I pulled off a confirmed-working CDROM drive from another working PC to be
sure the cause of the problem wasn't from the optical drive but still not
copy. The CDROM IDE cable was replaced with one from working PC; Non of the
WinXP CDs has scratches on it... i also tried to install with and other WinXP
CD to be certain the problem wasn't from the WinXP installation CD but still
not copy

So, you are confident it is not the optical drive or the Windows CD. Good.

Now you are down to the basics. Change out your Ram with known good Ram. No
good yet? Check that the CPU cooling fan is spinning at a good speed and
that the cooling fins on the heat sink are not clogged with dust. OK?
Disconnect the installed power supply and temporarily connect in a
substitute. Change out the CPU with a known good one. Still no good. As a
final resort replace the motherboard.

These are all things that I occasionally do when I am working on a customers
computer. There is no magic bullet that does this for you. It is a process
of elimination.

A few years back I did all of this and could not come up with any problem.
The computer worked fine in my shop. I gave it back to the customer. The
next day he was back complaining of the same condition as previously. I
hooked up the computer while he was there. It worked fine. Well, the next
day he was back.

It still worked fine in the shop so I decided to burn it in for an extended
amount of time. I took it home with me, connected it up to a spare monitor,
keyboard and mouse. It ran fine for 3 days. I gave it back to him.

Sure enough, the next day he was back. I asked him to go home and bring in
his monitor, keyboard and mouse.

It was his keyboard that was causing all the problems! The computer just
would not boot when his keyboard was connected. The monitor screen remained
blank.

--

Richard Urban
Microsoft MVP
Windows Desktop Experience



"Techinc7" <Techinc7@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:28814BAD-9052-4696-ABD7-D29163EC82AA@microsoft.com...
> I pulled off a confirmed-working CDROM drive from another working PC to be
> sure the cause of the problem wasn't from the optical drive but still not
> copy. The CDROM IDE cable was replaced with one from working PC; Non of
> the
> WinXP CDs has scratches on it... i also tried to install with and other
> WinXP
> CD to be certain the problem wasn't from the WinXP installation CD but
> still
> not copy
>
> __________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus
> signature database 3963 (20090325) __________
>
> The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.
>
> http://www.eset.com
>
>
>

__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 3963 (20090325) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

http://www.eset.com