A horrible tale of woe

[hackbackwards]

Nine months ago my computer died.

I don't remember the specs it had then; I'd built it three years earlier, so I kind of forgot. I do, however, remember how it died.

I was listening to some music, and suddenly everything froze. The music got stuck in a single instant, playing one note, and the computer wouldn't do anything. So I shut it down, and turned it back on. Only, while the computer would turn on, nothing else would happen. No boot spam, the monitor wouldn't even register something had happened on the other end. I checked the monitor with another computer and it worked, but I couldn't get anything to happen.

I've spent the past nine months replacing the entire inside of the computer (it took so long because I'm kind of broke). I replaced the motherboard, the RAM, the CPU, the CPU fan, the video card, and the power supply. I also got new, better versions than I had before.

I told you how it died originally because it may have something to do with what came next.

Yesterday the final parts came in for me to finally try and turn it on again. I hooked everything up, poured over the manuals to make sure nothing was out of place, and turned it on. It worked!

For eight hours.

Then, as I clicked on a streaming movie to play on the Internet, the screen got all wonky; big blue and green boxes appeared, the screen went blank, and showed "no signal".

I turned the computer off then on again, and something really yucky started happening: from the first boot spam all they way to just before login, there were little white boxes and bars covering the entire screen; less where some of the text was, but essentially making everything unreadable. I could get into the BIOS (and while still looking funky with blue lines everywhere, I could still read it ok), and everything looked completely normal. But, after the computer loaded windows, just before it got to the login screen, the monitor blanks and shows no signal again.

I could boot in safe mode, with networking and command prompt, though there were red lines covering almost every inch of the screen. I re-installed my video card software (using the CD that came with it), and the drivers for it, but (when in safe mode) the computer was behaving as if it were using the on-board graphics card, and not the one I had plugged in (even though it knew I had one plugged in); when I moved windows around they were all jerky would move only in stutters.

I reseated the RAM and the video card, to no effect. I ran every CD I had that came with the hardware, no effect. I couldn't run a virus scan, because all my programs were nine months out of date, and I couldn't update them because of some weird safe mode thing. The CPU temp is fine, the system temp is fine, the monitor works (plugged a different monitor in, same results), everything says it's working properly.

After a while of trying different things, I put everything (inside the computer) back in the slots I'd had them in before I started reseating them. This time, the computer just booted endlessly; I could still get into the BIOS, but it just wouldn't stop loading windows. I left it for an hour and it still hadn't stopped. I couldn't even get into safe mode anymore, because it wouldn't stop loading. So I left it overnight, just in case. Next morning, I turned it on again, same result.

Then I did something really stupid. For all that I do know about computers, there's more that I don't, and most of that relates to power-related things. There's a switch on my power supply, that was currently set to "115V". I switched it, to see what else it said, and the other setting said "230V". Thinking I had nothing to lose, I turned the computer on with that setting. There was a huge spark, and the computer shut down and wouldn't turn on again at all.

So I stuck my old power supply in. This time the computer turns on, displays boot spam, and gets to the screen where I can select to display POST or get into the BIOS. It won't go past that screen; it just restarts again. I can't get into the BIOS; it just restarts. When displaying the POST, the computer recognizes my motherboard, tells me what kind it is, my CPU, tells me what kind that is, my RAM, tells what kind that is, and that I have a single USB keyboard plugged in (I do), and then restarts. The white boxes and weird lines and strange artifacts all remain, though.

Here are the specs for the current computer:

Power supply (the one I fluxed up): Diablo / 550-Watt / ATX / Dual LED Fan / SATA-Ready / 24-Pin

Video card: Diablotek GeForce 6600 Video Card - 512MB DDR2, PCI Express

RAM: Centon 2048MB PC5400 DDR2 667MHz

CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 5600+ Processor 2.90GHz, 1MB Cache, 1000MHz (2000 MT/s) FSB, Dual-Core, Socket AM2

Motherboard: MSI K9N4 SLI-F Motherboard - NVIDIA, Socket AM2, ATX, Audio, PCI Express, SLI Ready, Gigabit LAN, USB 2.0, Serial ATA, RAID

I'm using Windows XP on a Desktop computer.

(lots of information provided because I have no idea what might help)

The power supply I'm using now is a 450W SATA-Ready 20-Pin ATX.

The only parts from my old computer are the case, harddrive, power supply, and CD/DVD drive.

I ordered another power supply, identical to the one I fried, just in case my old one isn't supplying enough power, and preventing the computer from fully booting up.

I used to think it was a video card problem, but the whole... loading windows forever kind of disillusioned me from that. Now I have no idea. About anything.

Anyone smarter and wiser than I have any suggestions? Any light to shed on this issue at all?