Crashing and bootup problems. help :) please

[ste1]

ok, having problems with a pc i was recently helping to build.

Its spec is

Shuttle sn25p bare bone
Athlon 64bit 3700xp
1024 geil value memory
160 gb samsung sata II hard drive
Connect3D ATI Radeon X1900 GT 256MB pci express
and a nec dvdrw drive

have been having problems with first after windows xp pro installed, the system suffered from lock ups after a small amount of use within windows.

The problem got worse as later when attempting to boot windows xp got stuck on the windows xp screen during built up and never loaded upto windows. just kept showing that black xp screen with the progress bar.

Have since tried reformatting system and had system freezing half way through installation and on other occasions disk drive error press ctrl, alt, del appearing before windows could even boot. I have tried swapping memory sticks but the problem still persists.

Also when windows xp was reformatting a message about disk damaged appeared makes me think it may be a hard drive problem.

Would a hard drive problem also be the likely cause of the random crashing?

. I have found sometimes windows xp can be installed and the system behaves for a week or so then the crashing and being unable to boot comes back.

Any help or ideas what could be causing these problems as im stuck

Thanks in advance

[chuckskull]

Hard drive problem cause that. Simplest thing to do is find another hard drive just to try.

[Jay]

it sounds like a harddrive head problem. Probably been dropped in transit.

does it click?

[ste1]

the hard drive doesnt click from what i can tell, sometimes the system can be run for long periods with no problem, but normally within a week the freezing and boot problems return. Would this be the hard drive, working sometimes, and then playing up again?

[rich_225]

if not hdd maybe psu? most sff pc's have piss poor psu's i've had random (but regular) freezin from an inadequate psu. can u attach an alternative 1 externally just to run 4 a while (b careful not 2 fry ur self!!)