Help: PC's Dead

I'm posting this from the local library because my home pc went down
three days ago.

Outside of the usual interent sluggishness I was experiencing I had no
clue that it would not work one morning when I tried to power up.

I get the Hewlett Packard screen and then a black screen with a
flashing cursor in the upper left corner. But that is as far as it
will go without me doing anything.

Only about half of my system's 160GB drive was filled and I
downloading videos from YouTube before power off the last time it
worked.

When I hit "Esc" before the that black screen with the cursor I see no
problems with the ram or connected hardware, and will get the Boot
Menu which if I remember correctly shows 1)CD-Rom, 2) Unpluggable
Devices, 3) Hard Drive, and 4) Network Boot.(Playing with the boot
order has not helped).

I don't want to try resetting the BIOS to default, because I still
have a hard drive from an earlier system I attempted this with that
became useless as a result.

I'm sure the problem is in either the BIOS or the boot sector.

I can enter set-up, be really don't know what to try from there, and
would appreciate any advice before I try to get another system to plug
my hard drive in as a "slave" in order to get the data off of it.

Thanks a lot.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

"Searcher7" wrote...

Outside of the usual interent sluggishness I was experiencing I had no
clue that it would not work one morning when I tried to power up.

What "usual sluggishness"? Something worse than when it was new?


I get the Hewlett Packard screen and then a black screen with a
flashing cursor in the upper left corner. But that is as far as it
will go without me doing anything.

Only about half of my system's 160GB drive was filled and I
downloading videos from YouTube before power off the last time it
worked.

You shut it down by turning off the power switch during a download?!?


When I hit "Esc" before the that black screen with the cursor I see no
problems with the ram or connected hardware, and will get the Boot
Menu which if I remember correctly shows 1)CD-Rom, 2) Unpluggable
Devices, 3) Hard Drive, and 4) Network Boot.(Playing with the boot
order has not helped).

Will it boot from your OS CD or system rescue CD?


I don't want to try resetting the BIOS to default, because I still
have a hard drive from an earlier system I attempted this with that
became useless as a result.

Resetting the BIOS won't make a HD useless. You may have to re-enable 48-bit
LBA for HD access before you boot again, but that can be done from the BIOS
setup screen.


I'm sure the problem is in either the BIOS or the boot sector.

Then boot from floppy or CD and run chkdsk /mbr.

What BIOS problem do you think crops up out of nowhere?


I can enter set-up, be really don't know what to try from there, and
would appreciate any advice before I try to get another system to plug
my hard drive in as a "slave" in order to get the data off of it.

"Searcher7" wrote in message
...
I'm posting this from the local library because my home pc went down
three days ago.

Outside of the usual interent sluggishness I was experiencing I had no
clue that it would not work one morning when I tried to power up.

I get the Hewlett Packard screen and then a black screen with a
flashing cursor in the upper left corner. But that is as far as it
will go without me doing anything.

Only about half of my system's 160GB drive was filled and I
downloading videos from YouTube before power off the last time it
worked.

When I hit "Esc" before the that black screen with the cursor I see no
problems with the ram or connected hardware, and will get the Boot
Menu which if I remember correctly shows 1)CD-Rom, 2) Unpluggable
Devices, 3) Hard Drive, and 4) Network Boot.(Playing with the boot
order has not helped).

I don't want to try resetting the BIOS to default, because I still
have a hard drive from an earlier system I attempted this with that
became useless as a result.

I'm sure the problem is in either the BIOS or the boot sector.

I can enter set-up, be really don't know what to try from there, and
would appreciate any advice before I try to get another system to plug
my hard drive in as a "slave" in order to get the data off of it.

Thanks a lot.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

Hi, Darren,

With the size of the drive and the large amount of files you've downloaded,
you may have gotten a virus, trojan or some other nasty. If the hard drive
is recognized in the BIOS then consider getting a boot cd with an anti-virus
on it (download at the library or from a friend's computer and then burn to
cd), set the BIOS boot order to boot from cd and try that.

If the hard drive is NOT recognized in the BIOS, check to see if somehow
either the power or IDE cable has come loose from the hard drive. Pull them
both and reseat them. Then boot the computer and see if that fixes things.
If not you may be looking at a HDD that has gone belly-up.

Others in the multiple groups you've posted in will probably weigh in with
even better ideas, but these are the first things I would consider.
Best...JG

On Sat, 12 Apr 2008 08:24:46 -0700 (PDT), Searcher7
wrote:

I'm posting this from the local library because my home pc went down
three days ago.

It wouldn't hurt to tell us a bit in detail about this
system, concise list of major components including drives,
drive interface type and position (PATA master or SATA,
etc), PSU make model wattage... and if anything on the
system had been changed recently, though perhaps you mention
that below.



Outside of the usual interent sluggishness I was experiencing I had no
clue that it would not work one morning when I tried to power up.

So the usual internet sluggishness is something you feel was
normal, not relevant to the failure?



I get the Hewlett Packard screen and then a black screen with a
flashing cursor in the upper left corner. But that is as far as it
will go without me doing anything.

This is typically a failure to find a viable boot device
and/or boot sector. IF your system is old enough that the
battery might've worn out, loss of CMOS settings could also
result in it defaulting to trying a different boot device,
so you should enter the bios and see if the system clock is
correct (if shown), if it is set to what appears to be the
right boot device.


Only about half of my system's 160GB drive was filled and I
downloading videos from YouTube before power off the last time it
worked.

What other boot options do you have? Generally it would be
time to run the hard drive manufacturer's diagnostics on it
if nothing else works, typically that would be done from
floppy, (or with no floppy, those files transferred to a
bootable USB drive (flash thumbdrive perhaps) or bootable
CD/DVD you make on another system.

Also open system and check cables, but it seems unlikely one
would spontaneously completely fail while exhibiting no
intermittent problems prior to this. It is possible a
failing PSU can degrade stability to the point where it
fails to find a boot device but less likely than a boot
device (itself) problem.



When I hit "Esc" before the that black screen with the cursor I see no
problems with the ram or connected hardware, and will get the Boot
Menu which if I remember correctly shows 1)CD-Rom, 2) Unpluggable
Devices, 3) Hard Drive, and 4) Network Boot.(Playing with the boot
order has not helped).

You could try unplugging any other boot devices it detects,
there is a slim chance it might help but normally changing a
bios setting would have equivalent result.



I don't want to try resetting the BIOS to default, because I still
have a hard drive from an earlier system I attempted this with that
became useless as a result.

Without further details it's difficult to say what happened
in the prior system but generally it is not common to loose
anything on a hard drive from clearing CMOS (resetting
bios).



I'm sure the problem is in either the BIOS or the boot sector.

Or the drive itself is failing which basically means it
can't even get far enough to read the boot sector. Given a
Windows CD (assuming windows OS) you could try to do a
repair install, or restore a backup (though some ways of
doing this wipe out existing data). The safest most
thorough method of handling this is to pull out the hard
drive and try it in another system - booting that other
system to it's original HDD only trying to read, never
write, to this drive. Doing so you remove the bios from the
equation, have a working system with which to try and pull
files off, run diagnostics, etc... or if the 2nd system
can't use the drive at all it's a more likely indication the
drive had failed - but more info about the system could be
important, for example if an old system that had need for a
drive overlay to access 128GB HDD, then booting a
different system from different drive won't load that
overlay.


I can enter set-up, be really don't know what to try from there, and
would appreciate any advice before I try to get another system to plug
my hard drive in as a "slave" in order to get the data off of it.

If the hard drive isn't set as the first boot device do
that. Make note of any changes, since you should not need
change anything unless the battery were low or other board
defect or failure caused loss of settings - but this is
usually a perpetual problem not something that suddenly
happens once after it had ran ok. I don't suppose there
were any electrical storms in your area that night that
could have put a surge through the system?

A virus could overwrite the boot sector, but by installing
drive in another system you would be able to scan it with
the manufacturer's diagnostics, just don't try to boot the
drive in a different system.

Odds are probably highest your drive simply failed to some
extent. If the data is valuable (I hope you made a backup
but if not on the backup...) then the next thing you should
do (leaving drive and system unpowered in case a problem
were getting worse) is prepare a different system having
enough free space on it's HDD to copy off the data, then
install the drive and first boot the OS and try copying off
data - before running diagnostics, before chkdsk or
scandisk, etc. Avoid writing anything to the drive
including being cautious about any windows settings that
could try to put a pagefile on a different drive, logs, or
whatever. Best to examine the config of the host system
prior to transferring a drive into it.

Searcher7 wrote:
I'm posting this from the local library because my home pc went down
three days ago.

Outside of the usual interent sluggishness I was experiencing I had no
clue that it would not work one morning when I tried to power up.

I get the Hewlett Packard screen and then a black screen with a
flashing cursor in the upper left corner. But that is as far as it
will go without me doing anything.

Only about half of my system's 160GB drive was filled and I
downloading videos from YouTube before power off the last time it
worked.

When I hit "Esc" before the that black screen with the cursor I see no
problems with the ram or connected hardware, and will get the Boot
Menu which if I remember correctly shows 1)CD-Rom, 2) Unpluggable
Devices, 3) Hard Drive, and 4) Network Boot.(Playing with the boot
order has not helped).

I don't want to try resetting the BIOS to default, because I still
have a hard drive from an earlier system I attempted this with that
became useless as a result.

I'm sure the problem is in either the BIOS or the boot sector.

I can enter set-up, be really don't know what to try from there, and
would appreciate any advice before I try to get another system to plug
my hard drive in as a "slave" in order to get the data off of it.

Thanks a lot.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

Dos boot disk.

FDISK /MBR

Sorted.

--
Cheerz - Brownz
'89 K100RS
'53 JCW MCS (Cage)
http://www.brownz.org/

It wouldn't hurt to tell us a bit in detail about this
system, concise list of major components including drives,
drive interface type and position (PATA master or SATA,
etc), PSU make model wattage... and if anything on the
system had been changed recently, though perhaps you mention
that below.

This is the same system we discussed in the post: "SATA Controller
Recommendation?". The drive is a PATA drive on an IDE motherboard via
a special connector chip: HW629 Rev.2.0 WD952H-1. (That converter may
actually be the problem).

My system is as follows:
-----------------------------------
HP Pavilion 7955
512 Ram
Hitachi Deskstar(HDT722516DLA380) SATA(on a single connector cable).
Power Supply: Bestec # ATX 1956D 220W(Is 200W enough for my system?).
Motherboard: Dublin (Rev. D)
CD Writer and DVD Player(at the end of the same two connector cable).

Outside of the usual interent sluggishness I was experiencing I had no
clue that it would not work one morning when I tried to power up.

So the usual internet sluggishness is something you feel was
normal, not relevant to the failure? *

I can't say. All four internet systems I've ever used on a regular
basis started to become sluggish within two weeks after I got them.
The sluggishness includes general everything. loading pages, opening
up desktop folders, ect.).

I do have AVG Anti-Virus installed, and also a Firewall.

I get the Hewlett Packard screen and then a black screen with a
flashing cursor in the upper left corner. But that is as far as it
will go without me doing anything.

This is *typically a failure to find a viable boot device
and/or boot sector. *IF your system is old enough that the
battery might've worn out, loss of CMOS settings could also
result in it defaulting to trying a different boot device,
so you should enter the bios and see if the system clock is
correct (if shown), if it is set to what appears to be the
right boot device.

I had already checked the system clock, and it is still correct.

Only about half of my system's 160GB drive was filled and I
downloading videos from YouTube before power off the last time it
worked.

What other boot options do you have? *Generally it would be
time to run the hard drive manufacturer's diagnostics on it
if nothing else works, typically that would be done from
floppy, (or with no floppy, those files transferred to a
bootable USB drive (flash *thumbdrive perhaps) or bootable
CD/DVD you make on another system.

I have a Sandisk Cruzer 4.0, but in the limited time I have at the
local library computer, I don't know when I'd be able to search for
these things.(I'm rushing just to post this, and don't know when would
be the next time get online).

Also open system and check cables, but it seems unlikely one
would spontaneously completely fail while exhibiting no
intermittent problems prior to this. *It is possible a
failing PSU can degrade stability to the point where it
fails to find a boot device but less likely than a boot
device (itself) problem.

I had checked the cables a few times. In fact I just took the drive
out to make sure I had it's info correct, and now after putting
everything back together the drive is not detected.("Operating system
not found"). I know it is still getting power, and all cables were
checked again multiple times.

The boot order as it is now is as follows:

+Hard Drive
Bootable Add-in Cards
CD-Rom
+Removable Devices
Legacy Floppy Drives
Newtwork Boot

BTW. The sequence of the lights I see when I power up are as follows:
CD, DVD, Floppy.(There is no light for the hard drive).

When I hit "Esc" before the that black screen with the cursor I see no
problems with the ram or connected hardware, and will get the Boot
Menu which if I remember correctly shows 1)CD-Rom, 2) Unpluggable
Devices, 3) Hard Drive, and 4) Network Boot.(Playing with the boot
order has not helped).

You *could try unplugging any other boot devices it detects,
there is a slim chance it might help but normally changing a
bios setting would have equivalent result.



I don't want to try resetting the BIOS to default, because I still
have a hard drive from an earlier system I attempted this with that
became useless as a result.

Without further details it's difficult to say what happened
in the prior system but generally it is not common to loose
anything on a hard drive from clearing CMOS (resetting
bios).



I'm sure the problem is in either the BIOS or the boot sector.

Or the drive itself is failing which basically means it
can't even get far enough to read the boot sector. *Given a
Windows CD (assuming windows OS) you could try to do a
repair install, or restore a backup (though some ways of
doing this wipe out existing data). *The safest most
thorough method of handling this is to pull out the hard
drive and try it in another system - booting that other
system to it's original HDD only trying to read, never
write, to this drive. *Doing so you remove the bios from the
equation, have a working system with which to try and pull
files off, run diagnostics, etc... or if the 2nd system
can't use the drive at all it's a more likely indication the
drive had failed - but more info about the system could be
important, for example if an old system that had need for a
drive overlay to access 128GB HDD, then booting a
different system from different drive won't load that
overlay.

I actually have a new Windows XP disk, but the XP install presently on
the drive was from a different disk I don't have access to.(I'm not
sure if that would be a problem).

I can enter set-up, be really don't know what to try from there, and
would appreciate any advice before I try to get another system to plug
my hard drive in as a "slave" in order to get the data off of it.

If the hard drive isn't set as the first boot device do
that. *Make note of any changes, since you should not need
change anything unless the battery were low or other board
defect or failure caused loss of settings - but this is
usually a perpetual problem not something that suddenly
happens once after it had ran ok. *I don't suppose there
were any electrical storms in your area that night that
could have put a surge through the system?

Nope.

A virus could overwrite the boot sector, but by installing
drive in another system you would be able to scan it with
the manufacturer's diagnostics, just don't try to boot the
drive in a different system.

Not even in a system that has no other drive?

Odds are probably highest your drive simply failed to some
extent. *If the data is valuable (I hope you made a backup
but if not on the backup...) then the next thing you should
do (leaving drive and system unpowered in case a problem
were getting worse) is prepare a different system having
enough free space on it's HDD to copy off the data, then
install the drive and first boot the OS and try copying off
data - before running *diagnostics, before chkdsk or
scandisk, etc. *Avoid writing anything to the drive
including being cautious about any windows settings that
could try to put a pagefile on a different drive, logs, or
whatever. *Best to examine the config of the host system
prior to transferring a drive into it.

I wouldn't know how to prevent Windows from writing to the drive but
obviously I have to try something.

Thanks a lot.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

On Apr 12, 11:24*am, Searcher7 wrote:
I'm posting this from the local library because my home pc went down
three days ago.

Outside of the usual interent sluggishness I was experiencing I had no
clue that it would not work one morning when I tried to power up.

I get the Hewlett Packard screen and then a black screen with a
flashing cursor in the upper left corner. But that is as far as it
will go without me doing anything.

Only about half of my system's 160GB drive was filled and I
downloading videos from YouTube before power off the last time it
worked.

When I hit "Esc" before the that black screen with the cursor I see no
problems with the ram or connected hardware, and will get the Boot
Menu which if I remember correctly shows 1)CD-Rom, 2) Unpluggable
Devices, 3) Hard Drive, and 4) Network Boot.(Playing with the boot
order has not helped).

I don't want to try resetting the BIOS to default, because I still
have a hard drive from an earlier system I attempted this with that
became useless as a result.

I'm sure the problem is in either the BIOS or the boot sector.

I can enter set-up, be really don't know what to try from there, and
would appreciate any advice before I try to get another system to plug
my hard drive in as a "slave" in order to get the data off of it.

Thanks a lot.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

had almost the same problem and could not get in to the system.
the only option i had was to reformat the machine with the system
restores disks.
put no#1 in and the machine did the rest. its just an idea.
hope it works for yoa. good luck.

On Sun, 13 Apr 2008 11:33:27 -0700 (PDT), Searcher7
wrote:


My system is as follows:
-----------------------------------
HP Pavilion 7955
512 Ram
Hitachi Deskstar(HDT722516DLA380) SATA(on a single connector cable).
Power Supply: Bestec # ATX 1956D 220W(Is 200W enough for my system?).

Yes, until you start adding parts, but that doesn't mean a
PSU will run forever. If nothing else resolves the
problems, test the PSU if you can or if not, consider
whether system is worth putting more money and time into or
if it's time to upgrade it.




Motherboard: Dublin (Rev. D)
CD Writer and DVD Player(at the end of the same two connector cable).

Outside of the usual interent sluggishness I was experiencing I had no
clue that it would not work one morning when I tried to power up.

So the usual internet sluggishness is something you feel was
normal, not relevant to the failure? *

I can't say. All four internet systems I've ever used on a regular
basis started to become sluggish within two weeks after I got them.

This is a bit too vague for us to understand what you mean.
What about now, and last few days or weeks, what was there?
Remember we have no idea what you are looking at.
Please just back up and start over again with a concise list
of only immediate problems, we can't do what it seems is
trying to account for many systems odds bugs over a long
period.


The sluggishness includes general everything. loading pages, opening
up desktop folders, ect.).

This makes no sense, why didn't you tackle that problem at
the time? Forget about many systems, focus on only one at a
time. Eliminate variables and don't let problems pile up
until it seems there may be several.

At this point it seems good to do a fresh OS installation,
but before then the basics of checking for dust buildup, fan
or capacitor failures, running memtest86+ for a few hours
before any OS installation or further tests running the OS.



I do have AVG Anti-Virus installed, and also a Firewall.

So the AVG was updated and you've scanned the system with it
after onset of the problems?



This is *typically a failure to find a viable boot device
and/or boot sector. *IF your system is old enough that the
battery might've worn out, loss of CMOS settings could also
result in it defaulting to trying a different boot device,
so you should enter the bios and see if the system clock is
correct (if shown), if it is set to what appears to be the
right boot device.

I had already checked the system clock, and it is still correct.

Ok, so we can probabaly rule out losing CMOS settings from
drained battery.



What other boot options do you have? *Generally it would be
time to run the hard drive manufacturer's diagnostics on it
if nothing else works, typically that would be done from
floppy, (or with no floppy, those files transferred to a
bootable USB drive (flash *thumbdrive perhaps) or bootable
CD/DVD you make on another system.

I have a Sandisk Cruzer 4.0, but in the limited time I have at the
local library computer, I don't know when I'd be able to search for
these things.(I'm rushing just to post this, and don't know when would
be the next time get online).


If you have no time available to do it at the library it
seems you need go elsewhere, as without the ability to do
more how can you solve the problem except taking it to a PC
repair shop?



Also open system and check cables, but it seems unlikely one
would spontaneously completely fail while exhibiting no
intermittent problems prior to this. *It is possible a
failing PSU can degrade stability to the point where it
fails to find a boot device but less likely than a boot
device (itself) problem.

I had checked the cables a few times. In fact I just took the drive
out to make sure I had it's info correct, and now after putting
everything back together the drive is not detected.("Operating system
not found"). I know it is still getting power, and all cables were
checked again multiple times.

Pull the drive and test in another system, or make a
bootable media with hard drive manufacturer's diagnostics on
it. If the drive was purchased at retail it may have come
with bootable diag floppy or CD, otherwise that's available
as a download from their website and you need supply your
own media to make the boot disk/disc.



The boot order as it is now is as follows:

+Hard Drive
Bootable Add-in Cards
CD-Rom
+Removable Devices
Legacy Floppy Drives
Newtwork Boot

BTW. The sequence of the lights I see when I power up are as follows:
CD, DVD, Floppy.(There is no light for the hard drive).

Just for the heck of it you might unplug data cables to all
but the hard drive, and then make sure hard drive is
jumpered to master (or single if applicable).



I actually have a new Windows XP disk, but the XP install presently on
the drive was from a different disk I don't have access to.(I'm not
sure if that would be a problem).

If a different version of windows (OEM vs retail vs
corporate, home vs pro, original vs SP1 vs SP2, etc) then it
may not accept your installation key. It seems you have let
a lot of potential problems pile up and need to get the
basics of maintaining a system sorted out. Always have a
way to restore the system whether it be the OS disc that was
used to do installation or the OEM restore discs, or a
restorable backup from a time system was known working
properly. At this point you will need one of those if the
drive has failed, or if you have a valid license and key for
the new XP disk, you might be able to repair or do clean
install from that but first things first, determine if
memory is stable with memtest86+, check hard drive with
manufacturer's diags. Check interior of system again - as
much as possible check hardware before depending on that
hardware to be stable writing files and running code for OS
install or disk checking if drive is ever detected again.
Moving drive to another known good system would help rule
out drive failure.




A virus could overwrite the boot sector, but by installing
drive in another system you would be able to scan it with
the manufacturer's diagnostics, just don't try to boot the
drive in a different system.

Not even in a system that has no other drive?

Do not boot the drive in another system.
There's no "not even".
The point is the other system is 100% functional without the
drive, so you have a constant - something that works. Next
you test whether the drive can be connected and accessed,
nothing ran from it, just accessed, and valuable files
backed up if any are present because it may be failing. You
want to not write anything to it yet, and read from it the
bare minimal amount possible, run it the bare minimal amount
possible. First attempt in a different system is boot the
other system as usual and try to copy off data. Next step
is scan drive for errors with manufacturer's diagnostics.
Next step is scan drive with windows.

1) Get data off
2) Test drive integrity
3) Correct data/OS faults if drive works ok



I wouldn't know how to prevent Windows from writing to the drive but
obviously I have to try something.


Check the OS installation's settings for where it puts logs,
pagefile, etc. Check for addt'l partitions and drives
already present. Check file dates. Suppose you had a
virus, if AVG scans it would make a folder and dump things
it detected into that folder, which is one thing you don't
want to have happen if the drive is failing.


If you were thinking about buying another hard drive, had no
others around you could devote, you might put some other
drive in the system, unplug the questionable one, and try a
clean OS installation on that to see if clean OS works
without the questionable drive... then if it does, you can
use same system to reconnect the questionable drive but
booting the other drive to the clean OS to test the
questionable drive.

On Apr 12, 11:24 am, Searcher7 wrote:
I'm posting this from the local library because my home pc went down
three days ago.

Outside of the usual interent sluggishness I was experiencing I had no
clue that it would not work one morning when I tried to power up.

I get the Hewlett Packard screen and then a black screen with a
flashing cursor in the upper left corner. But that is as far as it
will go without me doing anything.

Only about half of my system's 160GB drive was filled and I
downloading videos from YouTube before power off the last time it
worked.

When I hit "Esc" before the that black screen with the cursor I see no
problems with the ram or connected hardware, and will get the Boot
Menu which if I remember correctly shows 1)CD-Rom, 2) Unpluggable
Devices, 3) Hard Drive, and 4) Network Boot.(Playing with the boot
order has not helped).

I don't want to try resetting the BIOS to default, because I still
have a hard drive from an earlier system I attempted this with that
became useless as a result.

I'm sure the problem is in either the BIOS or the boot sector.

I can enter set-up, be really don't know what to try from there, and
would appreciate any advice before I try to get another system to plug
my hard drive in as a "slave" in order to get the data off of it.

Thanks a lot.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

Start using VMWare

On Apr 13, 2:33 pm, Searcher7 wrote:
I had checked the cables a few times. In fact I just took the drive
out to make sure I had it's info correct, and now after putting
everything back together the drive is not detected.("Operating system
not found"). I know it is still getting power, and all cables were
checked again multiple times.

The boot order as it is now is as follows:
+Hard Drive
Bootable Add-in Cards
CD-Rom
+Removable Devices
Legacy Floppy Drives
Newtwork Boot

This is an addendum to the many ideas provided by Kony. Eventually,
it appears your CPU is booting - BIOS works - which is why you can see
the boot order. This is an HP. That means the manufacturer provided
comprehensive hardware diagnostics just for your problem. Diagnostics
load and execute without Windows. Provided either on some other
partition of the hard drive or loaded from a CD-Rom (or obtained from
the HP web site under PC Doctor). Execute diagnostics so as to have
facts before trying to fix anything (which also says do not fix
Windows without first locating the failure or learning that hardware
is OK).

Second, boot the OS from a CD-Rom. Boot order should boot from the
floppy drive and from CD-Rom before booting from the hard drive. Boot
Windows from that OS to get the system (event) logs - where all
Windows failures were recorded while Windows was working around those
failures. What was failing for weeks previously while assuming a slow
computer was normal? Again, long before fixing something, the actual
failure first must be identified.

Some things to do - execute manufacturer's comprehensive hardware
diagnostics AND get information from system (event) logs and Device
Manager. Then post those details here to learn of additional
information also in those diagnostic messages. Don't short your
assistance of the facts - especially if those messages have numbers.