Virus? Can't reboot or run restore; totally stuck.

Hi:

I've owned my 532h for 16 mos and loved it - until now. With no warning, yesterday am it started turning off and eventually would not boot at all. Went to Acer chat, where they told me to remove the battery and hold ALT and tap F10 to access the restore function. It proceeded successfully. Deleted McAfee, added avast, deleted MS Office, added Open Office, then shut down the machine. All seemed well. But this am, while I was on the internet, a photo of a red-and-black-faced "Kiss"-type rocker dude - with a very menacing expression, I have to say - appeared on the screen, and the unit then started to turn itself off again. For the second time, I was able to run restore completely, and I then powered the unit off. No modifications were made after that second restore. Now the unit will do absolutely nothing. Acer has no help to offer other than to say I should purchase restore discs for $20. I will also need to purchase an external drive, since I don't have one.

I loved my Acer, but I have no idea what to do now.

Is this a virus? If so, what can I do now in this situation? Or does it seem to indicate a different problem?

I am totally baffled, and I have limited tech ability . . . .

Geeks on Call wants more $$$$ to look at it than it would cost to replace.

Can anyone help?