Hard Drive Issue

[dwndrgn]

I have no knowledge about computers so please bear with me.

My computer has space for 4 hard drives. It only has one. The ATA cable that plugs into the motherboard has four different ports to plug into. Recently the computer seemed to have died and a friend suggested moving the ATA plug from one port on the motherboard to another. It worked, computer back to normal. And yet, it happened again after about 10 days. We moved to the next port, again about 10 days and kaput. We are now on the last port and saving stuff onto an external hard drive in the case the computer dies for good.

Here's my question, is the fact that each new port gave us time suggesting that the hard drive is bad or the cable is bad or the motherboard itself is bad? Would it be worth the trouble to replace the cord? Or the hard drive?