XW8600 USB KYBD/Mouse Freezing

[tomk32121]

I have an xw8600 purchased via eBay about 10 years back.  Was originally running Vista then Win7 x64 as a desktop.  I then purchased the RAM risers & other stuff (tall CPU cooling towers, RAM enclosure, RAM, new 1050 PSU, etc)to support 128GB RAM to run eSXI 6.5 HP version.  Install was successful & system was running fine from 2018 to 2020.  We then moved back to NJ & the system was dormant from mid-2020 until now.  System now booted successfully to eSXI BUT as my home internet IP scheme had changed I had to change the IP address of the eSXI management network.   Keyboard was completely frozen.  Tried rebooting several times.  Keyboard didn't work.  Took out RAM risers, reduced RAM to 64GB, re-installed old RAM fan, rebooted, keyboard still didn't work.  For S&G's I removed the boot drive, substituted another 2TB seagate drive & tried installing Windows.  Got 2/3rds through Win7 or Vista or Server 2008R2 install (all x64) & would ALWAYS get a BSOD 0x000124 error.  Tried another 2TB drive & had same results.  Swapped out HDMI video card for a old VGA card but had same results.

This BSOD, accc'dg to Googling is a pure HW error ('HW in serious distress'); RARELY is it a device driver issue.  It's usually a heat issue, accd'g to most of the results.  I've tried almost everything I can think of; I'm now down to re-pasting the two CPUs with new thermal paste & crossing my fingers and saying another rosary or two.  If anyone has any suggestions I'd love to hear them.

Cheers,

TomK