intermittemt boot up

[metrevor]

I am taking a look at a friends PC for him. One day the PC will boot up and work ok the next day it won't boot up and vice versa.

When I went to have a look at the PC today but it would boot up properley. It does the POST test. After the memory check it detects everything on the ide channels (hard drive, DVD drive and CD re-writer). Then the system hangs. I am left with a black screen and flashing cursor.

The PC is 3 years old do you think the motherboard battery could be at fault.

[pickel]

Check the start up sequence in the bios ( if you know how ) and try resetting the CMOS as well as the battery voltage.