I'd take it to a computer repair place you trust or get a friend in the same city with expertise to help you.

Maybe some of the other buffistas can help more. Power suppplies are cheaper than mother boards, so I'd try replacing the power supply first. If that doesn't work then the Motherboard. But maybe there is a reason for trying it in the other order. In the end, regardless, it comes down to replacing parts and seeing what work.

Well, I googled up some information and went to Compusa for a replacement power supply. Wish me luck!

t dives

Okay, so the power supply is replaced. Now when I turn it on, the fan works. But I don't think the hard drive is working, and the monitor still isn't getting a signal. Argh.

Try disconnecting the Hard Drive from the ribbon/etc. cable, with just the power connector, you will be able to tell if it spins, at least.

remove all memory sticks and reseat, or try one at a time.

Okay, so the hard drive started, I heard it.

What's this all mean? To recap: The power supply now works and the fan works. The hard drive starts up when it's disconnected from the ribbon cable (that's the connection to the motherboard, right?). I don't apparently have a restart disk for this computer, but I"m assuming that's the next task, to restart it from a cd or floppy? What do I need to be able to do that? I have an external burner I can hook up to the laptop to make one...

Basic troubleshooting of a Motherboard starts with this:

1. Take out all add-in cards. If you have a modem or a seperate sound card? Out.

2. Start with a bare minimum of Ram.

3. turn it on and see if it at least tries to access the floppy drive, or brings up any sort of video.

4. If the video is built-in, try unplugging the monitor and starting it. Then attach the monitor if it seems to be working.

5. If it's a separate video card, take it out (see 1 above) and see if Motherboard beeps.

6. If the video is built-in, and you have an old video card from something else, try starting it up with that video card in a slot. If you have to borrow one, try that.

7. Let us know the results of above.

(Other people feel free to jump in, It's very late here, and I'm overtired...)

Does anybody here back up their Music folder(s) on the Mac, and what sort of software/hardware do you use to do it? I've reached about 7 gigs, so it's too big for a straight dump to a DVD, and even though most of it is music that I have on CD, I'd still like to have the complete set available....

I use a second, external hard drive to back up my Mac.

I have a LaCie external hard drive that I back every up on.

I need to do that again soon, come to think of it.

I was afraid it was something like that.

::makes a note of Even More Stuff to Buy sometime::

In the meantime, I'm copying it out artists A-J and K-Z (the Compilations folder throws off the usual alphabetic split). That gets it on two DVDs...

Microsoft pissed me off this morning, when I came down to find Automatic Updates had rebooted my computer.

Helpful Windows tip #3:

Turn off automatic restart after Windows Update.

1. Go to Start...run. Type gpedit.msc in the field, and click OK.

2. Click Local Computer Policy.... Computer Configuration... Administrative Templates... Windows Components... Windows Updates.

3. Double-click "No auto-restart for scheduled Automatic Updates installations."

4. Click the radio button next to Enabled.

5. Click OK.

6. Reboot when you get around to it.

eta: gpedit.msc should be in the \windows\system32 folder. I will see if I can track down which version of Windows XP has it.