power has a mind of its own

i have a dell precision 670 that i have to use at work. in the past couple of weeks, i noticed that it has been turning on about one minute after i power it down. then this week, a new development. it turns off about half a second after i turn it on (in addition to turning on after turning it on). i have already replaced the power supply once in the past year and there isn't much hardware to really put a drain on a 650W power supply. the diagnostic lights on the computer say everything is working fine (as far as it knows).

am i looking into needing to get another power supply or could it be something as simple as the mother board needing a new coin battery?

 

If the CMOS battery hasn't been replaced in quite a while, it certainly wouldn't hurt anything to do so. They're cheap enough.

A good indication that the CMOS battery needs replacing is the system clock being inaccurate.

 

in this case the CMOS battery would have nothing to do with randomly turning on and off. all the CMOS battery does is save the date and time, and saves all the BIOS settings for your computer.

if your computer isn't getting any kind of error messages at the POST then it probably would not be the CMOS battery.

i do have to ask has the computer been moved, kicked, or dropped? it sounds to me that there is a loose connector from the power supply to the mobo or maybe the processor/heatsink needs reseated. or maybe a faulty/infected install of windows.

first go through and check the power and try reseating all the hardware to make sure its all correct before assuming its a windows problem!

 

thank you. i will check everythng again. i doubt it has been dropped since it resides on the floor, but there is a possibility of being kicked. i just find it strange that it powers down immediately after the first attempt to turn it on, but not when i click the power button again.

 

Angelrat, have you followed up on ACE's suggestions? If so, with what outcome? Has the problem been resolved?