Plot thickens actually.

On the PSU front I have seen a good PSU with eBuyer - like you say, eBay has it's moments but in all honesty some of the listings don't give enough info to make a basic decision band most offerings are like for like with what I have and I do not see the point. I still feel that I will look at updating the PSU.

Following on from another thread I installed the utility Everest and ran it. It shows the GPU running at over 100C..............Aaahhh.

So is the graphics card up the creek? This morning I've removed it and gone back to the old 5200 to see if the system is still unstable. Have contacted the retailer (although it was bought June last year it should still have a warranty) and will wait to see what they say.

It's a 7600GS and the fan works fine, but that Everest reading seems to indicate a flaw and from that, some of the other 'incidents' maybe fall into place?

The 7600 has a power connector but my system PSU has no spare outlets. I'm tempted to retry it using one of the connectors from the CD drive and see if that makes any difference.

Don't you just love PCs when they go wrong? It's like being a bad detective following up one false lead after another.

Hopefully this may have narrowed it down - any opinions would be very welcome.