Computer shutting down on its own

Hello, I am having a problem and hoping someone can help. About two days ago my computer started shutting down on its own when its just sitting there. I'm not on it at all when it shuts down. The indicator lights even show there is no electric or battery power. If I unplug it and take the battery out and put it back in then the computer will boot again. Next day it started acting like everything on the desktop was frozen. Anything I clicked was non-responsive. I thought it was malware so I ran the READ ME FIRST and posted the logs on your Malware Removal forum. After running your READ ME FIRST, it appears (for now anyway) that the desktop is not frozen anymore. I was pleased thinking it is fixed. Well now it is shutting itself down again and I'm back to having to unplug and take the battery out. After reviewing the logs I have been advised to post on hardware forum because they did not see any malware problems.
Can someone please help. Thank you so much for your help.

 

What is your make, model, and operating system?

I'm guessing this is a laptop, and how old is it?

 

Yes, it is a laptop. It's a Lenovo Thinkpad W500 and it is about 5 years old. It runs Window XP. I'm sorry about not giving that information in my original post. Thanks

 

Greetings, Carrott.

Couple of things you might try (to determine if this is indeed a hardware problem or if you might be having some Windows issues):

1. Navigate to Control Panel > System Properties > Advanced. In the Startup and Recovery section click "Settings". In the System failure section make sure "Automatically restart" is unchecked. Upon reboot you should then be presented with a Blue Screen containing information about the next crash.

2. Start the machine in Safe Mode and see if you are presented with the same symptoms.

 

I have made the above change as you requested. But I need to clarify that the computer is NOT restarting. When it crashes its just OFF with no indicator lights on at all, not even the elec power and battery power lights. If I take the battery out and put it back in then I have power again. Also, I did run it in SAFE mode for about 30 minutes and everything seemed to be fine, but this shut down problem only happens about once every 24 hours.

 

When Windows runs in "Safe Mode", it only utilizes the minimal drivers necessary to run the operating system. I would advise making sure all your drivers are up to date, and this especially means the chipset and graphics drivers.

 

Sorry to be a dummy. What is the best way to check for updated drivers??

 

You need to head over to the Lenovo site, and get the ones custom tailored to your laptop. Your particular model should be on the product label on the bottom of the laptop.


http://support.lenovo.com/en_US/downloads/default.page?selector=expand#

 

okay, I updated Chipset, Display and Video Graphics. Hope this helps. I'll repost in a day or so. Thank you for your help.

 

Okay, its time to post what's been going on. After I updated the drivers I left the computer running with a game (Dragon City on the screen) and it crashed in a little less than 24 hours.

Then I rebooted and left it running with only the desktop on screen. It ran for almost 48 hours without crashing so I turned the game on again and it crashed within 1 1/2 hours.

Could the crashes be caused by the game?

Thanks again for your help.

 

I'm starting to lean toward some type of thermal issue.

I have seen cases of the hard drive simply turning off due to heat, or wear over the years even when the drive passed S.M.A.R.T. and other tests. Not saying it's the HDD, but stranger things have happened and you are at the upper limit of lifespan for a platter hard drive.

Could you also run a RAM test using MemTest86?

 

Happy too, but you'll have to tell me what to do. Sorry!! and thanks again for your help

 

Visit this link:

http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/ultimate_boot_cd_(ubcd).html


Just burning MemTest to a CD is a waste of good media. This is a link to the Ultimate Boot CD. It has a wide array of diagnostic tests and tools. It's quite useful. You will also need a free program such as ImgBurn to create the disc from the downloaded file. The menu is fairly self explanatory, and divided into categories such as BIOS, CPU, HDD, and of course Memory.

Let us know if you have any additional queries.

 

Thought about that as well, but would like to rule out other aging components first.

 

I have run the MemTest86 for 24+ hours. I'm not sure if its finished. It says Pass 13 with no Errors, but it still looks like its running.

Is it finished?

Thanks

 

It's been my experience that a 24+hour 13+pass MemTest usually indicates a good memory group.

Quick question: have you been able to access the machine's BIOS setup? Interested in any temperature / fan readings you might see there. Also, make sure there are no 'turbo' settings turned on - everything should be at safe defaults.

 

Earlier you mentioned this:

Please clarify - has your machine crashed while not playing this game?

 

Apologies for the triple post, but I thought of something else: have you tried to reproduce the symptoms with the battery removed (just AC power)?

 

Can you please tell me how to check BIOS.
The system has NOT shut down when not in the game.
and
I have not tried to reproduce the problem with the battery out. I will do that tonight and repost with results.

Thank you so much for your help

 

Press F1 as the machine starts up (the ThinkPad logo should be displayed - if you reach the Windows startup page you've waited too long and will have to repeat the procedure). While in BIOS, be careful - for now just navigate and record any settings, but I'd advise against changing anything unless you're sure.

For reference: the W500 manual is located here.

The fact that the shutdowns only occur when playing that game leads me to think that the game is causing some huge stress (either video or other resources) - plodr mentioned it in post #13. Maybe a visit to the game developer's tech forum (if available) to see if others are experiencing similar issues? Or even running another stress test to try to determine the point of origin of the shutdown? Just rolling some dice here...

Look in BIOS to see if there's anything obvious, and try the machine without the battery, let us know how it goes.

 

I'm not sure exactly what to look for in BIOS, but here are a few things that may or may not interest you:

Default Primary Video Device: Internal
Boot Display Device: ThinkPad LCD
Graphics Device: Descrete Graphics
OS Detection for Switchable Graphics: Enabled

Power:
Intel SpeedStep technology: Enabled
Mode for AC: Automatic
Mode for Battery: Battery Optimized
Adaptive Thermal Management:
Scheme for AC: Maximize Performa
Scheme for Battery: Balanced
CDROM Speed: Normal
CPU Power Management: Automatic
PCI Bus Power Management: Automatic
PCI Express Power Management: Autmatic

Extended Memory Test: Disabled

I DID NOT see anything like a temp or fan reading.

I will run now without battery and repost when it shuts down.

Thanks for your help.

 

It ran for 15 hours without the battery (only AC power) and then it shut down again. I have to unplug AC and plug it back in to get power.

Thanks

 

Were you playing the Dragon City game when the machine shut down?

 

I think at this point you should load a temperature monitor (HWMonitor is a good freebie) and maybe start stress testing (3DMark, Prime95, etc.), try to find where this is coming from.

It's gonna be tough to find an intermittent hardware problem with a laptop - we need to exhaust all software possibilities before we start physically tearing this machine apart.

You might also download that manual I pointed to (and any other service manuals), catch a couple of YouTube 'dis-assembly' tutorials.

 

Dagron City was on the screen, but I wasn't playing at the time.

 

You need to verify (especially in your own mind) if the Dragon City game is causing your machine shutdowns.

If you cannot reproduce the symptoms without the game, great - get rid of the game or try to determine what the game does to your machine to make it shut down.

 

okay, I have attached the two logs from hwmonitor. Thank you for your help.

 

Based on everything I've seen in the past few days, I do believe it is Dragon City. I will be away for tonight and Sunday (back on Monday) so its a good time to leave it running With Dragon City OFF again. I'll repost on Monday and let you know the results. I can't thank you enough for your help.

 

Your temps are a little warm, but not alarmingly so - certainly shouldn't be shutting down the machine if those are the norms.

Let us know how the non-game test goes - have a good weekend.