Dalo Harkin

Hi, Welcome to FPCH :)

As a last ditch attempt to the drive you could flash the firmware - I have seen BSOD when installing a CD/DVD that the drive didnt have the correct firmware for.

There is no direct cooling of the North or Southbridge - 99% they are over heating - install more fans in the case and please sort all the wiring inside - it looks like spaghetti junction - have a look at my sig and hopefully that will help

1440x800 is not a native resolution - try 1024x768 and see how that runs.

They are all fine - glad its all ok now

I dont think the error is relating to the AV program but something else you have installed in regards to a driver. are you running the AV from disk? in a CDROM etc?

Chances are that you just have a lot if unnecessary startup items and they all need closing before windows shuts down - open a command window (cmd.exe) and type msconfig and press enter - it will bring a box up and the last tab on the right is called startup items - untick what you no longer need/use - if you are unsure post a screen shot and we will help

As the PC is quite old - the chances are that it was never designed to use XP and therefore the drivers that you have are for an older OS and you need to goto the DELL homepage and find the additional drivers Documentation

do you have all the power saving features turned off? right click on the desktop and then select properties and then on the screen saver tab - bottom right it says power settings - make sure they are all set to NEVER. reboot and see how you go - failing that the monitor lead or the monitor itself sounds faulty

Right the problem with setting a RAID up is that it needs to be done before DATA is put on the drive preferably. You would need 2 disks the same size make and model number, and then you can use that as say C:/ so you would effectively show 1 C:/ drive but there is one that is always getting the data that is sent to C:/ sent to the other mirrored drive too. and you do the same with the D:/ drive preferably again to reduce cost you would partition C:/ and D:/ on the same drive and have that mirrored. I know this sounds confusing. please let me know if anything needs claifying

ok - thats still ok - you just need a different cable than a standard VGA one

Yes that is a sad story, but how many times do things like that happen - the words 'beyond reasonable doubt' would be more than enough

It is better and easy to see whats going on at more of a glance. I can back Mike up on the late nights :D The heart with the white cross on it is still at the top, that NEEDS to go

Hi Vivienne, I have no idea why a perc card has been recommended, your board does support RAID and the controller is more than up to the task. RAID is the best way for business setups as you will not technically lose and data, but there are alternative solutions. The thing to bear in mind is that all drives have failure rates and when you add 2 in RAID that chance is doubled but the backup is there. I am surprised that he has not recommended that you store the data online as it is then not using your resources as in the cost of drives. There are alot of companies that offer the ability to manage your data over the web and they have all the means in place to offer you basically an outsourced server and with that you get the bonus's of data recovery/disaster recovery and low costs - if you prefer to keep the data 'inhouse' then use RAID (Mirrored) hope this helps and please feel free to ask any more questions you have.

Agreed - there are some awesome ones on there :D

As do I, I am a strong believer in the death penalty and the only reason that we dont have it in most countries is that the government and people in charge are soft and they are afraid of the backlash from it - they need to grow a back bone and change policy. There is no real prevention for people committing serious crimes - people get locked up serve some time (with their mates) and then get out on good behaviour - Give me an AK47 and I will do it myself :mad:

Can you be more descriptive - is it on standby?

Right seeing as this is related to your other post - open add remove programs from control panel - remove the nvidia driver - DO NOT REBOOT Manually navigate to C:/Nvidia and DELETE all files in that folder. reboot and then install the latest driver that was released today ;)

3.5 years will be more than enough when the other inmates find out what he is in for he wont last 3.5 minutes :mad:

erm - not I :p

What resolution are you trying to play the games at the 8400GS is a budget card and may just be able to cope at 1024x768 but will need the majority of the 'effects' turned off like bloom and shadows. Make sure you are running the latest driver - one was released today from Nvidia ;)

going back to why you want to start afresh - if it is working now then just clean it up - goto add/remove and uninstall anything you dont need, run Malwarebytes and then we will talk you through msconfig to get rid of redundant start up items and it will be good as new!

ok - can you back the files up that you need to disk before we do any more as there is a high chance the OS or the disk is dying/corrupt

hmm - very odd, can you enter the BIOS and see if the disk is shown in there please?

right - let me get this right - you are classing a loading time from clicking the launch icon to the home page appearing yes? IE on mine is less than .5 of a second - I kid you not.