The Case of the Intermittently Rebooting Computer
Annoying as all hell.
The computer reboots intermittently. No pattern. Programs shut down for no reason: IE, Firefox, Quintessential Player (try that one, it beats Winamp).
My mom’s computer was an absolute mess this break, and I couldn’t figure out how to fix it. Now, I think I finally have, and the answer was tickling my brain the whole time. Of course: the power supply.
To think: I actually had a conversation not long ago in which I uttered the very words, “Some of the weirdest problems with computers come down to faulty power supplies.” Should’ve taken my own advice and checked that badboy first. I would’ve seen that the fan wasn’t running. No, it didn’t help to do a virus scan in Safe Mode. Didn’t help to run Spybot and Ad-Aware in Safe Mode. Didn’t help to uninstall Tiny Personal Firewall, install ZoneAlarm (which sucked, by the way), uninstall ZoneAlarm, and install Kerio Personal Firewall (recommended).
Moral of the story: If your computer is randomly rebooting and you’ve been running a firewall and antivirus software, check the power supply and save yourself a hassle.
January 1st, 2005 at 5:24 pm
Tom, I found this useful checklist.
http://scribbling.net/how-to-fix-moms-computer
Happy New Year!
- dave
January 1st, 2005 at 6:02 pm
Dave–
Great tip! Thanks.
January 25th, 2006 at 10:53 pm
Hi,
I had the same problem with my computer and I already changed my power supply last week, and it is still rebooting
Any other ideas?
January 25th, 2006 at 11:15 pm
Olivier: check the RAM. Could be a bad stick. See if you can borrow some RAM from a friend to swap in.
January 25th, 2006 at 11:27 pm
Thanks for the tip Tom, but the problem was (and is) so annoying that I already changed many of my computer parts thinking it was the problem. I changed the memory and I tested it with memtest86+ which said there was no problem. It can’t be an overheating problem since I have like 5 fans in there plus a temperature device which indicates 33.5 Celcius for the CPU, 32.0 for the HDD and 22.0 for the graphic card.
I searched over the internet and found that a virus called Sasser could be the cause since it causes computers to reboot. I installed the needed softwares to remove it but it wasn’t found.
I also ran every anti virus software in the world without any virus found.
On the internet most people say it’s a PSU problem or an overheating problem.
I hope I’ll find the solution because it’s been more than 3 months now and the problem is still unsolved!
February 21st, 2006 at 8:20 pm
All makes sense, yet I also have the same issue and have replaced the power supply and RAM with new parts and the same rebooting continues…clearly something else like the motherboard or heating of the processor… Any help is very welcome…would like this baby to work normal again!
March 4th, 2006 at 2:27 pm
My computer was randomly turning off too, I spent alot of money on a tech who was baffled after switching out and testing every part. (I had just bought a new motherboard, which was at fault) - Turning off ACPI fixed my issue.
http://www.annoyances.org/exec/forum/winxp/t1014234292
http://ask.americas.creative.com/wwenglish/general/acpi.htm
First off check if your computer is overheating by checking its sensors. You can do this many ways, but I recommend a freeware program called Everest: http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=4181
If the CPU is not overheating then try disabling ACPI as detailed in the links above.
I knew it was ACPI in my case, because my computer was not randomly shutting off in safe mode.
April 5th, 2006 at 10:48 am
Have you tried this:
If you haven’t changed any of the system failure settings, you should be able to see the error by looking in the Event Log. But a better long-term solution is to turn off the automatic reboot so you can actually see the error when it happens�chances are it will tell you enough about itself to let you troubleshoot further. To change the recovery settings to disable automatic rebooting:
1.right click start, click explore,
Right-click My Computer, and then click Properties.
2.
Click the Advanced tab.
3.
Under Startup and Recovery, click Settings to open the Startup and Recovery dialog box.
4.
Clear the Automatically restart check box, and click OK the necessary number of times.
5.
Restart your computer for the settings to take effect.
Now a fatal error occurs won’t cause an automatic reboot and you can sort out what’s causing the problem
April 10th, 2006 at 2:30 pm
I too have been having this problem. New power supply.
Its an Intel 865GBF board running a 3.2 P4, 2 gig memory. CPU temps are perfect, 40C or so, running a good CPU cooler. The case has excellent vents and cooling.
Running XP Home with SP2. I can’t see any loose wires. I tried to run in safe mode to do a virus scan, I have heard the lsass worm, or something to that name can do this.
Any tips. Is it possible to run the virus programs in safe mode and that adware ones too. I tried to run them, but they wouldn’t start in safe mode, and just plain old shut off in the other mode. Random shutdowns and reboots, no specific time lengths, and I have been monitoring the temps and the voltages, all of which are just fine (came with a temp/voltage program)
April 18th, 2006 at 3:02 pm
Specifically to Oliver but others as well:
Have you done a complete reinstall? Remove and reload OS and other programs? If after a fresh install you still have the same problem, you know it’s a hardware issue. If it doesn’t continue, you know it was a software or virus issue and can try to avoid it in the future.I know its a bit dramatic if you have a lot of files and what not that you don’t want to lose, but after 3 months, dramatic may be the way to go.
April 27th, 2006 at 12:19 pm
Glad that I found this thread, I’m having the same issues. For me it must be 8+ months at this point. I’ve replaced the ram, the disk, and most recently a nice power supply. Yesterday I decided to re-install windows again (trend micro had in fact discovered an infected file recently). Anyway, this morning I get everything updated / installed and I get the dreaded reboot without warning which rules out virii/software as far as I know. What makes this extra annoying is that this is my office computer which serves the database our company uses. I ended up having to move the db system over to another computer yesterday because I was sick of interrupting everyone’s work.
Anyway, I’ve just determined that temperature is not the issue so I will proceed with turning off ACPI, I’ll keep my fingers crossed.
May 4th, 2006 at 10:51 am
The PC keeps restarting. There isn’t enough time to install any program or even run exisitng programs before it restarts. It even restarts in Safe Mode. Substituted the power supply, hard drive, RAM. Also, I wiped the hard drive and reinstalled Windows. The computer is running Windows 2000.
May 5th, 2006 at 4:47 am
Reboot, could be cpu, level two cashe, you would have to test out of compugter box off motherboard with proper equipment
Reboot could be hd failure; reinstall can fix but not if it is continuing to fail sector by sector.
Reboot could be not just powersupply but brown out of power. ie less than 110 volts in Wall outlet ie breaker in box over taxed or breaker just plain old and letting the voltage drop or the favorite, too many electrical items pluggin in.
Reboot could come from bad or outdated drivers from an number of devices, and yes registry could reboot with fatal errors.
Reboot could be incompatible hardware components, though it should be like no bootup blues, but then we would fix that one easily.
well nothing like a good computer, and nothing like a stubborn problem with a computer.
The Coyote
May 26th, 2006 at 3:35 pm
I had the same problem, except it was only when i went to lan at someones house, would reset randomly with random errors , tested everything power supply, memory, and temperatures, and I narrowed it down finally. My problem only occurs when i lan and there are Multiple things hooked into the same power in my instance multiple computers and devices such as external hard drives, but doesn’t occur when its on an outlet by itself. My problem was occurring cause there was not enough power being supplied to the power supply itself, doesn’t reset at all any longer, check everything plugged into the same outlet if there are too many things hooked up to the same outlet then that may be your problem, hope this helps some!
June 17th, 2006 at 2:30 pm
My mothers computer continues to shut off for no reason… i don’t really have the money to get any new parts, and before a full system scan, it’ll turn off. Also, it only seems to turn off when connected to the internet, because my mom can be on for hours and have something go wrong and i’ll be on for 20 minutes and it’ll turn off. I’m thinking it could be a worm, but i have NO idea what kind of program i should look for to download. Any suggestions? you could e-mail me if you do at Hellbird19283@aim.com i really appreciate any of the help i can get. Thanks
June 19th, 2006 at 8:03 pm
I am fixing a friend’s computer and have just run into this problem…I know that it’s not the power supply. His computer is rife with viruses and trojans that Adaware, Microsoft Antispy, Spybot S & D, and several other programs are not detecting. I have picked the registry as clean as I dare. The problem started when I tried to download and install MS windows 7.0. It even reboots in safe mode. In regular mode the computer will take about 3 minutes, unless I try to install the new IE 7.0. Whenever I click on the desktop icon to install it - it shuts down and reboots immediately. I am sure that most of the users in this list have the same “bug”. I hope some savy tech people are reading this thread and have run across and solved this problem!
July 4th, 2006 at 4:39 pm
I’m also having the same problem with my PC. Have reinstalled Windows XP, replace my power supply with a new one and upgraded my memory to 1GB but still my PC reboots randomly. One thing more, during the OS re-installation process (where my PC is copying Setup Files from the CD) I encountered an error where I was suggested to remove recently installed hardware or disable Shadowing from the BIOS. I did this but didn’t help. I tried several attempts until it went through with OS installation. Next that I will try is disabling ACPI. Any other thoughts?
August 1st, 2006 at 8:32 pm
I have a Intel 865gbf board and recently notice problems. The problem that I am encountering is that when I turn the machine on within 15 seconds it turns on. I have read abou a acpi power management tha is incorporated in the bios set. I have not been able to change anything at all because it turn off on me before I even get a chance to navigated bios and make changes. Also sometimes when I turn it on it makes a funny beefping sound more like a medoly
August 1st, 2006 at 8:36 pm
Hey Bobby,
do you know how to dissable acpi within bios or is there a jumper in the mother board that I can just move
May 29th, 2007 at 2:23 pm
I have found this problem in a lot of Celeron based computers. I’ve found in most cases, it’s a bad cpu. I’ve had a lot of the celeron “D” processors cause this problem, especially the socket 478s.
August 22nd, 2007 at 10:26 am
My computer did the same thing. I was pulling my hair out testing every single part of the computer. Put a brand new 450 watt PS, new mem, motherboard diags ok
To find out, it was the case. the case was grounding out and was magnitised. Why? Dunno, but when I test the computer outside the case, it works fine…