SharePoint Dev Environment : Blank Sites

If you’ve created a SP2010 Dev environment, added the site to the hosts file (c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc), and created a root site collection… but then navigate to the site and get prompted several times for authentication – to see nothing more than a blank screen! Then you most likely need to disable loopback in the registry.

The Microsoft KB article is here : http://support.microsoft.com/kb/896861

Taken from the above, the steps are (I did both) :

Method 1: Specify host names (Preferred method if NTLM authentication is desired)

To specify the host names that are mapped to the loopback address and can connect to Web sites on your computer, follow these steps:

1. Set theDisableStrictNameCheckingregistry entry to 1. For more information about how to do this, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:281308(http://support.microsoft.com/kb/281308/ ) Connecting to SMB share on a Windows 2000-based computer or a Windows Server 2003-based computer may not work with an alias name 
2. Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then click OK.
3. In Registry Editor, locate and then click the following registry key:HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa\MSV1_0
4. Right-click MSV1_0, point to New, and then click Multi-String Value.
5. Type BackConnectionHostNames, and then press ENTER.
6. Right-click BackConnectionHostNames, and then click Modify.
7. In the Value data box, type the host name or the host names for the sites that are on the local computer, and then click OK.
8. Quit Registry Editor, and then restart the IISAdmin service.

Method 2: Disable the loopback check (less-recommended method)

The second method is to disable the loopback check by setting the DisableLoopbackCheck registry key.
To set the DisableLoopbackCheckregistry key, follow these steps:

1. Set theDisableStrictNameCheckingregistry entry to 1. For more information about how to do this, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:281308(http://support.microsoft.com/kb/281308/ ) Connecting to SMB share on a Windows 2000-based computer or a Windows Server 2003-based computer may not work with an alias name 
2. Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then click OK.
3. In Registry Editor, locate and then click the following registry key:HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa
4. Right-click Lsa, point to New, and then click DWORD Value.
5. Type DisableLoopbackCheck, and then press ENTER.
6. Right-click DisableLoopbackCheck, and then click Modify.
7. In the Value data box, type 1, and then click OK.
8. Quit Registry Editor, and then restart your computer.

I have added this here in case the links or page moves.

Also see http://www.harbar.net/archive/2009/07/02/disableloopbackcheck-amp-sharepoint-what-every-admin-and-developer-should-know.aspx … Note! DO NOT disable the loopback check in production