Endless Paradigm

evening all. my bro has a netbook (compaq mini 110). anyways this afternoon it died on him. (it crashed from win7, no BSOD, just shut itself down [for no reason])

It doesn't boot anymore though BIOS are accessible, but attempting to boot normally, the cursor in top left flashes a couple times, then a blank screen
Anyways, ive spent my evening trying to repair it.

So far ive:
-reset the bios
-attempted to boot up windows, ubuntu, and osx86 discs via a disc drive, all start to load (windows finished the loading setup files screen, ubuntu loads the select language screen, and osx86 opens chameleon) then freeze after aforementioned screens. Every time. Backtrack won't load from dvd either.
-done RAM and HDD tests in BIOS (RAM fine, hdd fails in read test in under 5 seconds of starting)
Attempted to boot from external hdd, and a pendrive. give same problem as internal hdd, blank screen

Anyway, even though the hdd fails the test it can't be the hdd itself that's the problem, because i can't load ANY disc from a USB dvd drive either, and i can't boot from external hdds either.

I guessed it must be something to do with so piece of SATA hardware, but how come discs begin to load and then stop...

Anyone experienced such a problem? Help would be appreciated, because im boggled :(
thanks

It sounds like it's the Motherboard... I'm afraid.

Would a failed HDD mount cause a Live OS to fail.. I'm not sure. Try booting it with the HDD removed.

With no luck, I think it'll need to be sent for repairs.

Senseito7 Wrote: [ -> ]It sounds like it's the Motherboard... I'm afraid.

Would a failed HDD mount cause a Live OS to fail.. I'm not sure. Try booting it with the HDD removed.

With no luck, I think it'll need to be sent for repairs.

ahh thanks. i had guessed that it was probably the mobo. sucks though cause the warrantly on ran out 17 days ago.

Boot Linux in text mode - it'll show you what's exactly being loaded and may give some hints.

But have you tried with the HDD physically disconnected?