Computer sometimes reboots itself

Discussion in 'Hardware' started by Morgan19, Sep 13, 2004.

  1. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    My computer's been rebooting itself randomly over the past few months, maybe longer. It'll be running and then *poof* all of a sudden it just restarts itself and boots back up. It doesn't seem to happen with any consistency: yesterday it rebooted literally right after I started the computer up and logged into Windows. Other times it'll be in the middle of browsing files, while other times it's in the middle of a game... There's really no pattern that I can tell. I have noticed that sometimes it seems like it'll do it while I'm opening an app, but that's not always the case. (This happens maybe once every week, not enough to really make it a regular occurence but enough that I'd like to figure out why it's doing it.)

    Tonight it did it again while I wasn't looking, so right after logging in to Windows again I checked the temps with SiSoft. The computer had been already been running for a couple hours before checking, with just a few non-intensive apps open before the reboot:

    Board temp : 24' C / 75' F
    Processor temp: 30' C / 87' F
    Power/aux temp: 55' C / 131' F

    How do those sound? It's been a while since I've been temperature-conscious so I can't recall what the norms are. Any ideas? I'm not sure whether to narrow it down to software or hardware, but in case it is heat related, here's my setup with any items relating to heat:

    Abit KT7A
    1.2 Ghz Thunderbird w/ a copper HSF (can't remember the exact brand, but it was a nice one I ordered, not the stock Athlon one)
    Gainward GF4 Ti4200
    2 Seagate hdd's
    400W PSU
    2 case fans (front lower for intake, upper back for out)

    m19
     
  2. BeerMonkey

    BeerMonkey Master Sergeant

    How much ram do you have?
     
  3. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    1 gig. Also forgot to mention that nothing, and I mean nothing, is overclocked... All stock speeds. :)

    m19
     
  4. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    I do both adware/spyware and virus scans weekly. Apart from the normal tracking crap sites store on my computer, there's never anything serious. :\ (Not that it makes me sad to NOT find anything, mind you...)

    (EDIT-) Oh that's funny, tonight I started the process of switching over to Panda from Norton. I'd heard good things about it. :)

    m19
     
  5. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    Oooo, I take that back. Panda's caught 15 items that Norton always missed. It looks like it dug up a bunch of Exploit/ByteVerify's in the Java folder, a few StartPage trj's, a ComSys.A, and two infecting corelsys.dll and olehelp.exe both in C:\Windows.

    The scan's only about 3/4ths done, I'll post more if/when it becomes available.

    m19
     
  6. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    The rest of the virus scan came up clean, and Panda disinfected the files that were bad. Could one of those have been causing restarts...? I'll keep my eyes on the system and get back here if it does it any more. In the meantime, suggestions and opinions are more than welcome. :)

    m19
     
  7. ojdidit

    ojdidit Private First Class

    Had a similar sounding problem for years before I discovered a RAM problem. Microsoft had a free beta RAM tester that proved it to me. New stick, no more crashes.
     
  8. ojdidit

    ojdidit Private First Class

  9. evilevets

    evilevets Sergeant Major

    I would replace the Power Supply. Those temps look fine, but does whatever monitoring software you're using monitor voltages as well? If so, post the voltages for us.

    I've seen similar problems and it is almost always the power supply, unless of course, it's a virus...?

    Heres what I would do: Buy a new power supply and install it. If the PC still reboots itself, put it back and the box and return it.



    Steve.
     
  10. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    Thanks for the suggestion, I'll check voltage at home tonight. Curious... Do things like this caused by PSUs usually result in a straight shutdown, or an actual reboot? It occured to me that overheating would most likely shut down the computer altogether and not reboot at all, whereas a virus would likely reboot it, so I'm wondering what a bad PSU would generally do.

    The system was fine for the few hours I was running it after the virus check, but since the reboot usually only happens once a week or longer, that's not really much evidence in the way of an infection-related reboot.

    I'll also look into that RAM tester, I'd been meaning to do that last night and didn't get a chance to.

    m19
     
  11. YiffyWereWolf

    YiffyWereWolf Private E-2

    The last time something like this was happening to me, my processor and motherboard and burnt themselves out because of a heat problem. I was a total newbie back then and I had -no- idea what was going on. But those tempertures look fine... so I dunno.
     
  12. Trihimbulus

    Trihimbulus Private E-2

    I bet ya it Power Supply
     
  13. mcadam

    mcadam Major Amnesia

    i get that problem occassionally, and it was my sound card driver, got the system has recovered from a serious error message and got taken to the m/s website where it gave info about a device driver. my soundcard was pretty old so i replaced it and hey presto! see if you got any driver that need updating
     
  14. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    Here are voltage readings I get from SiSoft:

    CPU core voltage : 1.79 V
    +3.3V Voltage : 3.44 V
    +5V Voltage : 4.91 V
    +12V Voltage : 12.01 V

    Haven't been able to run RAM test yet.

    m19
     
  15. evilevets

    evilevets Sergeant Major

    Those voltages look good to me, except that core voltage looks a little low. The tolerances are generally pretty wide, but that one might be close. Anyone else think so?

    Just get a new PSU and be done with it already ;)

    Hey, you and the guy who posted "Computer won't shut off" should get together!



    Steve
     
  16. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    As simple as that solution sounds, I'm not of the mind to run out and spend money simply because something *might* be the problem. ;) Even though they've been all over the board, I appreciate all the different avenues being suggested here as, if nothing else, they offer me more changes to get re-acquainted with my system. :)

    After having cleaned out a few of the nagging viruses Panda found last night, I'm going to run the system as normal for a while and see what happens, all the while keeping an eye out on everything else that's been brought up.

    If it makes you feel any better, I *am* going to go look around Newegg at PSUs, just in case. :D

    m19
     
  17. Toke

    Toke MajorGeek

    Might be a bit late with this one but it sure would be a good idea to keep in favourites, this will calculate your voltage usage right before your very eyes
    http://www.jscustompcs.com/power_supply/
     
  18. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    Well crap for crap... I was starting to install something earlier this evening and the system rebooted itself. Perhaps I'll go ahead with the PSU suggestion after all.

    Toke, I checked out your link but it just tells me I need ~240 watts of power... Needless to say my 400W *should* be enough. ;)

    m19
     
  19. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    How about these?

    Now that I'm taking everyone's word for it and looking into new PSUs, can I get some feedback on these particular units or brands? I'm researching them now but any personal experiences or feedback would be nice, also. I figure I'll be set with PSUs between 400 and 500 watts. My main goal, apart from not having my computer scream "DAS BOOT!" every few days is silence, so I'm looking for supposedly quiet PSUs. It would also be nice if the power cords can reach everywhere in a full tower case.

    (If something says it's P4 compliant, can I still stick it in with my Thunderbird or newer AMD processor if and when the time comes?)

    Silverstone SST-ST40F
    http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=17-163-104&depa=0

    Thermaltake W0013
    http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=17-153-008&depa=0

    Zalman ZM400B-APS
    http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=17-103-213&depa=0

    This is bad... As I was looking through all the PSUs I wandered into processors and motherboards, and now have that tingly "want to upgrade!" feeling. Ohhhh boy. :D

    m19
     
  20. Major Attitude

    Major Attitude Co-Owner MajorGeeks.Com Staff Member

    Re: How about these?

    I see originally that you had some items removed from virus scanning. I hope I am not going backwards, but the Blaster or sasser worms and their variants can cause reboots. Are your Windows Updates current, that blocks the holes they exploit.
     
  21. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    Windows Update is current, and after the full Panda scan I still had a reboot last night. I'll double-check again that nothing nasty is hanging around, though. Are there any certain filenames I should be searching for as well that shouldn't be there?

    m19
     
  22. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    The latest addition to the saga... After having run Panda (updated, of course) twice this week, tonight I came home, checked Windows Updates (to make sure I had all security stuff) and somehow managed to get ezstub, tvmedia, and a couple other nasties on my system (past my router and Sygate, no less). By the time an hour had passed with me trying to clean everything, my computer wouldn't even boot into Windows: it just kept cycling. I was about the wipe the drive and reinstall when I remembered Windows' "remember last good setting" option at bootup. A little finesse and several rounds of Hijack This, Ad-Aware, Spybot, and Panda scans, and I'm back to normal. I've done several rounds of scans since getting to that point and everything looks clean again. Maybe it's my imagination, but everything seems to be running peppier too... We'll see how this goes, this time...

    Good freaking lord. Whoever all makes viruses, trojans, spyware, and the lot needs to be dragged into the street and stoned twenty times over. >=(

    m19
     
  23. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    Should a new motherboard run hotter? I ended up replacing my current setup with an MSI K7N2 Delta-L board. With the Abit board temps were (as per my first post):

    Board temp : 24' C
    Processor temp: 30' C
    Power/aux temp: 55' C

    With the new board:

    Board temp : 41' C
    Processor temp: 51' C
    Power/aux temp: 46' C

    The only things that changed were the new motherboard and a stick of DDR400 (since I couldn't use the PC133 anymore). I just swapped my Thunderbird onto this one since it was still supported. Case fans, CPU fan, all that are still the same.

    m19
     
  24. Morgan19

    Morgan19 Specialist

    Maybe I just need to reapply some thermal compound... That would make sense, since I switched the processor out I had to remove the HSF and then put it back together.

    m19
     

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