Windows 10 laptop, no USB, keyboard and mouse

Question

Today when I wanted to use my computer again (it was still running from the day before), I noticed my mouse cursor was gone. Moving the mouse did not reveal the cursor, neither did using the trackpad. The keyboard from my laptop worked fine so I used that to reboot.

Then after the reboot my keyboard did not work either. So I can not login.

When I go to the bios, then the keyboard and trackpad work fine. Also an external keyboard and mouse work, so it seems like this is a software issue.

After a lot of attempts, I managed that I can boot to "safe mode with networking", but the keyboard does not work their either. Also the mouse does not work, the led won't even go on.

What can I do at this point?

---- UPDATE

When I boot with the recovery options and try to go to Command Prompt there then it says my password is wrong...

---- UPDATE 2

I can not find a way to boot from a usb. I have a asus zenbook pro duo.

• fast boot is disabled
• secure boot is disabled

I have a usb with ubuntu and one with windows 10, they both show up on my mac when booting. For windows I get nothing...

--- UPDATE 3

I noticed that sometimes I have to reboot several times before the laptop can see the USB with windows 10 on it.

I was able to Enable built in Admin Account, atleast it sayed the command was executed correctly, or something among those lines. However, If I boot, I don't see it to log in with it.

I tried a startup repair from the usb, I get:

Startup Repair coulnd't repair your PC Press "Advanced options" to try other options to repair your PC or "Shut down" to turn off your PC. Log file: C:\WINDOWS\System32\Logfiles\Srt\SrtTrial.txt

At this point I'm the most interested in recovering my data. It ain't much, but it's still worth it. Any help is welcome. A repair would also be nice, but at this point I have no clue of what to do.

---

As for the steps that John pointed out in what is at the moment the first answer:

• I did enable the built in admin account. But not sure if this went ok. I did not get any errors.

First: Try Windows 10 Initial Repairs.

I cannot run CMD as an Administrator, cause my password is wrong.

Second: If the above does not solve the issue, run a Windows 10 Repair Install

This gives me "Startup Repair couldn't repair your pc".

Third:

No idea how to backup the data.

Finally:

Same as step Third, no Idea of what to do.

Answer 1

1. Don't panic, your data is still there and laptop can be reset and will be good as new. In fact, it will be better than new after reset ;-)

2. If your primary objective is not losing data, stop immediately with any attempts to repair/reset anything, as well as trying to retrieve your password or boot from another Windows USB stick. Make a backup of your data first, experiment later.

3. The easiest way to make a backup is to boot from a bootable Ubuntu USB stick, connect an external hard drive to a USB port and copy all your files to the external hard drive. Which you then disconnect and store in a safe place before performing any further repair actions. You say you have an "Ubuntu USB stick", but are you sure it is bootable?

4. The easiest way to make a bootable Ubuntu USB stick is by using software called Rufus on a different Windows computer. You can also create a bootable USB using MacOS.

5. If your "broken" laptop has a 64-bit processor, you can use any Windows or MacOS computer to create a bootable USB. However, if your "broken" laptop is 32-bit, you will need to find another computer running 32-bit version of Windows. Or install a 32-bit version of Windows on that computer first (physically or in a virtual machine).

6. For bootable Ubuntu USB stick for backup purposes I recommend using an older version of Ubuntu, particularly 16.04 LTS 32-bit version. The reason is because it will run almost guaranteed on any laptop, no matter 32- or 64-bit, fast or slow. This Ubuntu version is still officially supported. Get it from here: http://releases.ubuntu.com/16.04/ , make sure you download 32-bit version to create a USB stick from it.

7. To actually create a bootable Ubuntu USB stick, simply follow this easy official step-by-step tutorial: https://ubuntu.com/tutorials/create-a-usb-stick-on-windows . The first section of the tutorial gives you an option to switch to a tutorial for MacOS.

8. Once you have created a bootable Ubuntu 16.04 32-bit USB stick, you insert it in your "broken" laptop and switch it on. Then go to BIOS. Find a setting that looks like "BOOT PRIORITY" or "BOOT ORDER" or "BOOT SOURCE" or something similar, and put your Ubuntu USB stick on #1 spot in the list. Reboot. Wait. Ubuntu installer will start up. Choose "Try Ubuntu". Now Ubuntu interface will start up. This way, you can safely copy all your files to an external HDD.

Answer 2

... external keyboard and mouse work, so it seems like this is a software issue.

You need to be able to log in. Please see this article for enabling the built-in Administrator Account. If you succeed with this, you may be able to change the password of your user account.

Enable built in Admin Account

First: Try Windows 10 Initial Repairs.

Open cmd.exe with Run as Administrator.

dism.exe  /online  /cleanup-image  /startcomponentcleanup
dism.exe  /online  /cleanup-image  /restorehealth
SFC /SCANNOW

Restart when this is complete and test normal boot.

Second: If the above does not solve the issue, run a Windows 10 Repair Install

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

Windows 10 is running, so click on the Download button (not Upgrade Button) and select Run. If the Repair will not run as per above, use the Download button to create a USB Windows Installation key, then run Setup on the USB Key.

This will launch the Repair and proceed normally.

Start with the option to Keep Everything.

Third: The repairs above cannot repair a damaged Windows User Profile. If the Windows User Profile is damaged, back up all the data and email in the User Profile, delete the Profile and make a new Profile.

You can also Keep Data, or Keep Nothing. Keep Nothing is very close to a clean install.

Finally: Major issues may indicate the need to back up your data and re-install Windows. Use the Windows 10 USB (Media Creation Link) to start the system and back up data.

Answer 3

After 3 days troubleshooting and finding lots of poor people who didn't take a Restore Point before trying the RegKey hacks, I finally found a solution.

I ended up calling Microsoft support who went through many troubleshooting efforts with me. In the end, I needed to perform a full Windows upgrade to correct the issue.

Ref:

https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/windows-10/pointing-devices-disappeared-from-within-device-manager/m-p/161142

Solution

Follow these steps to perform a full Windows upgrade, it does take a few hours though it's the only thing I've found that solves the problem and gets your USB Mouse, Keyboard, Joystick and etc back working again:

Take an OS image

1. Using a PS2 keyboard (or a USB female to PS2 male converter) navigate to Windows 10 download site.

2. Download and save the "Create Windows 10 installation media" on your computer.

3. When the download is completed, as a Administrator logged into your PC run the Media Creation Tool (MediaCreationTool21H1.exe).

4. Accept the license agreement.

5. Choose Create installation media for another PC & click Next.

6. At the next screen choose Next. *

7. At 'Choose which media to use' choose ISO file and click Next.

8. Select a location to save the 'Windows.iso' file and click Save (typically a 4.5GB file).

In place reinstall/upgrade using the OS image

1. Open Windows Explorer and navigate to the folder you saved the 'Windows.iso' file.

2. Right-click on the ISO file and select Open With > Windows Explorer.

3. Double click the setup.exe application.

4. At 'Ready to Install' screen, make sure that the "Keep personal files and Apps" option is selected and click Install.

5. Wait for the inplace reinstall/upgrade process to complete.

After it finishes you can plugin your USB Keyboard and Mouse and they will work!

Answer 4

I understand that if you recover your administrator password you could recover the system.

So what you need this: recover said password.

There are multiple ways to do it. But without using dubious software the best is to boot with a USB with Linux.

I use the one described in great detail here:

https://miloserdov.org/?p=4287

And in a more summarized way:

Reset windows 10 password from Linux

goog luck!!!

Answer 5

If you have another computer, then you can put the laptop's hard drive on it to recover the files.

If your computer can detect a USB flash drive, you can use CMD (without the admin rights) to copy all your important files there.

If you still have your Windows installation disc, you can use that to hopefully be able to use CMD (again, without admin rights), then copy all your important files to a USB flash drive. (You can't access network files in cmd afaik sadly.)