PC problem resolved

After more than 2 weeks, my HP desktop has been rescued. After finally getting a HP technician to come over to my place, I had expected my problem to be solved. But that was not to be. After changing a new harddisk, and even changing the motherboard, the problem did not go away... in the end, I had to send it in for repair.

The PC came back a few days later, the problem was with the card reader. Finally, I was able to work on it again, and to start reinstalling all those programs and copying back my files... only to find that the DVD drive doesn't work. Shock.

It turns out that HP, while troubleshooting, disconnected my DVD drive... and forgot to connect it back before they returned the PC. So after plugging it back in, my PC is now back in a healthy state.