I just got my computer back from my dad, who says he hasn't used it for a while. I got everything set up and when I pushed the power button it took me to the HP Invent screen, where it say press F1 for setup, Esc for boot menu, etc. My keyboard is either not working or the computer is frozen on that screen. I tried to search around the internet for solutions, but so far nothing I found has helped. I tried to restart it while holding the escape key, one solution I did find, and that did nothing. I even tried putting a CD in, to no avail. When I first start it I can hear the computer thinking, but then after about three seconds it stops. The computer is a hp a636n, and I've had if since 2004, if that's helpful.

I'm trying to help a friend who is having the same problem with an HP Media Center PC m7367c. It's about 5 years old as well. She used the computer 2 days ago, and shut it down properly. Yesterday, it froze on the hp invent screen, and no connection to any of the periphials (this includes the USB keyboard). After trying several disks to try to circumvent the hard drive, I went to make coffee. After about 20 minutes of bluescreen, windows just began working. While the computer was up, I deleted a bunch of junk files, (games and crapware)and let MacAfee run it's scan. The scan took over 1.5 hours, and found 2 problems, as I tried to find/fix the problems, the program closed and I couldn't see what they were. I decided to restart the computer and acdientally shut it down completely. During the entire time the bluescreen is on, the HD light shows it to be running, I can hear the light "hummm" but it's like the disk is spinning but nothing is reading it . Now, 2 1/2 hours later. I have tried her disks again, and nothing. Unfortunatly, she does not know the importance of good labeling and has no idea if she ever created the boot disks or the XP backup disks . What now? I don't even know what made it finally start this morning. If anyone wants to chat as they help, I will be more than happy to post the conversation in this thread so others can learn from it, too.

A quick update...I read on several other sites that one possibility was issues with the USB ports. I unplugge all the usb devices (wireless keyboard/mouse, monitor, printers) and the computer began running. I plugged the monitor back in, immediately, and saw the XP startup screen. Within about 20 seconds, the computer was running again. I plugged the keyboard and mouse back in, and it's still running. The issue, now is how to keep this from happening again. Any ideas? Thanks!!!