowsRE OS). Read section 3 of the link below "Boot from the installation media" how to proceed: https://windowsreport.com/repair-efi-bootloader-windows-11/

If you get stuck or the above procedure does not work, I recommend bringing the laptop to Acer Services. 😉

StevenGen

https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/698384/stuck-on-start-up-screen-and-preparing-automatic-repair

This “Preparing Automatic Repair” can happen when the boot drive is faulty and/or the Windows startup repair tool fails to fix the startup issue, and it can be frustrating to deal with. Here are some ways you might be able to fix it:

Do a Hard Reset and clean the PCIe3x4 M.2 SSD drive pins and laptop M.2 slot from dust, then take the main battery out and disconnecting the RTC/BIOS battery and short its mainboard +&- pins at the plug, as that resets the CMOS and then take the removable ram out and leave the laptop like that for 15min and reconnect everything and see if the laptop boots.
If the laptop reboots then be aware that your laptop is running the 1st Acer oem bios dated: 2019/11/21 bios, so you need to update the bios to the last version 1.10 and make sure that you have all the Win-10 updates and latest Chipset and VGA AMD driver updated for your Swift SF314-41 laptop.
Check if you’re booting to the correct drive: It’s possible that your PC is trying to boot to the wrong drive. To check and potentially change it back to the correct one, you need to open your PC’s boot menu and select your C: drive .
Boot into Safe Mode: Safe Mode is a diagnostic tool that may be able to load a basic Windows version that fixes your startup error, and the repair loop will no longer trigger. To boot into Safe Mode, reboot your system using the Power button and press F8, F12, or F2 while it reboots. When you start seeing the Windows logo on the screen, turn off your system again .
Perform Startup Repair: Some users recommend performing Startup Repair when the laptop is stuck on Preparing Automatic Repair during startup. The steps are as follows: Insert the bootable media into your computer and boot from it. Select your language preferences, and click on Next. Click on Repair your computer 3.