computer just reboots

S

spacetrucker

New Member
my chumputer (no typo) is just restarting for some reason it also has problems with running simple games.

System:
intel p4 celeron 2.7
ecs pt800ce-a Mobo
western digital 20 gig hard drive
que 32x10x40x cdrw
 
installed anything lately? have you checked your psu and your memory ram? you can check your memory with memtest and you'll have to sorta manually check your psu.
 
If you are running XP and games see crashes due to a driver conflict or need for updates on sound as well as video XP's crash control when enabled will often reboot a system. A hardware problem can extend from the board itself as well a problem with the supply, memory, or less likely cpu. If you start seeing Windows lock up when reaching the desktop like a seeming memory fault you can try lowering the memory settings to see if that suddenly sees an improvement. That could point at the chipset on the board.
 
A flaky bios can be a problem as well if the non-volitile ram is losing information overheating or failing. A system can run hot literally and not see a number of sudden restarts without an overheat protection circuit kicking in. I've seen a cpu get right upto 85C and have to shut it down fast when the fan failed on a heat sink. Bad caps on the board could be one item to add here by looking any that are bulged out or leaking. You will need a pocket magnifier to really get a close and pocket light as welll. A bad cap or even diode doesn't necessarily have to be one the larger ones.
 
Have you made a examination of the board to see if there are buldged out or leaky caps seen? That would be a hard issue as the cause to look into. But incomplete, corrupted, or infected Windows installation could see the crash control kick in when running programs or the supply is unstable where the draw on current pulls the life out of it. That could easily see a power drop where the system would suddenly restart. But if your system is booting normally and something heats up when gaming or running a large app that would suggest a board problem being seen there.
 
Ive updated my computer again new hard drive, dvd burner and new video card but I still get occasional restarts checked over the mobo everything looks fine did a voltage test on the psu with a multimeter everything is within .05 volts of specs.
 
An unstable supply will give good readings when simply tested without a load but fail once a load pulls the current down. Was the supply included with the case or was it bought separately? Often generic supplies are thrown in with cases bought for a lower price. Two others things to consider possible are the battery on the board itself while now less likely since the restarts are fewer and a need for a bios update.

With Windows XP a crash control feature can kick in at times and restart a system to prevent a system lock when a game or other program crashes. Without any faults found with memory or the supply having swapped out other hardwares the board and software situation are things to look at now.
 
the power supply is new bought sepperate it is a lead power 480 w could be bad. The computer just shuts down when it wants wether it is downloading, surfing the web or just sitting there
 
If simply shuts right off instead of seeing a restart of Windows the board is the chief suspect now. A bad cap in the supply would see a few different problems like a hard time for Windows to load when the current level drops off. When a system is first powered on and goes through the post tests the heaviest draw on a supply is seen at that time. A failing chipset or weak battery on the board wouldn't cause any high temps to be seen,
 
How's that new drive going for you? Was it the WD 20gb or another drive that let go on you before? I meant to ask you on the other thread.
 
Are you sure the drive quit or is it an inaccessible partition? Often the partition or mbr information can be lost making a drive look dead. If the read heads and controller card are still good booting from a live Linux distro like Knoppix or ubuntu could be used to gain access there.

Recently in the last case a strange clicking sound started coming from the main drive. Assuming the drive was about to fail totally I grabbed a fast replacement. It wasn't the drive but the board or cpu as it was later discovered when other problems were seen. A live distro running off of a cd or dvd doesn't need to read mbr/partition information. It simply reads right off of the drive itself. Know anyone close who uses Linux?
 
ya could be the problem dont know anyone running linux got another hd that is a mismatch someone put a 160 gig controller on a 120 gig hd. Any one have a western digital 120 gig drive with bad sectors that needs a controller for a 160?
 
I had a WD 120gb until recently when a friend wanted to use a WD 200gb SATA drive as the primary. There was no way to disable the ide controller for XP to detect the drive after taking the drivers off of a floppy. Yet the bios clearly listed that drive. It may be a bad drive? That would be rare for WD.

The 120 was then loaned out and wiped clean :eek: !!! which had been a dual OSed XP/Linux drive with a ton of Linux files stored on it. :( The 120gb is still going strong "in another case". :rolleyes: Now that I am trying to get another distro running the secondary is twice the size now. :)
 
well i finally found out why my computer would shutdown every now and then. It was the cpu. I replaced that celeron 2.7 piece of junk with a p4 2.66 and now i can run any program i want aand not have a problem.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top