My computer can't boot. I can't even get into BIOS w/delete key. Someone told me to disconnect all periphials, I did that, to no avail. Could it be the motherboard. The screen it freezes on, looks something like this.

Phoenix -- AwardBIOS v6.00PG, An Energy Star Ally
Copyright (C) 1984-2002, Phoenix Technologies, LTD

W6769SMS V1.0 030403 13:13:59

Main Processor : Intel Pentium(R) 4 2.40GHz(133x18.0)







Press DEL to enter Setup
03/04/2003-SiS-651-6A6IXM40C-00



If someone can help me out, on what I should do next, hopefully not being to change motherboard.

Chino

that is really a hardware issue... it recognizes your cpu, so that is a good thing right there - you could have duff memory (perhaps even only one bank!)
it will not bee anything like the soundcard or your nic or some minor card.
you could try tunrning on your computer with only one ram module inside, you could try replacing the graphics card (but i honestly doubt that this card is causing trouble)
newer motherboards tend to have really good protection towards the cpu, so i don't think it will be that either.
check your ram, sometimes it is even fine to only swap the modules around.
also disconnect everything you do not need for passing the bios:
sound,
nic
any drives (hdd, cd, dvd, floppy...)
any controllers (appart from onboard ones of course)
but leave at least one memory module in the computer.

I want to second Nathanael's information there. Your memory is
the very next thing it reads, to write to, and that looks like where
it's hung. When you move the stick(s) around, but sure that you
seat them well and close the ends good.

I only have one stick of memory for the thing (256). I'm thinking maybe I should go out and buy another one. I did remove and reinsert the memory already. Nothing happened. I need more memory anyways, so it will not be a setback if that don't solve problem.
Thanks for info.

removing and reinserting does not help - your motherboard might 'remember' what was pluged into the banks, and swapping things around seems to make a diff.
what helps is putting a new memory module into bank 0 and for the beginning leave the old one out - afterwards put it into bank1
(perhaps you can get a memory module from another pc temporarily?)

Do you get any beeps? You should get two short beeps for a memory error (see http://www.helpwithpcs.com/upgrading...beep-codes.htm). If not, you could try to start up with no memory. If you still get no beeps, the problem is probably even earlier. Some motherboards let you leave slot 1 empty and use slot 2, which might be worth a try.

Pretty good diagnosing there, I'm sure it's basic to you guys, but not all of us are as savvy. I changed the memory stick into the second slot and it started right up, booted with no problems. Once it got going, and it was on for a while. It shut off on its own, and rebooted. So I'm assuming its a bad memory issue. Gonna go out and buy some memory today and I'm almost 99 percent convinced that will solve my problem.
By the way, is this a common problem, memory going bad?

Chino

before throwing the old mem stick run memtest86
you can find it on google
you boot your computer via cd or floppy and let the scan run over night ;-)

Will do, thanks

Well, did what you guys said, and everything works now. My comp was restarting on its own, but tracked it down to a trojan virus.
I'm new to Linux, so I have all these manuals on how to do stuff. Like my first thing on list is using my printer, and new video card. Let's see how long this takes.
Thanks again.

Is this happening once your Linux OS is running, or just while Windoze is running?

Do you have new memory? Is the old stick bad?
For the printer, try looking for it at LinuxPrinting using CUPS

The video card will need the proper module for it's chipset.

Yes, it was restarting on its own under windows, unfortunatley, I'm not to the point where I can do away with windows yet, but I imagine I will soon.
I did do a search on how to install my HP 5510, in the search, and came up with my answer.
Video card can wait, til i'm more edept at using linux.
Thanks Chinaman