Mysterious Vista KSOD (blacK Screen Of Death)

It has been reported on a few Vista systems where the system boots up to a black screen with a mouse cursor. As quoted from LogBlog:

"KSOD Defined: Where after a reboot the Windows Vista PC boots up to a black screen with a white mouse cursor and nothing else ever loads (no logon screen, etc). Safe mode does the same thing. Last Known Good configuration and System Restore do not fix it except in rare cases where performing a System Restore to 1 month ago or earlier does (thanks Mike Katz for figuring that out)."

According to sources, the problem is related to the RPC service running under the LocalSystem account as opposed to the NT Authority\NetworkService account. Although the work-around is quite technical and should not be done by the inexperienced, it has been found to be successful. It can be found at "Windows Vista Black Screen with Mouse Cursor Only Issue."

To help track down the "trigger" (i.e., a 3rd party service or software update or other unique combination), if you have been impacted, please help track down the solution by downloading the Sydi server inventory script http://sydiproject.com/download/ and email the output to Susan Bradley (susan-at-msmvps.com).