Have I fried my mobo, CPU or graphics card?

bluep

Boogiemaster,
I know that some viruses attack bios(es? i? plural? hehe), I was just saying that I thought NIS or Panda or one of the other 2 online scanners I used today to check the two hard drives from that comp, would have picked up some trace of the original virus 2 weeks after the comp started going all funky on me.

"I need to know how I can safely scrub the infected hard drive clean, if possible." - my point was I have pulled off my two hard drives and they are clean.

Plus the two computers are networked, so if something was so viralent to bypass the firewall, jump the anti-virus program and my frequent online scans, AND not leave any trace on my hard drives after zonking the bios, would it not have also attacked my laptop?

However, thanks for trying to help

boogiemaster

You need a secure erase to get rid of all the files? It dose take a lot longer than a format but it better for you in the long run.
Try this software for the secure erase http://www.heidi.ie/eraser/

I use partion magic to secure erase the files and it takes a while but all the files have gone.

Rave

Once the computer has posted and begun the boot process the work of the bios is done, so it really doesn't sound like a bios problem to me. My bios is a bit flaky and often fails to initialise a boot drive after a reset (requiring me to power off and on again), but it's never caused issues once the computer actually is booting.

The fact that you cannot get either the existing windows install to load, or the XP installation CD does strongly suggest a hardware fault....although if your XP disc was scratched that could also cause it. TBH bluep it seems you've done pretty much everything you can to test and it would surprise me if your local store will be any better able to locate the fault. All I would still do is download UBCD and run Prime95, it hammers the hell out of the processor, board and RAM, and as you say the RAM is not now the likely culprit since swapping out different sticks makes no difference. Have a look at the motherboard to see if any of the capacitors are swolen or leaking, that's still a surprisingly common fault. If you find that the computer is stable if you underclock it like I suggested, then that points to a problem supplying power to some part of the computer (like the processor or chipset). Have you tried a different power supply? They can cause these types of problems.

bluep

Boogiemaster : "You need a secure erase to get rid of all the files? It dose take a lot longer than a format but it better for you in the long run.
Try this software for the secure erase http://www.heidi.ie/eraser/

I use partion magic to secure erase the files and it takes a while but all the files have gone."

I think we are talking at cross purposes - I was quoting the user you quoted in your post about a bios virus and saying that I however had no such infected files on my hard drives - therefor no need for an erase in my case although it looks like he needed one!


Rave - I had pretty much come to the same conclusion. It's unlikely I would get into Windows normal mode around 5% of bootups and Windows Safemode 30% of bootups if there was a serious problem with the bios. PLus the Win XP disc functions fine with my laptop. The mobo "looks" fine so nothing the eye can see and I don't have another power supply to test it all out. It's not a problem though, the comp shop said they'd test the mobo and CPU and power supply. The only issue is which one had gone and whether I need to buy a newer mobo or CPU to match the replacement mobo or CPU as both of mine are 2 years old now. heh.

Thanks for your help

Rave

AMD just this month packed up their last K7 generation processor, but there'll be supply of them for a while yet. There are plenty of motherboards still around at very reasonable prices (like <£30 mail order). If they try to sell you complete CPU and motherboard upgrade on the grounds that parts are no longer available then they're misleading you. If they try to sell it to you on the grounds that it might be a worthwhile upgrade, then I guess that's for you to decide. You can get AMD 64 bit systems for as little as £130 for the processor and board now, but if you decide that what you've got still does the job I'd expect a small shop to be charging maybe £60-70 for an equivalent or slightly better processor, £30-40 for a board, or £30-40 for a mid-range power supply. HTH:).

bluep

Just thought I'd let anyone interested know what it turned out to be in the end. It was the CPU but not irrepairable - it was still overheating and all the shop did was put a high-end heatsink and fan on it rather than the old cooling technology that was there anyway. They charged me £20!! very happy here even though it was something I could have fixed myself, I was thinking it was going to cost me over £100 to replace the mobo/CPU.