In article .net,
says...

snippety

I've run the mboard out of the case with just power, and pressed,
squeezed,etc. without any hint of what I'm looking for. I've examined it with
a glass looking for cracked board and/or traces, separating solder joints,
the obvious. It does still fail out of the case, so this isn't a
short-to-case issue.

Any ideas what else this might be? Do ASICS and other ICs fail (internally)
in this mode?

Remember that any modern computer motherboard is going to have a
bare minimum of four layers. Most have six, and I've even heard of a few
that have eight or ten.

It sounds to me like the board you're working with may have
developed a hairline crack somewhere. Short of inspection with high-end
ultrasonic or X-ray equipment (which probably costs more than you, me,
and my wife make together in a year), I really doubt you're going to
find the problem, much less be able to fix it.

Time for a replacement motherboard.

Happy hunting.


--
Dr. Anton T. Squeegee, Director, Dutch Surrealist Plumbing Institute.
(Known to some as Bruce Lane, ARS KC7GR,
kyrrin (a/t) bluefeathertech[d=o=t]calm -- www.bluefeathertech.com
"If Salvador Dali had owned a computer, would it have been equipped
with surreal ports?"