My toshiba laptop... when turned on, has the windows xp screen with the green bar that goes across... then I hear windows starting (the bells) but my screen goes blank. My hard drive is perfectly fine as I can blindly click and it'll make noises, but my screen is gone. I've ruled out the video card as the welcome screen comes on. What can it be?

See if you can get into safe mode, tap F8 when comp starts to get to options screen and try safe mode
If you get into safe mode try and try to do a system restore

Tried that. Tried to go into the initial setup screen as well. Pretty much, if it's anything but the WINDOWS XP welcome screen, it won't show up.

I Forgot My Administrator Password! (http://pubs.logicalexpressions.com/pub0009/LPMArticle.asp?ID=305)

Read this page and just follow up until step 9
This is what I would recommend, but the information I was going to suggest is what is covered up to step 9

This will not add anything, it does what it says, "press R to begin the Repair process" it repairs the windows installation

I'm not so sure that's helpful as 1. I don't have a password... and 2. it's not a password issue... my lcd just goes completely blank.

You may have damage the screen or a small part of the hard drive , some wires came losse. Best get a new laptop

Got a new laptop.

I've ruled out damage on the screen. The screen's fine during the WELCOME setup.

Can you access bios during boot? You might have to grab your manual to figure out how... pcs don't tend to prompt you for it these days.

If the screen is working fine until the windows starts to load I'd think that's where your problem is. With windows. Something in the startup, registry, ini files getting in the way of the normal processes... possibly bogging down the operating system when it tries to go fully functional. Might need a clean wipe, and fresh install of the operating system.