Possible motherboard failure?

[kevorz]

it all started a couple of months ago when seagate finally shipped me a replacement hdd. I transferred everything that i had on my backup onto it. my computer was working fine for a couple of weeks but then, when i would play games but mostly source engine based games, my computer would crash in one of two ways; it would either immediately give me a colorful static-like ribbon on the top few inches of my screen or the game would freeze for a second and then i would get a blue screen. At first this did not occur often, about once a week so i didnt think much of it. But as school started in mid September, I couldnt play source games anymore because my computer would crash within minutes of playing oddly it's only ever crashed once on a non-source based game. I know that the source engine is hard on the processor so i figured my processor might be overheating but the temps were completely normal. also thought it might be the ram because the crashes were happening randomly in game so i ran windows memory diagnostic and it said i had a faulty piece of ram so i tested the computer with each single stick but it kept on crashing. I tried doing a system restore to when i first installed everything onto the computer and that fixed the problem for a couple of days but then last night playing css it crashed and now my computer wont boot past the my motherboards logo screen. It just leaves me at the beginning of post with black screen and flashing line in the top left(not sure what its called, looks like a command prompt). when i reset cmos i can get into bios just fine but there really isnt anything i can change in there to get my computer boot.

specs:
amd athlon 965 (the 140 watt version)
crossfired radeon 5770's
4gb ocz gold ram
500gb seagate refurbished hdd
corsair 750 watt psu

any troubleshooting suggestions or theories you guys have are much appreciated

 

[rolli59]

It looks like you might have to do a repair install of windows. Restoring fixing the problem for a little while points to corrupt system driver or registry. Could be the hard drive causing this, scan for bad sectors.

 

[kevorz]

thanks, ill try that tonight.
oh another odd thing is i cannot enter bios unless i clear cmos also, if i start the computer with no ram i wont even see the mobo startup logo. (i dont know if this is normal or not)

 

[rolli59]

No ram should not boot. Having to clear the BIOS points to motherboard problems but can be as simple as a dead battery.

 

[kevorz]

okay so i fixed the problem by booting it without an ide hdd i was using solely for storage. I wouldnt think that would be the thing keeping it from booting but ive seen crazier things. The weird thing is that now it boots just fine with the ide hdd plugged in. Also do you guys think this is related to my games crashing? I dont see why a storage drive would cause my computer to crash when my computer isn't even accessing the drive.

 

[kevorz]

Best answer selected by kevorz.