Hardware problems, need help

So last night I was using my PC as usual when it became incredible sluggish and froze, then I got the usual BSOD(WinME). So I rebooted only to find out my computer had suffered a stroke of some kind. 1) The POST seems to go by OK, however half the time the RAM check isn't done which is odd. It detects all the drives as usual. If I go in to the BIOS it reports all the information it should(as if everything's OK). 2) After all it's checks it prints "Verifying VMM(or something) data ......". Now normally this is only on screen for a second, then the windows load screen appears. However now it just hangs with the load light(red LED) constantly on. 3) I tried using my old win98 boot CD. However the computer freezes again like in step 2, but just after having read from the CD. 4) My floppy emergency disk runs alright. I can still go through all the folders on the hard drive, except windows. When I try to read from the Windows folder I get "can't read from C, error". 5) FDISK reports that the primary partition is intact and the proper size. 6) Using the disk I tried running a few COM programs on the hard drive. They do run, but very slowly. So my conclusion is that a) my hard drive still works but it's motor is fubared b) same but windows folder is somehow fubared. c) my ram has died. I still have no idea why a hard drive issue would cause problems with the boot CD, unless both the HD and RAM are dead. Oh and I don't have any spare HD's or RAM to help figure this out. Has anyone had this problem before? Does anyone now any DOS programs I could download to help figure out what's wrong? Should I just buy a new cheap $400 computer(which is what this one was originally). Please I need your help. I'm on a public PC right now and I only have 3 hours left. I won't be able to get back online until Monday afternoon.