What does the bttery control? Can I remove it for 5 seconds,then replace it and solve the ITHR checkpoint problem ?

Need more info. What happens when you try to boot? Fans spin? LED's blink? Anything on the monitor? When you push the on/off button does it start and in a few seconds shut down?

Your "friend' probably put a BIOS password on your computer. Find and disconnect or remove your BIOS battery on the mother board. You may be able to slip a business card under the contact on the top effectively removing the power from the BIOS. Let it stay disconnected for 5 minutes. Reinstall and reboot.

If this doesn't fix it, you will probably have to get professional help at your computer dealer or repair shop.

Lesson learned: Don't lend your computer or your spouse to your friend.

Thanks for your visit today.

Start system, pressing F2 to get to the BIOS. Go to "event log” section, clear the last event, save the settings, boot again

Try booting in safe mode. Then boot normally.

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What can cause this error?

Well, this is the problem since quite a variety of problems can trigger the error.

1: the bios can be malfunctioning (a bios reset or flash can give a solution)
2: the cpu can be malfunctioning (this requires a new cpu)
3: the cpu socket can be failing (this requires a new mb)
4: the problem can be with bad usb sockets
5: even a bad uplink to a usb hub can cause this error to appear.
Did you change your monitor lately? I would chase down the USB things first...that and the monitor seem to trip the trigger...
Hope this get you started- I think you were right on target with the flash of the BIOS-try it again using the BIOS flash downloaded from the dell site...and to run the chipset again...it just might
Good luck my friend, hope this helps, please leave rating, thank you kindly

the problem description is
Ithr
Smm mode is initializing the thermal probes.

problably the system is running at high temperature because of improper fan speed, so try to clear the nvram if its not working flash the bios if still the issue persists, replace the heatsink assembly and the motherbord.

Sounds like you tried everything except reseating any other hardware that may or may not be placed in another socket such as PCI, AGP, etc... Like a Modem, Network adapter, Sound/Graphics card, Wireless card, etc... This is probably a wasted post as if you knew to check each stick of memory seperatly then you've probably already reseated all socketed hardware. Though, you could remove all non essential hardware such as I mentioned above and try installing Windows again?
Good luck and keep us posted.

Go to BIOS and make the USB Controller to No boot and try restarting the computer

Hi,
One of the greatest factor in intermittent shutdowns is because of heat issues. try to check the fans if they are all spinning. if all fan's are ok then you only need to replace the motherboard. here's a manual that might come in handy http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/dim5100/en/sm/index.htm

Hope this helps.

thanks