random shut down, not heat related

[lisaone]

for the past couple of months my computer will randomly shut down out of no where. It happens sometimes while just surfing the net, or sometimes during games, or just now while watching a movie. A google search lead me to download a program called speedfan to check that my computer wasnt overheating (i wouldnt think so, its winter here in oz and i have a very well ventilated case) speedfan says temp1 is 44 degrees C with a green tick so i guess thats not too high.. i only wish i knew what temp1 actually was lol. my 4 cores are running at 23-29c idle and 45 when i open a bunch of stuff (wow@ max settings + movies + 6 tabs in firefox)

I dont know else it can be, there seems to be no common reason for it to shutdown. One thing that may be worth noting is that when it shuts down it wont always start right up again, i press the power button and nothing happens, then if i leave it for about half an hour it comes good again. Then it may run fine for days with no shut downs. a couple of weeks even. Othertimes after a half hour break it may start up again only to shut down after being up for 2 minutes.

Im so lost! plz help!

 

[CarlTR6]

Do you get a blue screen of death when it shuts down or does it just turn off? If it is just turning off, it could be a power supply problem. The only way I know to test that is to try another power supply.

 

[lisaone]

no, no blue screen or anything, the power supply is fairly new, i got it when i upgraded my cpu and motherboard which was probably about 6 months ago.. maybe longer, but the shutdown problems have not been around that long. I dont actually have another power supply around since i gave it to my brother for a second a PC he was building. So i hope thats not what it is!

Is there anything else i can try that doesnt involve any spare parts, the only old things i have are my old CPU, motherboard and RAM (the RAM doesnt fit this motherboard)

 

[Petey7]

The only time I had this kind of problem was when a PSU went bad on an old computer of mine. It would randomly cut of and not turn back on for 2-3 minutes. Then one day a friend of mine that knows this stuff better than I do was over and I showed him how after 5 minutes the computer would shut off, then we smelled something burning. Smoke was rolling off of the floppy drive. My friend immediate said that the PSU was done. My dad got a good 750 watt one from a guy he works with and my bro got a floppy drive a dumpster. That computer hasn't had a hardware problem since.

I can't say with any certainty that it is the same problem, but I thought that little anecdote might lead you on the right path.

EDIT: sorry for the slow reply.

 

[lisaone]

well mine is 750 watts and only 6 months old. Unless anyone has any better ideas (i would really like to hear ANYTHING at this stage) i suppose ill have to take it over to my brothers house and try it out when i get a chance.

 

[Petey7]

The wattage wasn't really the point, just that they can go bad at any time and second had parts can work better than new ones at times. If you still have your old hardware, by all means test different configurations. Do what ever it takes to pinpoint the problem.

 

[lisaone]

yeaaaah. After i built this computer I'd sword id never open it again! I'm not exactly pro at this kind of thing but i wanted a computer that could handle what i wanted to do with it and look pretty at the same time ^^

my cable management is so excellent and took me about 1000000 hours to get them all out of sight and installing my CPU fan was just about the most fiddly thing i have ever done in my life, i've never sworn so much in a 30 minute period.

I was REALLy hoping it would be something non hardware related but its looking like im out of luck isnt it.

 

[Petey7]

Well, another guy on here had the exact opposite problem (is computer turned on when ever it felt like it) and we fixed it with a BIOS flash. I suppose we could try the same thing if you wanted. The only problem is, if the computer cuts off during the BIOS flash you might as well throw the mother board in the trash, unless it has a built in method of recovery, which many boards don't. If you have a manual for your board, it should tell you if it has such a thing.

 

[lisaone]

interesting, i will look into that, i have a lot of backing up to do first, i need to do that really no matter what the problem is. its very overdue.

thanks for the replies i will be back.

 

[CarlTR6]

Recheck each of your connections - power connections, hard drive connections, etc. Make sure each one is solid.

 

[Hobbyisti7]

I know this is an old thread but I have been fighting a similar issue for over a week. Turns out the marvell drivers do not work well with ...well most things. Take your system drive off of the marvell port and uninstall the drivers.