
Originally Posted by
Tristan
If you are displaying accurate graphics during safe mood and boot up, I wouldn't bet on the graphics card being spoilt. If it is wonky you normally either get no visual output at all, or inconsistent graphics quality that is on-again-off-again. Not usually a consistent problem at a consistent stage.
I would guess it was your motherboard giving you problems. Or the CPU itself overheating? Not much to go on, but if it were my setup, I would:
1)Reapply thermal paste to the CPU/Fan contact point after degunking the whole fan of dust bunnies- try it again
2)Run it up in safe mode with a full install of your choice of OS
3)If you can't complete step two, borrow a cheap graphics card from a buddy who has one lying around. Most of the old cards, the modern PCs are legacy enabled. So you can at least finish setup, even if you can't run anything much with it.
4) If you don't have a buddy with a spare Graphics card, pop yours out and bring it to a friend's. If you can get his setup to work with your card, then you'll eliminate that as the problem.
Sorry there are no certain fixes with this one. I had a computer that was problematic once, went through like 2 repair stops after me and five buddies tried everything we could on it (ran down the entire list of what was possibly wrong)... I finally figured out that it was the reset switch wire that was shorting, causing it to reset at random intervals (no visible degradation of wires) so... the ghost in the machine could be from nearly anywhere.