Hello all. I have a Dell Dimension 8400 that seems to be about to give up the ghost. I have been told by various people that the problem is the motherboard, but I've also been told that replacing the old motherboard in a Dell is no small task. I would like to, if possible, replace everything except the Hard Drive, RAM and Video Card, if that's possible. I'm particularly keen on keeping the hard drive, since I've got all my stuff in there the way I like it AND because I have a perfectly valid WinXP install. Can someone give me some solid information on how doable something like this is?

"I have a perfectly valid WinXP install". The problem you have is that WinXP install is only valid for THAT EXACT computer. You can migrate the harddrive to a different computer as a slave. Some people claim some success with moving an OEM HDrive to a different computer but doing so is iffy at best. Usually success is when staying within the OEM realm and within similiar hardware. You can try but I wouldn't count one it working.

that dell mb is easy to change. i do it all the time. the mb's come mounted on a snap in tray. i have 2 of the 8400's. just unplug all the stuff, snap out the mb, snap in the new, reconnect, etc, presto, its done, easily

"I have a Dell Dimension 8400 that seems to be about to give up the ghost. I have been told by various people that the problem is the motherboard" As OtheHill said, your current XP install will only work with the stock Dell 8400 motherboard. If you were to change boards, XP would no longer boot & your Dell CDs would be useless for a repair. The only way around it would be to replace the board with the exact same model. How about explaining the symptoms...it *may* not be the board at all.

Excellent advice above! It's almost impossible to diagnose a defective motherboard without a lot of work. You would have to disconnect all the devices connected to the motherboard and you would also have to eliminate the power supply as the problem.

The problem with my system is that, for the last nine months or so, any time I shut the computer down for a few hours, when I went to start it up again, the fan on the heat sink went crazy, like it was a jet trying to take off. If I just restarted, it was fine, so I pretty much left it on 24/7. When I finally took it to a computer repair place, described the symptoms and told the guy it was a Dell, he shook his head and said "Motherboard". That's the sum total of my reasoning behind it being a mobo issue. Right now, I'm leaning strongly towards just building a whole new system from the ground up. I have a friend who's done it before and we've found all the other components (mobo, processor, case, RAM) for under $400. If I'm hearing that the idea of putting the old HD into this setup isn't going to work, I may just go ahead and throw down the additional $200 or so for a new HD and WinXP install. Anyone know where you can get that cheap?

I'm leaning strongly towards just building a whole new system from the ground up... I may just go ahead and throw down the additional $200 or so for a new HD and WinXP install. $200 is way too much. A new hard drive, depending on the size, is $45. New OEM copy of Windows XP is $90. So $135 for both from www.newegg.com . Reusing components is an excellent way to save $$ and avoid waste. No reason not to use your existing hard drive as long as there aren't any bad sectors.