i have an IBM laptop only a little over a year old. When i turn it on the fan starts to turn but then nothing happens. Once in awhile i get a message to get it to start windows xp in safe mode, but once i say yes, everything just stops again. the bios might be gone too. can a virus do this to me? or is it more likely a mobo failure? any comments are welcome. thanks.

Boot sector viruses are very rare. Do you have any kind of boot disc? Recovery disc?

If it is still under any warranty follow that course.

what happens if you boot it in normal mode? has it been getting worse ort has it suddenly does this?