Hardware Problems..

I bought my friend a Semi-Built PC from ebay. By semi built I mean it had the Case and Mother Board along with the processor pre-installed and I put all the rest in.

The problem with this machine has me stumped. The machine likes to shut off out of no where.

Times it shuts off the most:
When trying to Re-Install Windows.
Burning a DVD.. (Burning a DVD Data it does fine)
and whenever else it feels like..

I finally got it to put a new copy of Windows XP on a 80 Gig Hardrive. It seems to run fine even though I did not try burning a DVD movie yet.

However, I wanted to put in another HD a 40 gig with windows installed on it and have the 80 for my back up. The machine will shut down completely every time I try to install it again.

I assume its either the Power Supply, Mother Board, or the Intel Processor.

According to my friend who asked a person at the store, they said it COULD be the power supply or the Mother board has a crack? I just recently came up with maybe the Processor is bad but not really sure.

Any Ideas?

Thanks in advance..

 

Possibilities to check
1)Are you sure the memory is correct type for the motherboard and processor?
Who installed it, you or the supplier?
Take each memory stick out, clean the contacts and socket contacts. Then make sure it is reseated back properly.
2) Ditto the processor. Blow clean the socket and re seat the processor. Make absolutely certain the heatsink makes good contact using themal grease or pad. Otherwise the thermal protection will shutdown intermittently.
3) Make sure the airflow for cooling is unrestricted.

These are the usual culprits for intermittent shutdown.

Studio T

 

I placed the Ram in it. The ram called for 400 mhz DDR. I had another stick of DDR laying around so I tried it in their and did the same thing. However I was wondering if it wasn't shutting down due to being to hot. The air flow isn't restricted I made sure of that one. Next chance I get I will clean the DDR slots and the processor.

Thanks for the help..

 

if it shut down because its too hot, it will tell u on the next boot up.

Im leaning towards a bad PSU. if u can swap in another PSU and test it, that would be the best way to make sure its the PSU

 

Yeah I never seen nothing from a reboot that saying it was a heating problem.

I was thinking PSU my self orignally. I unfortunely don't have one on hand but can easily go get one. I plan on cleaning it out anyways... So I'll see what happens..

Thanks for the advice...

 

I agree with the power supply theroy, and its easy to test, unplug your DVD/CD drive, floppy, and extra hard drive, let it boot straight to the hard drive, see if it runs there... if it will stay running then you can start to look for things overheating, however at that point if it stays running then you have to guess it's a bad PSU, the fact that this happens whne you install Windows could be during a time when you are trying to use the hard drive and the CD drive at the same time. A lot of times if its the CPU, or memory, or heat problem they will report on the screen at next boot up, you didn't say anything about what kind of power supply it is, or any details on it, so make sure it is enough to handle all that your throwing at it, also and this is a little farmer atitude about PSU's but take it out, if the thng feels really light compared to what you think it should then I would be looking for another one, being really light is an indication of a cheap power supply and if one of the rails is varying the voltage by too much it will shut down the system, even though the power supply is as good as it ever was.
Hope that helps.

 

of course it could also be a damaged mains cable... wall socket .... psu internal fuse ... failing temp sensor...

If you don't have the resources to test these things take it to someone who does as you are approaching the realms of electrical safety. If I were servicing this machine, my next move would be to monitor it on an electric supply power meter.

Studio T