Try using the Recovery Console on your installation cd. To enter it, start setup as usual but then choose the R option. If your hdd is faulty then it will not proceed far because the Recovery Console requires windows on the drive to be recognizable.
It may of course be the motherboard at fault, ie. the drive interface [which is the Southbridge if an Intel-based machine]. And unfixable save by the manufacturer. Simplest check of that is to plug in a different hdd and see if Setup can proceed.
So...If your machine is actually still bootable then do this [this procedure will burn a diagnostic program onto a cd which in turn may be used to boot your machine and check the hd] :
You'll need access to a computer with Internet connectivity and a CD burner, plus a blank CD-R or CD-RW.
Then go to this link: http://support.thetechguys.com/Uploads/%7Bb4d5f239-78d9-4bd8-8e7a-2de1983b4d7d%7D/DiagCD23.exe
Either Run the file download or Save diagcd23.exe to your computer and dclick it to run. The procedure is quite automatic: you will be asked to insert a blank CD for burning the file.
Once the disk is created, put it in your broken machine, then restart it. It should boot from the CD and then give you the opportunity to run a Long HDD (hard disk) test. The utility supports a wide range of disk manufacturers.
Say how you get on.
gerbil
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