Repairing the Windows install was a PITA. Either the whole System32 folder was missing or it went missing after I ran chkdsk. It was instead replaced by a file with 0 byte size. What I didn't know at the time however was that chkdisk had recovered the folder and put it inside a different folder in the root.

None of the recovery steps outlined by MS would work because they weren't intended to repair the whole folder. What should have worked, using the Repair option when re-installing Windows was also not working...

At first I simply wasn't getting that option as the installer would never find a windows installation. The boot.ini was also toast and MS's previous steps didn't repair nor rebuild it. So I copied the boot.ini from my other machine which has been set up previously with the same disk names and folder structure. I also copied that system's System32 folder which was itself also a PITA which required multiple tools to accomplish.

That finally led me to being able to select the repair option during Windows installation when booting from CD. But I still couldn't get the issue fixed because the installer would disable the mouse and keyboard - both USB and PS2 models.

I decided that perhaps I'd better build a new installer disk by slipstreaming SP3 onto my WinXP SP2 install disks. nLite is what I used and it was a smooth build. The new install disk finally let me use my mouse and keyboard and accomplished the repair. After some more dancing in having to swap drives letter assignments for C and D (not as straight forward as using Disk Management) and after some driver re-installs I was back in business.

The new memory has been running in the system without incident. 4GB of Kingston value RAM. A new Gigabyte mobo has been ordered along with the new HVR-2250 and HDPVR. As mentioned, this mobo also required a gfx card, but at least it's only costing me $30. Next week the ASUS mobo goes bye-bye and I do another Install-Repair with another specialized slipstream disk I made (containing the ATI drivers for the new GFX card, all the Gigabyte mobo drivers and the Hauppauge drivers).

Fingers crossed.