Overheating and Shutting Down

[Fumz]

Hi bpickartz,

Running memtest is never a bad idea, but, as marsmimar said, in order to stress all the address ranges you'll need to run at least an 8 hour loop... an hour or two really doesn't tell you anything. Memtest is good, but it isn't definitive. If you pass an 8 hour memtest loop, you should then boot into Windows and run Prime95. This will catch errors memtest doesn't. Memtest only tests RAM; Prime95 tests memory and cpu: Free Software - GIMPS

Heat doesn't appear to be your problem... at least according to the screenshots you posted... both the cpu and gpu are relatively cool. You might want to have a look in your bios' health section and see what's been set for the shutdown temp? Likewise, you should also be ready to post screenshots of temps while running Prime. Things will get hot, very hot, as the test puts an unrealistic load on the machine... a load you'd never encounter in real world usage.

Run the first Prime95 test with the room fan pointed at the box. Again, to be sure a machine is solid, you need to Prime for at least 8 hours; however, since we're not testing for stability, an hour or two will do. Things heat up rather quickly when Priming, so you should not have to wait very long to see the machine get to max temps. If you see no errors after an hour or two, then re-run the test without the fan. Perhaps you just have a faulty fan on either the cpu or gpu?

A memory leak, per se, would not cause the system to shut off. It would eventually slow to a crawl, but not just shut off. Memory errors would though... and this you'll find out running Prime.

I did notice you had 6 instances of Chrome running... that's a lot. I don't use Chrome, so I'm unaware of any issues it may have, but it would be a good idea to check and see if that's normal behavior.

***EDIT***

Lastly, right click on Computer, select properties. Click System protection (left hand pane), then the advanced tab. At the bottom, under Startup and Recovery, click settings. Make sure "write an event to system log" is checked, and uncheck automatically restart. When the machine bsod's, write down everything on the screen and post it here.

You can undo this later by following the same path. To restart the machine just hit the reset button, or control+alt+del.

 

[bpickartz]

Thanks much for this information. I'll run both and will report back with information. This is puzzling.

The Chrome issue did concern me earlier, but I'm using it the same way I've always used it (several open tabs...which show up independently on in the processes). I've even used Firefox only (again several tabs), but saw no difference.

These shut downs are instant...no warning, no blue screen, just on one minute and off the next. When I reboot, I do get a message asking if I want to boot to safe mode or boot normally. I've done both. It will run for ten minutes or so and do the same thing again. It doesn't seem to care what programs I'm running or be dependent on the heat necessarily.

I've tried to backtrack and the only program I'm using that is memory intensive (and that I installed recently) is BoldChat. I can't tie it to the crashes and run it most of the day without incident, so it's hard to link it to the shutdowns.

I'll run all of these and will report back. Today, the machine has run without interruption both with and without the fan. This is the pattern and then one day it will crash again (several times) before staying up. Go figure.

Thanks again.

 

[Rhammstein]

Have a look inside your case, with the PC on, and check to see that your Power Supply's Fan is spinning. You should feel it blowing air out the back of your tower, where the power switch is; where the power cord plugs in.

Over the years I've twice had a PSU fan fail, and this is very typical behavior, it's worthwhile just having a look.

 

[bpickartz]

Great suggestion. I'm actually taking the pc home tonight to look at it and that will be the first place I look.