>Have you tried running System Restore on the balky Dell? IIRC you have to press F8 before the Windows logo appears, then follow the prompts. That's for Win7 and I'm sure is slightly different on earlier versions. I had to do that recently on one of my daughters' PCs.
I am sure its hardware, as most of the time it does not even reach the point where you can press F8, it just flashes the power for 10 seconds or so. Other times it might even reach the start of windows, but only once in a hundred times, and then dies.
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