Random, Infrequent Reboots

Using XP2 updated.......The computer will reboot itself once or twice a
week.

Help?

Marc

Oreally wrote:
Using XP2 updated.......The computer will reboot itself once or twice a
week.

Help?

Marc

That could mean, the computer has "blue screened", and you have
selected automatic reboot as a reaction to that.

The first step would be, to go to the System control panel,
Advanced, Startup and Recovery, Settings, and untick the
box next to "Automatically restart". That will keep the
blue screen error message on the screen, until you can
copy it down. Then you can manually complete the reboot
and continue on.

Copy down the numbers, and particularly, the name of the
driver or code file that is crashing. You may see a trend,
such as the same driver file each time. It may imply a
hardware problem with that particular device. (Like, a
video card driver could be crashing, as a result of
the video card overheating, because the fan on it is
stuck and no longer turns to cool the card.)

Record as many of the crashes as you can, and post a summary
of them here, if you need more hints.

If the crash messages are relatively random, affecting entirely
unrelated pieces of code on the computer, then the computer could
be telling you that some RAM is failing. You can do a basic
RAM test, with a tool from this page. Scroll half way down,
to the download section.

http://www.memtest.org

Even if this turns out to not be a memory problem, it's still
good to have a copy of that software handy. I've had three lots of
RAM go bad, a couple after 1.5 years, the latest after 2 years
of usage. And even if memtest passed last week, it could be
failing this week. So having at least one copy sitting around,
is a good idea.

Other reasons for a computer to crash a

1) Power supply is getting weak. My first power supply became weak,
and even today, it still runs and didn't blow up. But the 12V rail
is so weak now, it can't even run a single cooling fan any more
(100ma fan). So supplies don't always disappear in a cloud of smoke.
They can also bow out gracefully. And system crashes might be the
first sign. One of my more modern systems, started crashing, because
the power supply had some leaking capacitors inside it, on the
secondary side.

2) You can also have leaking capacitors on the motherboard. Some Dell
models were particularly hard hit. So hard hit in fact, that when
you see those models for sale on the web, stay away. You couldn't
even safely order a replacement motherboard for a machine like that,
because the replacement could have bad capacitors, just like the
original one.

http://www.badcaps.net/images/caps/kt7/kt3.html

Systems can also crash, because of malware. The existence of malware
multiplies the number of symptoms computers can produce, by a large
amount. So that is another potential cause, and much hardware to
pin down.

Paul

"Oreally" wrote in message
...

Using XP2 updated.......The computer will reboot itself once or twice a
week.

How old is the Power Supply Unit? Local repair shops tell me PSU
failure is the most common cause of random reboots.

--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)

The computer is 5 years old.........what is the cost of replacing the PSU?
(generally)

Marc

"Don Phillipson" wrote in message
...
"Oreally" wrote in message
...

Using XP2 updated.......The computer will reboot itself once or twice a
week.

How old is the Power Supply Unit? Local repair shops tell me PSU
failure is the most common cause of random reboots.

--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)

On 26/01/2011 22:55, Oreally wrote:
The computer is 5 years old.........what is the cost of replacing the
PSU? (generally)

I saw PSUs at the local computing fair in London from £15 to £90. Times
that with 1.5 to arrive at the rouch US$ price. Though computer
components could be cheaper in the US.

Naturally you get what you pay for, in general though not always, but
don't forget the law of diminishing returns! State of the art components
naturally come at a premium.
--
choro
*****

Marc

"Don Phillipson" wrote in message
...
"Oreally" wrote in message
...

Using XP2 updated.......The computer will reboot itself once or twice
a week.

How old is the Power Supply Unit? Local repair shops tell me PSU
failure is the most common cause of random reboots.

--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)

Oreally wrote:
The computer is 5 years old.........what is the cost of replacing the
PSU? (generally)

Marc

I spend around $50 on them. Some people like to buy the $20 ones.
So far, none of mine have exploded.

I try to find them on sale - for example, a local computer store had
some end of line Enermax units, which seem to be pretty good. The newer
ones (this year's stock) are twice the price. So if you can find a
discontinued model number, sometimes there is a price break on them.

For an older computer, this might be an example of a good substitute ($45)

http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=17...20Power%20Intl.

+3.3V 28.0A
+5 30.0A
+12V1 18.0A (powers disk drives, and motherboard main connector)
+12V2 18.0A (powers the processor 2x2 power connector)
+5Vsb 2.5A (May be used for USB)
-12V 0.5A

+3.3V & +5V=180W Max
+12V1 & 12V2=348W Max

That should be enough for a non-gamer computer (no fancy graphics card).
You can probably handle a mid-range video card, assuming there is a way
to provide power connectors for it. That power supply doesn't have any
PCI Express auxiliary power connectors, for example. You'd have to use
a dual Molex to PCI Express adapter, if you needed to wire up a video
card with an aux connector.

You can check the reviews, and look at the cabling provided, here.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817103013

One advantage of that one, is it doesn't have power factor correction,
which means it'll work well with any UPS you connect it to. Some of the
more modern supplies (the 80+% efficiency kind), also include features like
Active Power Factor Correction, and some uninterruptible power supplies
have non-sinusoidal outputs, and the power supply doesn't work well
that way. I have such a UPS, so I have to be careful to buy an ATX
supply that doesn't care about such things.

You can see a warning here, about power factor correction.

http://www.dougv.com/blog/2010/03/01...t-low-end-ups/

You really need to work out power numbers, to buy exactly the
right supply. The one above, the 400W one, would be suitable
for a lot of low end desktops with 250-350W supplies in them.
The unit doesn't draw 400W from the wall - it only draws enough
power, to supply the load inside the PC, and that load might
only be 100-150W most of the time. 400W represents the maximum
load it could take (and its pretty hard to draw that number,
without exceeding an individual rail limit in the process).
The only practical way to draw exactly 400W from it, is with
a power supply tester.

Paul


"Don Phillipson" wrote in message
...
"Oreally" wrote in message
...

Using XP2 updated.......The computer will reboot itself once or twice
a week.

How old is the Power Supply Unit? Local repair shops tell me PSU
failure is the most common cause of random reboots.

--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)

The message I get about once or twice a week says: "IRQ...NOT LESS OR EQUAL"
Also some numbers...mainly zeros, then: 0x804F89E3 And a message about
disabling bios 'caching or
shadowing.'

Totally perplexed!

Oreally









"Oreally" wrote in message
...
Using XP2 updated.......The computer will reboot itself once or twice a
week.

Help?

Marc

Oreally wrote:
The message I get about once or twice a week says: "IRQ...NOT LESS OR
EQUAL"
Also some numbers...mainly zeros, then: 0x804F89E3 And a message about
disabling bios 'caching or
shadowing.'

Totally perplexed!

Oreally


Stop messages are documented here.

http://aumha.org/a/stop.htm

Important numbers, are the main error number, like 0x0000000A.
And the name of any driver file that is listed in the error message.

If you disabled automatic reboots, you'd get a nice blue
screen message sitting on the screen. Which you could
copy at your leisure. Maybe this is your error. I don't
see a driver name here. Your error might look like this one.

http://img410.imageshack.us/img410/4550/irqnc9.jpg

I can find an article here, but some of these steps are
pretty daunting. I think I got stuck, trying to get the
debugger to run. I did manage to get symbols downloaded,
but even that step wasn't easy to do.

http://www.adopenstatic.com/cs/blogs...0_-Part-1.aspx

When I got a copy of windbg, and downloaded symbols, it was a couple
gigabytes of symbol downloads from Microsoft. So this isn't exactly
easy to do if you're on dialup. The following procedure is OK to follow
if you have a broadband internet connection.

http://www.adopenstatic.com/cs/blogs...0_-Part-2.aspx

Using Driver Verifier...

http://www.adopenstatic.com/cs/blogs...1/09/1005.aspx

Good luck,

Paul