It booted up (usually) ok, worked ok for about ten minutes, then completely froze up - it would still be doing clunky "hard disk" noises, but nothing actually responded. So much for "oh you need Windows reinstalled."
Fantastic.
I must admit, I got very leery of using it after that - as in, I didn't want to be in the middle of something, and have it fall over. I don't like things that don't work. Electrical things make me uneasy. Remember I mentioned how the motherboard failed in my new laptop, a month or so after I bought it? I've been using it close to daily since then, and I STILL worry that it won't turn back on when it's in power saving mode. So I did leave it longer than I should have to take it back in to the shop, but my Mum kindly offered me a lift to take it in a couple of weeks ago.
Well, I just got my PC back from the repair shop for the second time today, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it's "properly fixed" this time. The man who handed it over to me checked on their database and said it had been the hard disk that caused the problems.
I have more things to talk about but I want to get the PC up and running again and get it to do its updates. I'll update LJ from there, if it works. *cross fingers, haha*