Okay. So the computer I use for surfing the net got some malware. Couldn't shift it with what tools I had. So I DBAN'ed the HDD. Then, I could not boot it. So I put in another HDD.

THE FUCKING THING STILL WILL NOT BOOT. I changed the boot order. Nothing. Nada Zilch. Even tried resetting the BIOS.

So I replaced it with my tower, and I now a user of an old AppleMac Power PC.

Has anyone ever encountered this? I have replaced dozens of hard drives in the past and done clean installs. Never had a problem like this before in my life.

It's most likely a hardware problem then if it's not booting with a new HDD.

How far exactly does it get in the booting process? Does it POST?
Does it display any error messages? Does it beep any? What sort of computer is it? What sort of hardware?

I think I have tracked down the cause of the problem. Seems like Packard Bell, in their infinite wisdom, built models of this ilk that are configured to boot from a network. I have to track this pesky thing down in BIOS and disable it.

The problem I have at the moment is the way Packard Bell put this machine together

But...on the plus side....it's given me an excuse to get my old Mac out and start using it.

Didn't Packard Bell go out of business like 20 years ago?

Well PC world sold my sister a Packard Bell in 2004......I warned her NOT to buy a machine from those rip of merchants, but would she listen? Oh hell no. What do I fucking know eh? I only fix PC's for coins of the realm. I know nothing, me. The day PC world conduct an honest day's business is the day I get a blow job from Emily Watson!

If you ask me, the BIGGEST cause of security headaches is WINDOWS! Time and again, IE has been PROVEN to be about as secure as a fucking sieve. I can deal with ANY bug. I'm just having a right old game trying to sort this PC out. I just don't want to scrap it, 'Coz I want to reload it as a dual boot machine with XP and Ubuntu. Like the one I am talking to you dudes on now!!!!

If it's any consolation, I got a taste of my own medicine a couple of hours ago when trying out Sabayon Linux:

LOL, did it actually do anything?

Nope, I'm still here. But I'm already fed up with Sabayon, the package manager breaks too easily because it's not fully compatible with the Gentoo repos. I don't recommend it, just stick to a decent version of [v]platform[/v].

Well guys. I must say. I have NEVER worked on a PC as badly put together as THIS fucker. I've given up th project and shall be sticking with my Mac, and my dual boot machine.

I almost had a

The moral of this story? sometimes it's better to let things stay broken!

Fixed the bugger

Had to go through the BIOS with a fine toothed comb. Loaded it up with XP Pro and it's working okay now.

Y'know sometimes when the problem is staring you right in the face?

'Course it would help if Packard Bell would have built the machine so you could service it....