I was just needing confirmation to see if this was a motherboard problem. The past couple of days have been filled with a lot of headaces trying to get my computer fixed. In safe mode, I was having numerous lock ups when trying to do something as simple as a virus scan. In normal XP, I would get a lockup every time I tried to run any sort of program. I got a suggestion that it could be my memory after getting a MACHINE_CHECK_EXCEPTION error, so I took out my stick of XMS and found a large ammount of dust. I cleaned it off, and found no chang ein the lockups. Once I started switching the sticks out, things are where they were now. The computer hangs in the startup screen on "AMD Athlon 64 3000+". It is suppoused to say "Memory Testing: (memory ammount) ok", but that never comes up. I cannot even get into the BIOS settings. Is this a bad motherboard? It doesn't seem like it would be a bad processor, as the processor is the one thing that shows up on the BIOS screen allright. Could this even just be a memory problem? Any help appreciated.

Do you have a case speaker hooked up tot he motherboard? If there is a problem during the post, you should get a sequence of beep codes that will help you find the cause of the problem. Michael J

Could be motherboard, could be power supply, could be memory, could be the hard drive. I recommend putting the hard drive into another computer as the Secondary Master and run chkdsk on it and a manufacturer's diagnostic too. Have you tried resetting the BIOS with the jumper on the motherboard? Try some other memory to eliminate that as a problem.

What antivirus program are you running, what version and up to date?

No beeps during POST, I have the case speaker set up correctly. I am running AVG anti-virus, and it is up-to date. I couldn't finish a virus scan (when the computer was able to start up) because the computer would lock up. I was able to complete a virus scan about 6-7 days ago, when lock ups were less frequent, and nothing showed up.