USB Devices No Longer Work

[Sanada]

Tonight, I was playing a game of CSS when my Internet cut-out (which is pretty typical on my ISP, Pipex) and I returned to the server when it came back. I had the purple checker cubemaps when I reloaded the map but thought nothing of it as it happens some times.

About 5 minutes later, my computer freezes and I get a BSoD. I restarted the computer with the reset switch. At first, Windows wasn't loading. It'd get to the point where you'd hit F8 for boot options and not go any further. After 3 tries it finally loaded again.

When it finished loading, an icon in the system tray was complaining about a USB devices drivers not installed properly. I thought nothing of it and went to play CSS again. About 15 minutes later it crashed again but no BSoD came up.

I restated it and loaded Windows again. The icon was still there complaining but the computer crashed at the desktop as soon as it finished loaded. After another restart, the icon disappeared along with any connectivity to USB devices.

Now no USB devices work from my mouse to USB pen drive. The USB controller appears in the Device Manager with no problems to any of the sub devices. I suspected the cause of the problem was my internal card reader/writer. The LEDs still light up on this but it doesn't work. I unplugged it but still nothing works so I guess the damage has already been done.

I think the USB controller may have been damaged. Since the drivers are Windows default, can I just uninstall it and it will come back? Is there any software tool I can run to check to see if the USB controller is broken?

 

[Uriel]

Buy a new computer
......or system restore?

 

[Sanada]

Well it doesn't matter now as the Motherboard just died. :|

I don't want to do get a completely new computer yet. I wanted this one to last me for atleast 6-12 more months, giving enough time for DX10 and Vista to come into stream. I also just bought a GFX card, some RAM and a PSU to rebuild another computer which I'm planning to use as a replacment for this but it's having problems with the SATA drives. I can't send these back now as the return policy for unwanted goods has expired so I may as well put them to use.

Could anyone suggest a resonable good Socket 478 board? It needs to have SATA and support a 3.2GHz P4 (800FSB), <$100 if possible. The one that just died was a Asus P4C800-E Deluxe (USB Failure, then death). The one before that was also a P4C800-E Deluxe which also died (On-board LAN failure, then PSU killed it along with ifself). I can't send this one back as the warrenty has ended. I'm not keen on getting an Asus again as everyone I've had has had problems. :/

Thanks in advanced.