My bro had his MSI K7T Pro2a die on him. At first I thought it was the cpu... but it (cpu) worked fine in my pc. PS in also working. Here is the problem. When I power on the PC a strange noise starts up (it's not the fans, i stoped the fans and the noise was still present) then the pc locks hard either when the bios screen appears or a little after that. The source of the noise seems to be coming from the cpu. I removed the cpu and all other components... powered on the pc (w/o cpu) and the noise ceases. place the cpu in the noise begins (it's not the fan). Have you every heard of a mb making a noise? it sounds kinda like scratching fading in and out. I'm sorta afraid the board might blow up or something. I've reset the cmos, same result. the board is grounded properly. The board look just as good as the day i bought it. any ideas? thx.