Black screen of death during login

[ChrisERAU]

I was customizing some windows login bmp's, and when I put the computer to sleep and woke it back up to test the login screen, I got the black screen of death. I'm not sure why this happened, because I've modified this and other bmp's without any problem. By the way, the bitmap in question is one of the user tile pictures. It seems like windows freaks out if just one bmp is "invalid". I've tried restarting and got the same black screen, even though the computer boots right to the desktop after restarting (automatic login, without showing the user tile).
I've read tons of posts regarding similar issues, but I haven't been able to resolve my issue. Here's what I've tried:
All configurations of safe mode (i.e., networking, command prompt, etc.)
System restore
Startup repair
Sfc \scannow
None of these worked. I've done successful system restores in the past, but those restore points are not available anymore, and the two that I have now didn't work.
Again, task manager is NOT available, and safe mode also goes to the black screen.
I don't have all my files backed up. Ironically, I was looking for external hard drives earlier, but I haven't bought one yet. The copy of windows that I have was a LEGAL downloaded copy, so no recovery discs or flash drives.
The worst part about this is that I know exactly what file is causing the issue, but I just can't access it. All I need is to be able to access my files in order to solve this issue.

 

[Ghostroster10]

Well you messed your pc the only way to get your important files are you going to buy a thing so you can connect it through usb and connect it to a other pc open it and take it out put the thing back and reinstall windows if you want heres the windows 7 iso's
https://www.w7forums.com/threads/official-windows-7-sp1-iso-image-downloads.12325/



And and also if it helps pls sub to my youtube channel


https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMW00uHoYfqz5MUU2ka2qqA

 

[ChrisERAU]

I just booted to Linux through my phone (using the DriveDroid app), restored the backup of the bad file, rebooted, and I was back up and running. It was actually really simple.

 

[Shintaro]

DriveDroid, very interesting.

Happy that you were able to get your PC up and running again.

What was the file that you restored?

 

[ChrisERAU]

DriveDroid, very interesting.

Happy that you were able to get your PC up and running again.

What was the file that you restored?

It was the authui.dll. The only thing my computer didn't like about it was the alpha channel in one of the bitmaps was not quite right. Picky picky...

 

[Shintaro]

Cool, It's great that you sorted that out.
Could you please mark the thread as solved.