There would be two places I would put my money on: Either a bad processor, or a bad or unstable power current from the outlet. Have you tried any other outlets, maybe in a diff room? I had that problem before and had an extension cord running across the hall before I could have a change to pull the drywall and rewire it.
and the only way constant restarting could damage the hdd, is if the read head got pinged off the side, or if it sent bad power to the hdd.
The last thing I can possibly think of is that maybe the motherboard is shorting to the motherboard tray.
and lastly, I've heard of this happening: have you tried any other monitors, mice, keyboard, unplugging any un-needed peripheral devices and booting? because the internal circutry could be shorting and triping something to make it restart or if your keyboard has a power button on it and it is shorting
heh you should of read my last post, i just said... this computer has been pluged into outlets in other buildings and does the same thing..and another thing, it's not restarting.. its shuting down, which usualy means something differnt then a random reboot so i heard. and again with the motherboard, this is the second motherboard with the same exact problem, so i don't think it has anything to do with it.. and like i said, i've unpluged everything i could 1 at a time to try to eliminate everything i could but still can't find the problem besides the 1 hard drive that seems to make the booting up harder, but the computer still shuts off after a while. with only the "better" harddrive ..no one's really come up with a differnt idea besides power or motherboard but as i've said i've checked these things already.. and it's not 99% sure it's not the motherboard or outlet and for the hardrive damageing, i ment the new hard drive that i just bought that came in today, since my computer randomly shuts off if it shuts off durring install of mobo drivers or of windows on the new hd he said it wouldn't be fun trying to fix it and it'd be better to wait to see when i get the processor sent to me from amother fourm member trying to help me out which i am of course very greatful for it's just so frustrating not being able to find the problem and.. everyone is at a loss on what it could be..