Windows 7: Computer Won't Stay Off!

Hi all!

I am about at wits end when it comes to this computer. I just built it like last week, and everything runs beautifully about it; that is, except that the dang thing won't stay turned off! I tell it to shutdown, and it turns itself back on after about two or three seconds. Let me clarify: the computer itself does NOT randomly shutdown, nor am I having problems with sleep or hibernate (haven't used them yet).

Ok, so I have tried about everything on every help forum I've read from here to knittingforums.com. I have disable all wake events, including the ones in regards to network adapters. I have disabled automatic restart, and even fooled around in the BIOS, disabling all wake events. I've even flipped around between BIOS commanded and OS commanded event wakes in the BIOS. About the only thing I can do is log off of my user account, and then do a hard shutdown. Even did the thing where you specifically set what the power button does.

So... please help! I will be most gracious, and will give any more information if necessary. The only thing I have NOT done is flash the BIOS; it won't recognize the USB device I have the updated drivers on.

I will take you up on giving more information. Like filling in your system spec's in your user cp so we know what your system is to start with. Thank you and welcome to sevenforums. Fabe

LOL at knittingforums.com. It's important to maintain a sense of humour under adversity

I was half-way through mentally composing the "have you flashed your BIOS?" response when I read your last sentence. In a way, I think it's important that you overcome the USB device side issue because flashing the BIOS is an important step in these situations. The BIOS code controls much of the hardware-level power management and power state functionality, and bugs in the BIOS can easily manifest themselves in this way.

Otherwise, you might want to rip out as much non-essential hardware and then test again. Remove the mouse, all expansion boards you don't absolutely need to run the box, all HDDs except the boot/system partitions, all USB/firewire-connected devices... The point is to test whether the smallest-possible hardware configuration does the same thing. If not, then you start adding things one-by-one until the symptom comes back.

Maybe it's a simple matter of having "power on mouse" in the bios.

If the mouse is on a shiny surface it will detect light changes and think it's being moved.

I had this with my HTPC, with the mouse on a glass table and mouse power on enabled.
Disabling it solved it.

It's worth to check it out.

Greetz

edit: also check in device manager if "allow this device to wake up...." is checked for the mouse.
Uncheck it.

Fabe: Thank you for the welcome! I will get around to updating my profile tomorrow, but my specs are as follows (sorry, been out; Braves lost. dang.):

MSI P55-GD65 mobo
Intel Core i5-750 Lynnfield
G. SKILL Trident 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR3 2000
GeForce 9600 GT 1GB Silent Cell 256-bit GDDR3 graphics card
580 Watt ATX Power Supply
Western Digital Caviar Blue WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM HDD
Old, unnamed 16x DVD player from my old PC; same case, too.

So, the only thing that I think might send up a flag would be the power supply; don't know why. Everything is as up-to-date with drivers as I can make it. Anything you want me to flesh out more on?


Sulfuric Acid: Thank you for a response! As far as taking it apart piece by piece, that will be my last resort. Haha. I will go about trying to flash the BIOS again tomorrow, as per your recommendation. I was worried, too, about the updated BIOS file I downloaded from the MSI website; I followed the selection process to precisely target my mobo, downloaded the files, looked at them, and it said something about them not being compatible. Not sure whether or not it matters if I am using x64, but that popped into my head. Yeah, I know you can't open and apply the file in Windows, so maybe I just got spooked didn't want to give it a spin (my BIOS version is 1.0; up-to-date is 1.3). Will get over my fear tomorrow and give flashing it a try... again. Any ideas for a good USB device? I tried my thumb drive, but it wouldn't even detect it in the BIOS.

squonksc: Thank you for a reponse as well! I'm 99% positive I have that disabled already (checked it out earlier just to be certain). Mouse (while old) is on a sort of cloth mousepad that has four pictures of the globe on it. Haha. So no glossy one, but thanks for thinking outside the box! And the device manager field of power management for the mouse is disabled.

Thanks guys so far.

Just thought I'd see if anyone else had anything to suggest? Anyone? Bueller?

I remember something in the Bios Setup about restore to power ON after a power failure, maybe the weak power supply ???? Just a thought .

Hi sjones39

DocBrrown you gave me thought.

May be your power or reset button jammed.

Just a thought.

have you by anychance connected the 2 little wires that go from the switch to the motherboard the wrong way round? Im sure you know the ones I mean - there are a set of them which light up the HDD light on the front panel etc. There should be 2 of them for power. Ive seen that done before now.

Go into Power Management settings (network adapters) in Device Manager. Right click and select properties. Uncheck the "allow this device to wake the computer" box (on each item) individually, to see which one might be the culprit.