My friends Pc has got some major problems, the first is no internal modem will work, it just tries to dial and then says "hardware" problem", after trying 3 different modems, i think maybe the motherboard has had it as an external modem dials, and connects but doesnt load IE, but i think the software just needs re-installing. I used spybot to give it a quick check to see if any dialers or anything strange was stopping it from working and now after re-start we get a message "cpu has been changed" and pressing F1 is the only way to boot the pc. Anyone shed any light on any of this? general opinions welcome.

To me it sounds like your CMOS battery might be flat, this would cause the PC to behave strangely and for it to say that the CPU settings have been changed.
Have you noticed the time/date in windows being wrong.
If you have a multi-meter at home (which most people don't) you could test the battery and make sure it is at the recommended 3.3 volts.

Otherwise as you say it could have something to do with the motherboard, but check out the CMOS battery first. If you don't have a multimeter then just buy a new battery (they are cheap) and replace it. When you first replace it, it will tell you that your CPU settings have changed again and you will possibly need to change your date and time.

Ok thank You, will try that. sounds like a power surge has caused some damaged, so might have effected the battry aswell. When the internet stopped working there was interference down the phone line, after unplugging the the modem the ineterference was gone but so was the modem lol. Pretty sure the pci slots for the modem are dead. Will have to work it from an external for now and get a battry, that certainly sounds like the problem for the cpu problem as it has only just appeared and we havent messed with the pc in anyway except for the modem change and the drivers, which i uninstalled. Thanx again will try it, appreciated =)