Yes, a generic surge protector is only worth the parts in it... most
provide no more protection than any decent power supply, only a second
"layer" of the same protection, though perhaps a more immediate path to
ground.
Yes, if the bios is the problem. However I'd suspect the "knocking" it
more than the bios, has broken some component or solder joint, trace, etc.
You might also inspect the AGP slot for bent contacts but I think that
would result in no video or crash, not corrupt display.
You know Ive been having and Ive seen two problems that may or may not
be what I think they are , but they seem to be related to corrosion
(my best guess) and power anamolies. The electrcal system here I think
stinks. Ive seen some weird stuff in the news and Ive seen numerous
cutoffs in power here - many that happen only for a minute or so.
A recent one seemed to cause lots of problems with PCs in my condo
building. Lots of neighbors asked me to fix their PCs and claimed it
screwed up after the recent power outage. I know some posters keep
saying its a myth and very rare but there seems to be some kind of
connection.
Another one - Im attributing it to corrosion as a best guess but a lot
of PCs here seem to suffer from mysterious weirdness. A lot of can be
cured by just reinstalling things etc - especially messing around with
the battery or clearing the CMOS. Ill clean the battery surface many
times and reinstall and the really bizarro behavior goes away.
Some of the symptoms are - general weird behavior, corruption of the
bios it seems. Youll see weird characters when various drives are
detected especially the CD roms , burners. Another is the PC seems
dead. A light will go on but there will be no video and it seems dead
no matter what you do. Ive swapped parts out just like the other times
when I had bad problems and everything will point to a dead vid card
or motherboard, Since then Ive learned at least in my cases - clearing
the CMOS or taking the battery out and cleaning it seems to make it
work again. Its weird. Another weird thing when I change some thing on
my system itll go into that dead mode - no video etc for long periods
when booting up but if you wait it out - the WIN logo pops up and all
is well.
I think a lot of these type of things explain why there are so many
supposedly dead boards returned and then resold as refurbs that seem
to work OK.
My neighbors kid just had another incident that was the same thing. I
fixed it once after it seemed to go dead - an ABIT KT333 similar to my
older boards Im using as a second PC. I was convinced it was dead but
doing the CMOS , battery thing - it worked. Then the other week 6
months after the first incident - it was dead again. I took the
battery out and cleaned it and zing - it worked.
I just did it on my ASUS deluxe system the other month and twice on my
KT333 system. The KT133a system also went bonkers several times until
I took the relatively new replaced battery out and cleaned it. You
wouldnt believe her system. It went bonkers - wrongly detecting CDroms
, corrupt bios readouts for drives and then refusing to bootup - no
video after it worked perfectly at home but not when I carried it to
her house. Im blaiming it all on corrosion - but who knows what it is.
