I was gonna build an old p4 tower to make music on.

I tried using one harddrive to install xp and on the restart it freezes at the loading screen. restart freezes at loading screen. grab some other HDD I had laying around and on power up everything shuts off and now nothing turns on and i smell burnt electronics. Did my hardrive fry a capacitor or something?

Sounds like it may be a power issue. Power supply could have damaged both drives (and maybe more).

Could a HDD hold a charge as too like electro shock and kill your comp?

The same HDD killed two comps. Same way. Turn on and die immediately. I threw the HDD away. F that juju.

I may just build a new comp in the case. any suggestions of cheap fast mobos you may be looking at?

How cheap? How fast?

This may be overkill or over-priced for you: http://www.tigerdirect.com/app...-1103.

Lower cost: http://www.tigerdirect.com/app...-1090.

These are bare-bones kits, of course, not just motherboards.

Z

Leaning towards a notebook. I feel I might lug this thing with me and dragging towers around sucks.

Main uses would be Reason 4, Acid pro, Vegas, and other media editing.

Thinking like $500 laptop + $100 1TB external= $600 media center.