Compy randomly turns off

horse-fly · 13th July 2004, 05:20

My computer randomly turn off as if someone pulled the plug. It usually happens in the night. The computer is 4 years old, so can it be some type of hardware failure? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

pixiefied · 13th July 2004, 05:22

it went ni-night on its own! how cute.

horse-fly · 13th July 2004, 05:25

Not when you are using photoshop. So many hours... agh...

s0be · 13th July 2004, 05:26

probably Power Supply or heat related, I'm guessing the former. Try turning the machine off for a couple hours before you go to bed, then turn it on when you go to bed, and see if N hours from turning it on, it turns off.

s0be

horse-fly · 13th July 2004, 05:27

Well, it is more of a restart, but like if someone cut the power, then supplied it again with juice.

Myxomatosis · 13th July 2004, 06:47

Probably your motherboard restarting due to overheating CPU.

horse-fly · 13th July 2004, 06:48

So I need ice?

MStar · 13th July 2004, 07:13

Quote:

Originally posted by Myxomatosis
Probably your motherboard restarting due to overheating CPU.

I had that problem. It was definitely mobo, not sure about heat though.

Lapikas · 13th July 2004, 08:19

I had almost same kind of problem few months ago, but on my situation I had to pull the plug off for a moment before it would restart. Bought a new power source and problem was fixed. But on this case I would suspect overheating too..
Watch temperatures!

MonKeyRum · 13th July 2004, 18:52

One of my older pc's would do it cause of a crappy coded screensaver. It would go into powersave mode and then just reboot. Never figured out why, didn't care, and it only occurred with that specific screensaver.

Namelessv1 · 13th July 2004, 18:58

Quote:

Originally posted by Lapikas
I had almost same kind of problem few months ago, but on my situation I had to pull the plug off for a moment before it would restart. Bought a new power source and problem was fixed. But on this case I would suspect overheating too..
Watch temperatures!

I had the same problem, and I fixed it the same way, too.

Atmo · 13th July 2004, 20:10

Post full specs please. It's difficult to even guess without knowing what's in it.

I dont think it would be caused by an overheating cpu or similar. A 4 year old system wont have any hardware overheat protection, it only started appearing on boards in the last couple of years. So the only way an older system like that would shut itself down due to overheating issues would be if you had MBM or similar software set to turn the system off once it reaches a certain temperature. Otherwise it would just get hotter until it hangs.

That still wouldnt explain why it turns itself back on though...

My best guess is that it's power related, or there's a problem with the motherboard. Heat could be a contributing factor, if the psu fan isnt spinning, the psu could be running too hot (which means it wont handle anything near it's rated output). If the psu is cutting out, and the system is set to turn itself back on after a power outage (check bios settings), it probably is the psu.

If it cant turn itself back on after a power outage, then i dont think it's power related...Otherwise it would just shut down and stay off. In that case, it would more than likely be a fault in the motherboard.

dlichterman · 13th July 2004, 21:10

well it could be other things-- my comp used to do this. It was windows crashing because of hardware issues, but i had blue-screening turned off so it would just restart. check if all the error things are turned on

control panel-->advanced-->startup and recovery-->check and see if restart is checked. also look for memory dump thats how it will BSOD

eleet-2k2 · 13th July 2004, 21:33

It could be either an overheating motherboard as suggested, so adding a fan or two, or generally improving airflow would help. Or you could turn your computer off and let it cool down during long periods of use.

Seocndly, and this has happened with my power supply, is that sometimes the wires get a little loose, especially at the Molex connectors, so any slight bump to the case would cause my harddrive to lose power for a split second, enough for it to crash my system and need to reboot it again. You can solve that by getting a new power supply, or getting a molex splitter and using that in conjunction with a good molex connector.

horse-fly · 13th July 2004, 22:58

It is a slightly modded version of an Emachine Etower 466i.

ctn|chrisw · 13th July 2004, 23:33

Quote:

Originally posted by pixiefied
it went ni-night on its own! how cute.

lmfao.
Maybe try smth like mbm5 to monitor the temperatures?

Myxomatosis · 14th July 2004, 17:04

Quote:

Originally posted by horse-fly
[Image]

It is a slightly modded version of an Emachine Etower 466i.

My brother's computer has similar specs. How many case fan(including your PSU fan) do you have? How often do you turn off your computer?

horse-fly · 14th July 2004, 17:06

I have 1 fan, located right next to the power supply, which still works. I start up my compy around noon each day and shut it down around 1 or 2 AM.

siebe83 · 14th July 2004, 17:13

Did you scan for spyware/viruses etc.?
Maybe some nasty prog is scheduled to reboot the system at a given time... (just a thought)

horse-fly · 14th July 2004, 18:39

Only tracking cookies were detected the last time I scanned with Spybot and AVG, which was a week ago. This problem is older than 1 week.

CaboWaboAddict · 14th July 2004, 19:23

I had a similar problem after adding a USB 2.0 card. Everytime I tried to write to my external drive the system would reboot. Worked fine with the built-in USB 1.0. I returned it and tried a different brand. Many days and many phone calls later, I was no closer to solving the problem.

Here is what I found: I have a Soundblaster Live Platinum. It requires two DOS compatible interrupt to be assigned to it like the really old sound cards did, wayyyy back when. Anyway, when I added the USB card, there were no 'floating' interrupts left on the PCI bus so it 'shared' interrupt 5 with the sound card. So, everytime the two things tried to operate at the same time, the system would re-boot.

So have you added or replaced ANY hardware recently?

InvisableMan · 14th July 2004, 19:36

adding to what atmo said about heat; the only way it would be a heat problem is if it got SO hot that a chip actually ceased to function because of it, and it flipped out. but since it's such a old computer i seriously doubt this would happen. if you just installed dx9.0b it may be your videocard throwing up all the information it cant handle back to where it cane from and then the computer flips out. i've had weirder things happen.

dlichterman · 14th July 2004, 20:44

when i was having driver problems with my geforce card that happened...drivers w/sound card were crashing it

jakeledel · 15th July 2004, 01:45

i had a problem like this, it turned out i had too little ram for all the crap i was running, so i got more.

InvisableMan · 15th July 2004, 03:11

yeah, you might wanna shell out $150 to upgrade the majority of your system.

13th July 2004, 05:20	#1
horse-fly Account Closed Join Date: Apr 2001 Posts: 2,360	Compy randomly turns off My computer randomly turn off as if someone pulled the plug. It usually happens in the night. The computer is 4 years old, so can it be some type of hardware failure? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

13th July 2004, 05:22	#2
pixiefied Mother Trucker Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: in the forest Posts: 3,520	it went ni-night on its own! how cute. "Well, got to love you and leave you, need to go get into the shower and rub my hard naked body all over with soapy bubbles, I'll be back later to carry on playing.... It'll take you some time to get over the image of me naked in the shower......mind you don't masturbate to hard thinking about it...." - Mr.Jones

13th July 2004, 05:26	#4
s0be Major Dude Join Date: Jun 2001 Location: melbourne Posts: First Posts: 1,313	probably Power Supply or heat related, I'm guessing the former. Try turning the machine off for a couple hours before you go to bed, then turn it on when you go to bed, and see if N hours from turning it on, it turns off. s0be And On that day, the Lords of the land said unto their Master Architect, "The temple you have made to the gods of Wasabi and Maki has brought us no great prosperity" and they sent out him into the lands. As he traveled to a far off land, he found he wasn't traveling alone, but that he had gained companions, and when they found their new land, they started work on a new temple, one that would be OPEN to all who wanted to worship. from The Book of Wasabi C 12 Vs 09 (pg 2003)

13th July 2004, 06:47	#6
Myxomatosis aka bRiAnFuRY Fuck it dude... let's go bowling. (Major dud) Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 1,162	Probably your motherboard restarting due to overheating CPU. Alex Jones: Do you want the puppet on the right or the puppet on the left? What a bunch of garbage; liberal democrat, conservative, republican. It's all there to control you! Two sides of the same coin. Two management teams bidding for control, the CEO job of Slavery, Incorporated! The truth is out there in front of you, but they lay out this buffet of lies. I'm sick of it, and I'm not going to take a bite out of it, do you got me?

13th July 2004, 08:19	#9
Lapikas Major Dude Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: the other side.. Posts: 670	I had almost same kind of problem few months ago, but on my situation I had to pull the plug off for a moment before it would restart. Bought a new power source and problem was fixed. But on this case I would suspect overheating too.. Watch temperatures! The requested SIG could not be retrieved

13th July 2004, 05:25	#3
horse-fly Account Closed Join Date: Apr 2001 Posts: 2,360	Not when you are using photoshop. So many hours... agh...

13th July 2004, 05:27	#5
horse-fly Account Closed Join Date: Apr 2001 Posts: 2,360	Well, it is more of a restart, but like if someone cut the power, then supplied it again with juice.

13th July 2004, 06:48	#7
horse-fly Account Closed Join Date: Apr 2001 Posts: 2,360	So I need ice?

13th July 2004, 18:52	#10
MonKeyRum Major Dude Join Date: May 2004 Location: The North Posts: 859	One of my older pc's would do it cause of a crappy coded screensaver. It would go into powersave mode and then just reboot. Never figured out why, didn't care, and it only occurred with that specific screensaver. Suburbia: The place where they clear down trees and then name roads after them

13th July 2004, 20:10	#12
Atmo The Freak (Forum King) Join Date: Feb 2002 Location: Australia Posts: 9,400	Post full specs please. It's difficult to even guess without knowing what's in it. I dont think it would be caused by an overheating cpu or similar. A 4 year old system wont have any hardware overheat protection, it only started appearing on boards in the last couple of years. So the only way an older system like that would shut itself down due to overheating issues would be if you had MBM or similar software set to turn the system off once it reaches a certain temperature. Otherwise it would just get hotter until it hangs. That still wouldnt explain why it turns itself back on though... My best guess is that it's power related, or there's a problem with the motherboard. Heat could be a contributing factor, if the psu fan isnt spinning, the psu could be running too hot (which means it wont handle anything near it's rated output). If the psu is cutting out, and the system is set to turn itself back on after a power outage (check bios settings), it probably is the psu. If it cant turn itself back on after a power outage, then i dont think it's power related...Otherwise it would just shut down and stay off. In that case, it would more than likely be a fault in the motherboard. :Psykotech:

13th July 2004, 21:10	#13
dlichterman Forum King Join Date: Mar 2001 Location: Where Hell Froze Over Posts: 2,466	well it could be other things-- my comp used to do this. It was windows crashing because of hardware issues, but i had blue-screening turned off so it would just restart. check if all the error things are turned on control panel-->advanced-->startup and recovery-->check and see if restart is checked. also look for memory dump thats how it will BSOD Software is like sex: It's better when it's free.--If at first you don't succeed; call it version 1.0--Guess the band from pics game

13th July 2004, 21:33	#14
eleet-2k2 Forum King Join Date: Aug 2001 Location: Mobil Ave. Posts: 5,381	It could be either an overheating motherboard as suggested, so adding a fan or two, or generally improving airflow would help. Or you could turn your computer off and let it cool down during long periods of use. Seocndly, and this has happened with my power supply, is that sometimes the wires get a little loose, especially at the Molex connectors, so any slight bump to the case would cause my harddrive to lose power for a split second, enough for it to crash my system and need to reboot it again. You can solve that by getting a new power supply, or getting a molex splitter and using that in conjunction with a good molex connector. "Welcome to the Island of people who know too much."..."Did you really think balloons would stop him?!" See what I'm listening too.

13th July 2004, 22:58	#15
horse-fly Account Closed Join Date: Apr 2001 Posts: 2,360	It is a slightly modded version of an Emachine Etower 466i.

14th July 2004, 17:06	#18
horse-fly Account Closed Join Date: Apr 2001 Posts: 2,360	I have 1 fan, located right next to the power supply, which still works. I start up my compy around noon each day and shut it down around 1 or 2 AM.

14th July 2004, 17:13	#19
siebe83 Forum King Join Date: Feb 2004 Posts: 9,229	Did you scan for spyware/viruses etc.? Maybe some nasty prog is scheduled to reboot the system at a given time... (just a thought) If you're bored go here or, if the boredom is more serious, here.

14th July 2004, 18:39	#20
horse-fly Account Closed Join Date: Apr 2001 Posts: 2,360	Only tracking cookies were detected the last time I scanned with Spybot and AVG, which was a week ago. This problem is older than 1 week.

14th July 2004, 19:23	#21
CaboWaboAddict Forum Sot (Major Dude) Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Marietta, Ga. U.S.A. Posts: 3,916	I had a similar problem after adding a USB 2.0 card. Everytime I tried to write to my external drive the system would reboot. Worked fine with the built-in USB 1.0. I returned it and tried a different brand. Many days and many phone calls later, I was no closer to solving the problem. Here is what I found: I have a Soundblaster Live Platinum. It requires two DOS compatible interrupt to be assigned to it like the really old sound cards did, wayyyy back when. Anyway, when I added the USB card, there were no 'floating' interrupts left on the PCI bus so it 'shared' interrupt 5 with the sound card. So, everytime the two things tried to operate at the same time, the system would re-boot. So have you added or replaced ANY hardware recently? Idiot's Advocate My site (under construction)

14th July 2004, 19:36	#22
InvisableMan Ninja Master! (Forum King) Join Date: Mar 2001 Location: Hotel California Posts: 4,333	adding to what atmo said about heat; the only way it would be a heat problem is if it got SO hot that a chip actually ceased to function because of it, and it flipped out. but since it's such a old computer i seriously doubt this would happen. if you just installed dx9.0b it may be your videocard throwing up all the information it cant handle back to where it cane from and then the computer flips out. i've had weirder things happen.

14th July 2004, 20:44	#23
dlichterman Forum King Join Date: Mar 2001 Location: Where Hell Froze Over Posts: 2,466	when i was having driver problems with my geforce card that happened...drivers w/sound card were crashing it Software is like sex: It's better when it's free.--If at first you don't succeed; call it version 1.0--Guess the band from pics game

15th July 2004, 01:45	#24
jakeledel Banned Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: The Ohio State University Posts: 439	i had a problem like this, it turned out i had too little ram for all the crap i was running, so i got more.

15th July 2004, 03:11	#25
InvisableMan Ninja Master! (Forum King) Join Date: Mar 2001 Location: Hotel California Posts: 4,333	yeah, you might wanna shell out $150 to upgrade the majority of your system.

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