Dell Inspiron 510M no longer powers up

Hi,

I have a Dell Inspiron 510M running Windows XP Pro SP2. The laptop was a work machine and is set up as a Windows Server client. To login I have a domain login. When I try to login the cursor jumps and changes the insertion point. This means I can't login. I tried to clear the login password or at least change it to the same character x 8 ie. aaaaaaaa using Sysinternals ERD 2000. I only got the option to change the administrators password. I believe this is because ERD can't change domain passwords. So, I changed the admin password to aaaaaaaa and tried to login. The laptop made a loud sound of random beeps like Morse code.The login failed.

I then booted the laptop into Safe Mode with Command Prompt as I had done previously and had the same cursor jumping around problem. I managed to type chkdsk /R. There were some errors reported and fixed. I then rebooted but had the same problem with the cursor.


Next, I booted from the Windows XP CD and tried a repair. During the repair none of the setup files could be copied. The laptop also made a very loud sound of several beeps in a morse code like pattern for about 5 mins. I exited the repair and rebooted the laptop. I got the same problem with the cursor.

I then decided to re-install Windows and tried booting from the CD. The laptop would not boot from the CD. The screen froze at the press any key to boot from CD...I rebooted the laptop from the hard drive and it booted normally to the login screen. Same cursor problem.

I then shutdown the laptop and decided to install a new HDD. The laptop now doesn't power on at all. Does anyone have any ideas?

 

What type of pad have you got (the bit you use to move the mouse)
that could be dammaged, usually most local computer shops should be able to repair it under £100./

 

I need it to power on first. Any ideas on why it would just go dead?

 

Thankfully I did pay attention and the beep codes were continuous as described in my earlier post. The beeps went on for five or so minutes. The links you listed suggest hardware failure which is exactly what I thought it was. However, I was hoping someone else out there had a similar problem which was caused by a virus. Some virus' have been known to nuke RAM, BIOS chips etc. Thanks for all your help.