XP Wierdness - Time jumps, profile corruption

[Ur_Mom]

I have a user today that completely lost his user profile. It couldn't be loaded, so I named it user.old and logged into domain to create a new local profile. All good. user.old didn't have any data in it, other than what is by default (and some missing items).

Fast forward 2 hours - user is logged in with user rights. Not able to change time/date. All of a sudden, his calendar alarms start going off. It logs him out and he can't log back in due to wrong time between workstation and server. I log in as admin and change time. It jumped up exactly one year. Logged him back in as normal and it's all good again.

WTF!? Hard drive checks out as completely perfect. Everything else works great. Other than a few lost files, he's great (everything but desktop is synced with server). Just these weird things keep happening. Anyone have anything happen like this? Any suggestions on what to look for if it is reoccurring (I hope not!).

 

[cyclone3d]

Sounds like the onboard timer is dying.

Could also be that the CMOS battery is almost dead.

I would try:
Reset BIOS via jumper or pulling battery.

If that doesn't fix it, do this:
Reseat processor, RAM, and all cable connections.

If it is still screwing up, I would try a wipe and reimage.

If it still messes up, I would say it is either the motherboard or processor.

 

[Ur_Mom]

Forgot to mention it's a 6 month old laptop...

Thanks for the suggestions.

Sounds like the onboard timer is dying.

Could also be that the CMOS battery is almost dead.

I would try:
Reset BIOS via jumper or pulling battery.

If that doesn't fix it, do this:
Reseat processor, RAM, and all cable connections.

If it is still screwing up, I would try a wipe and reimage.

If it still messes up, I would say it is either the motherboard or processor.

 

[Demon10000]

Even a six month old laptop can have a bad battery. With your description, that is what In would have suggested.