Photoshop Suddenly Useless -- Black or Transparent Image???

All of a sudden when I open an image the thumbnail in the layers palette shows me that the correct image has been opened --- however the image shows as either a completely black image or a transparent image with a blue background. This renders Photoshop virtually useless. I am attaching screen shots --- Look at the layers palette --- you can see thumbnails of the images... I have checked that the channels are correct -- all are RGB or CMYK images, nothing out of the ordinary.

I have reset the preferences back to the default, thinking I must have changed something really BAD. No help. In desperation i uninstalled Photoshop and reinstalled it, still no help.  I can open a raw image just fine, but when I go from raw to Photoshop I get either a Black screen or a blue screen with a transparent square where the photo should be.

I noticed this after the recent update to Photoshop, but i'm not 100% sure if that is related or not. Can anyone help? Is anyone else having this issue? I am so frustrated at this point -- and behind in my editing. I need an answer ASAP ---- and I can't find a way to contact Adobe to ask.