We've been having a LOT of difficulties with Vista on our laptops recently. The bootup process goes relatively fast until it gets to the "please wait" screen just before CTRL-ALT-DEL would normally appear. The laptops can sit here for 10 minutes or 10 hours. No rhyme or reason. Nothing in the event log says anything about what it is trying to do. Everything seems normal except this LONG wait at "Please Wait..."After some experimenting, I determined that if I disable the "Network Location Awareness" service, everything works fine. Better than fine actually... everything is faster than ever. Boot up takes 45 seconds from power on to the CTRL-ALT-DEL screen.My question is, why all of a sudden is this an issue? Why would NLA cause huge hangups and delays on boot? By disabling it, it seems to be fixed, if not better than before. If I leave this disabled, is it going to break anything else? Minded, we are a school district. We have a local network. No internet acess unless through a proxy. Relatively simple network setup. 2008 servers. 1 domain controller.Ideas?

Hi, Thank you for posting here. Based on my research,system needs to judge the current network profile/location when applying computer policies because some policies may depend on such information (e.g., Windows Firewall policies.); so, when it starts, it will wait for the NLA service. If the service does not work properly or it is conflicted, it may lead to this issue. At this time, please try the following to have a check: Clean boot ================= 1) Click the Start Button type "msconfig" (without quotation marks) in the Search box, and then press Enter. Note: If prompted, please click Continue on the User Account Control (UAC) window. 2) Click the "Services" tab, check the "Hide All Microsoft Services" box and click "Disable All" (if it is not gray). 3) Click the "Startup" tab, click "Disable All" and click "OK". 4) Please ensure that NLA is not disabled. Then, restart the computer. When the "System Configuration Utility" window appears, please check the "Don't show this message or launch the System Configuration Utility when Windows starts" box and click OK. NOTE: we can go back to normal boot by running msconfig again and checking on Normal Startup in the General tab. In the Clean Boot Environment, the third party services and applications are disabled, please check the issue persists. If the problem does not occur, it indicates that the problem is related to one application or service we have disabled. You may use the MSCONFIG tool again to re-enable the disabled item one by one to find out the culprit. Thanks. Nicholas Li TechNet Subscriber Support in forum If you have any feedback on our support, please contact tngfb@microsoft.com.Nicholas Li - MSFT

Hi, I just want to see how everything is going. If you have any questions or concerns on the recent information I've provided you, please feel free to let me know. I am happy to be of assistance. Thanks.Have a great day! Nicholas Li TechNet Subscriber Support in forum If you have any feedback on our support, please contact tngfb@microsoft.com.Nicholas Li - MSFT

Sorry it took me so long to reply. I have already tried everything you had suggested. I spent an hour or more disabling services and rebooting. As I had stated, I basically disabled everything in MSCONFIG. That did nothing. The next thing I started doing was disabling services. I disabled everything that wasn't microsoft supplied. That did nothing. Then I disabled pretty much every service that was set to automatic. Every time I rebooted, the system came up quickly without incident. I began re-enabling services and rebooting to see if any one of those caused the problem to come back. The only time the problem came back was when I re-enabled the NLA service. I then disabled NLA once more and re-enabled EVERYTHING I had done. Everything... services, msconfig, startup groups... etc. The system once again booted quickly without problem. Once I re-enabled the NLA service again, the problem returned. I then moved to another computer that was having the issue. I left everything as-is and went straight to disable the NLA service. On a reboot, the problem was gone. I enabled the NLA service and reboot, the problem returned. Something is causing NLA to hang up on boot and cause a "Please wait" screen that will sit for 30 minutes or more. It doesn't happen on every machine, but on the machines that it is happening on, disabling the NLA fixes it every time.

Hello, I am experiencing a similar issue, with Windows 7 Ultimate, the system updated recently with a critical patch, recently being in the last few days. The system gets to the "Please Wait" screen and there it sits. I have disabled the NLA Service as Chuck5566 has commented on with resolving his problem. Unfortunately that did not cure mine. I have attempted the MSConfig routine that was also discussed in this posting, and I get the same result... the system hangs at "Please Wait" Any additional help would be nice. Thank you A.Hohensee Computer Nook Microsoft Partner (909)381-3446 allen@cnook.com ahohensee@hotmail.com

My system was hanging at "Please Wait" as well. Disabling the NLA service fixed it. Thanks!

I'm running Windows 7 x64 on a Dell laptop. I could sometimes make this go away by switching off the wireless radio. Not always, though. I ended up setting the service to manual start. So far, go good. I'll post back later if I have to disable the service. Thanks for the tip. Greg Wilkerson

I had this issue as well. Disabling NLA worked for me, but now I have the red x through my network icon in the system tray. Any idea why NLA would all of a sudden cause this? Didn't have a problem until last week, and it happened on both a laptop and a pc with Windows 7 pro. Running on sbs 2008 domain with folder redirection.

Same problem for me, however it started just after I had registered the PC's (Vista) to a brandnew SBS2008 domain. When removing it from the domain, I again reach alt-ctrl-del stage, as soon as I link it to the domain again, they go into indefinite hang on 'please wait' screen.

John, When I was running Vista, I found that issue to be related to the group policy service. If I recall correctly, the group policy service can't be disabled (I wasn't using it). So, I renamed the group policy dll (can't remember the name) to something Windows couldn't find. You'll get an error in your event log everytime you start the computer, but it booted much faster. Greg

I have exactly the same issue as A.Hohensee and wondered if there has been any progress on this. My client's laptop is a Lenovo T410i with Windows 7 Pro and is not a member of a domain, using only local profile. So far, I've tried: Booting to Safe Mode and disabling all Services - doesn't work Downloading the password-protected KB fix from MS but you can't run this in Safe Mode! Rolling back to the last System Restore point Rebuilding from Recovery Partition Always the same result and I can't pinpoint which update it is that breaks it. I'm now looking at potentially paying MS £199 to fix a problem that they caused and the published potential fix for which is useless! Any help appreciated. Alan Rogers DreamGenius Ltd +44 17 3730 0480 info@dreamgenius.net dreamgenius@hotmail.com

Hello Alan, I was wondering if you were able to get anywhere with this issue. I too am in the same boat and have tried all the above with no luck. Ian Gillanders

Hi Ian, That same problem started with my new Dell laptop (E6410), running Windows 7 Enterprise. By systematically doing the "Clean Boot" procedures, I found out that the "Audio Service" by IDT, Inc. was the culprit. Through "msconfig", I disabled it both from the "Services" and "Startup" tabs - the system came up fine. I did not have to disable NLA or any other services.

We have the same problem with many Win7 Ent machines, but a different cause. It turns out that the Microsoft SCCM client is "bloating" the WMI Repository (c:\windows\system32\wbem\repository). When the repository gets big (above 150-200MB) then the Please Wait screen is shown for 4-6minutes. When disabling the "Windows Management Instrumentation" service (winmgmt), then the problem disappear. However, this is of cause not a solution as this is caused by the SCCM client, the solution must be to get the SCCM client fixed.

Download the Vista Recovery Disk here: http://neosmart.net/blog/2008/windows-vista-recovery-disc-download/. Create boot disk from .iso. Boot from disk. Chose "Repair Computer". Chose "Vista Installation". Chose "Command Prompt". Type "bootrec.exe". Ignore all four choices. Type "bcdedit /export c:\bcd_backup". Type "c:". Type "cd boot". Type "attrib -s -h -r". Type "ren c:\boot\bcd bcd.old". Type "bootrec /rebuildbcd". Type "y" for yes. Restart. Problem solved.

I just tried booting in safe mode and selected the last known good configuration.. and it worked ..solved my problem..

@james1seattle: Your solution of backing up and replacing boot files: How about an explanation of why it works. Because.... ....excact same "please wait" occurs frequently during Windows XP installing, for repair install or new, using OEM cd. Even if first run repair commands in recovery console.

I have been having the same problem on a windows 7 pro machine. Disconnecting the ethernet cable before boot allowed it to start with no problem. The compute is connected to SBS 2011, however I know the server is still having a problem pushing group policies to the domain computers.

We have been seeing a few situations where a laptop that is not connected to any wired or wireless network connection will hang at “Please wait” for quite a long time. Go to -- Network Location Awareness properties or local computer step 2 : Then you see a window Network location then go to Generl Tab step 3 : Go to startup type : it should be automatic or we suggest trying to set the NLA Service to Automatic (Delayed Start). If that still causes the stall at start up, then change the service to Manual so that the OS can still fire up the service if it is required. Once the setting change is complete, the laptop should boot up and display the logon screen in essentially the same amount of time whether connected to a network or not.

Same thing here, I have an Dell Latitude E5410, also Windows 7 Enterprise. when I disabled Audio Service by IDT, the system worked fine.

I'm seeing this problem too, but my system doesn't have the IDT audio service, and I've tried disabling NLA. Here are some other notes: "Please wait..." shows for almost exactly an hour consistently. I've found nothing glaring (to me) in an enourmous ProcMon (SysInternal) boot-time capture, but I wasn't really sure what I was looking for. It boots pretty much normally (minutes) if I disconnect the network. One suspicion I have is that software-install group policies that refer to a network path on a decomissioned server are at fault. However I've created a test OU and turned off those policies, and the only one claiming update is readily available. Is there any way I can more closely monitor boot-time semiphors? Or Boot-Time GP processing?

I had this same problem with a computer running Win 7 Pro in a domain. I disabled NLA , which did not work. I then removed the computer from the domain and manualy deleted the computer object from the Active Directory. After rejoining the computer to the domain I checked the AD again to make sure the object was created, reenabled network discovery on the machine and remapped network drives, reenabled NLA and then did a restart. It all worked fine. No more problems. Anyone with the same setup may want to try this.

We have the same problem with many Win7 Ent machines, but a different cause. It turns out that the Microsoft SCCM client is "bloating" the WMI Repository (c:\windows\system32\wbem\repository). When the repository gets big (above 150-200MB) then the Please Wait screen is shown for 4-6minutes. When disabling the "Windows Management Instrumentation" service (winmgmt), then the problem disappear. However, this is of cause not a solution as this is caused by the SCCM client, the solution must be to get the SCCM client fixed. We are experiencing the same exact thing... Were you able to ever correct this specific issue with SCCM?

I found this link that helped troubleshoot the issue: http://soeteam.blogspot.com/2011/03/howto-turn-windows-7-please-wait-into.html Turn on verbose messages about what is actually happening during the "Please Wait" screen. In my case, some old GPO-based installs were still being applied to some client machines. Whatever is happening, flipping this registry setting to turn on verbose status messages should aid troubleshooting.

We have the same problem with many Win7 Ent machines, but a different cause. It turns out that the Microsoft SCCM client is "bloating" the WMI Repository (c:\windows\system32\wbem\repository). When the repository gets big (above 150-200MB) then the Please Wait screen is shown for 4-6minutes. When disabling the "Windows Management Instrumentation" service (winmgmt), then the problem disappear. However, this is of cause not a solution as this is caused by the SCCM client, the solution must be to get the SCCM client fixed. We are experiencing the same exact thing... Were you able to ever correct this specific issue with SCCM? I found the issue. There is a hotfix from microsoft that stops the WMI from running a full check on each bootup.