Intermittant power issue. Advice needed!

I recently brought a PC through ebay a couple of months ago, which has an irritating problem that I'm not sure how best to tackle first.

It's a Athlon64 3200 on a ASUS K8VE deluxe. 1Gb of RAM, a couple of ATA100 HD drives, 200 and 120Gb, DVDROM, DVD-RW, Tsunami dream case and a Saphire X800Pro VIVO flashed to a X800XT PE running stock PE speeds. Latest omega drivers are in place. ColorsIT 550X 550W PSU.

The problem is that the box keeps resetting, as if the power has been cut for a split second. The box posts and reboots straight after, nothing in the event logs when it's back up. At first I thought this was only happening during games making me suspect drivers or gfx card, but i'm sure I've seen this problem before I added the X800 and new beta based omegas. It's now also rebooting in this harsh manner during standard windows tasks running 2D, very occasionally.

More recently the box has either refused to power on, or powered on for a split second or 2 before staying powered off, the power button not responding to further presses until Ive unplugged the power cable and plugged it back in. This bit makes me think it's a problem with the PSU rather than down to the modded X800. I can't seem to find much information on ColorsIT, the company that makes the PSU. From thier website I'd guess they make cheap PSU's and that this could be the problem. I don't have a spare PSU I can test with, and I'm loathe to go and buy a different one if that's not the problem.

Can anyone give me any advice on things I could try out before biting the bullet and buying a new PSU. If that is the problem then recommendations for a new one wouldn't go amiss either.

 

I do think its the power supply.
http://www.newegg.com/app/viewproductdesc.asp?description=17-153-006&DEPA=0

 

its your power supply,
it sounds like your trying to run a lot of stuff off that power supply, and it might not be up to the job
power supplies "trip" like that when they cant handle the load
can you by any chance tell us the brand and how many watts your power supply is?

 

The power supply is ColorsIT 550W PSU, as it says in the first post. I wouldn't have recognized it either as it's not a brand I've come across before now. I've now found a link to the product. The 550W one I have has the wattages on the bottom row of the table marked 400U.

http://www.colors-it.us/powersupply/goldensilent.htm

I would've thought this sort of power would be fine for what I'm running, but I'm not really that knowledgeable about power supplies.

Colemanguy have you come across these PSU's before, hence the comment? Or is it just the symptoms are obvious? I can't find much information or reviews on ColorsIT kit on the web. Has anyone else ever come across them?

 

hmm looks like your psw is fine... are you sure your pc isnt overheating ?

 

Yeah I'm pretty sure the temps are fine. The CPU and GFX card temps are well within reasonable limits (well under 60C under full load) The Tsunami Dream also has a couple of 120mm fans front and rear, so airflow is very good.

Overheating wouldn't explain the box failing to power on occasionally IMO. The box is being turned on from cold. In some cases I've found that the box seems more stable when it's been on for a bit. Eg It might reset like this once or twice within the first 30-60 mins or so, then it's fine. It's getting to the point where I'm turning on the box an hour before I want to use it to try and minimise the chances of it falling over mid game. Still happens sometimes though

 

I had a very similar problem, I had a short in my power button wiring which was shorting to one of my drives. I thought my bios was messing up and the power controller but it was just a simple nick in one of the wires.
Good Luck