Computer crashes when usb barely connects.

[musiclover7]

My father's computer running windows 7 ultimate seems to crash frequently. The other day, he was plugging in his USB flash drive, and had it upside down, and as soon as it made contact, the computer crashed. There was an on-going problem with plugging in this usb flash drive, that I thought we had resolved after I ran some error checks, and re-formatted it, but according to him, all it did was make brief contact with the usb port, and the screen went instantly black and said no-signal.

It also had chronic problems crashing coming out of hibernate, so set it to never hibernate. Today, I need to do some serious trouble-shooting on this machine. Any advice very much appreciated.

 

[musiclover7]

Here is the hardware pulled from system info:

System Manufacturer Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
System Model GA-MA785GM-US2H
System Type x64-based PC
Processor AMD Athlon(tm) II X2 250 Processor, 3000 Mhz, 2 Core(s), 2 Logical Processor(s)
BIOS Version/Date Award Software International, Inc. F5, 9/16/2009
SMBIOS Version 2.4
Windows Directory C:\Windows
System Directory C:\Windows\system32
Boot Device \Device\HarddiskVolume1
Locale United States
Hardware Abstraction Layer Version = "6.1.7600.16385"

 

[musiclover7]

In the event logs I see 41 Kernel Power errors..

'The system has rebooted without cleanly shutting down first. This error could be caused if the system stopped responding, crashed, or lost power unexpectedly.'

 

[musiclover7]

Attaching all of the mini-dumps..

 

[zap]

The other day, he was plugging in his USB flash drive, and had it upside down, and as soon as it made contact, the computer crashed.

When making contact upside down, the 5 Volts on the USB Port gets shorted . . . Probably to ground. What damage this does is not clear.

but according to him, all it did was make brief contact with the USB port, and the screen went instantly black and said no-signal.

Shorting 5 Volts to ground creates damage in a millisecond.

 

[musiclover7]

Ok.. but it used to happen all the time when he would remove or connect the same usb drive.. Regardless of whether or not the usb drive was upside down or not.. My paps stated that the drive barely made contact with the front of the usb port this last time.. For my part, I do this all the time... plug a usb drive in upside down or otherwise, and I never see any of the symptoms he is getting..

 

[musiclover7]

Anyone have any idea what to make of my minidumps? I am still stuck on this issue.. Thanks..

 

[musiclover7]

My father replaced the usb jump drive to try another, and the issue is still at large. It also happens when he brings the computer up out of hibernate. And now, he tells me that if he lets the screen=saver go active, when he comes back, the computer is often locked up, and must be rebooted in order to get it back functional. All very strange symptoms, and I have no idea where to start with it. Apparently, if he even touches the usb drive to the the female usb insert, it is enough to make it crash. That is far from normal.. I am always having to rotate usb drives up and down to get them to fit when I plug them in, and this has never happened to me.

If anyone has any ideas, I would be grateful..