Anyone have any clue what to check? If my computer cranks away at 100% CPU for a few minutes, it just turns off with no warning what so ever. Also there are no event logs about it. Then when it does start back up, windows hangs for a long time... I click on a bunch of things and after 5 minutes or so, it opens up the things that I clicked on.
Ideas?
this is very very very annoying and stopping me from doing work.

I've seen this with a bad video card, bad CPU and an overheating CPU. Good luck, man.

check power supply, then check hard drive.

Do a memtest86 about it.

or overheating, yeah. check your heatsink. CPUs rarely act differently, they either work or don't work, so that should be fine.

the power supply usually causes random complete shutoffs, it's probably that. your motherboard probably has a safe temp threshold before it shuts off due to overheating. it might beep or notify you in POST if that's the case.

The power supply is my first guess... so please tell me how you "check it". Unless "check it" translates into "replace it".

I've also been curious cause my operating system isn't the most legal. I'm debating loading up a linux image and running a CPU burn program to see if it happens.

there's a whole bunch of part swapping you could do depending on what you have lying around. you try running the system at bare minimum parts, but it won't give you a definitive answer. taking a voltmeter to the PS won't tell you much either. power supplies are hard to diagnose but easy to replace.

i'm guessing you're running a lot of drives and a beefy system on a cheap power supply. wattage tells nothing about the quality. the PS itself could be fine but isn't made to run a system like yours.

also the legality of your OS wouldn't cause random shutdowns. it's either cracked or not cracked, if it's not cracked it would just annoy you and then lock you out.

i had so many random shutdown problems on my quad core system because i was running some cheap circuit city rocket dog power supply, after my rosewill power supply died for whatever reason. once i sprung for a corsair it was a huge difference, quieter system with power to spare.

fwiw, i couldn't diagnose my PS issue with prime95 or any other CPU stress tester. 3D games/stress tests would be more revealing, video cards suck loads of power and my system would only shut off during 3D apps.

Holy fuck, did this just make it 10 semi-constructive posts without anybody making the system32 joke? Good work, gentlemen, commendable. Your internet achievement certificates are in the mail.

my drives in this machine are
1) 128GB SSD
2) 1TB wd green drive

I also have 8-10 CDroms, but they are all USB external units. But I can get it to shut down with just about any cranking.

I think the ps is a 500w OCZ supply. I just replaced it like a year ago. I think I have another 400w ps upstairs, but I think it's missing one of the connectors for the CPU.

hmm. i'd swap the PS if you can. if it's an intel quad core it has the two power connectors, but it should be able to limp along with one. stick your baguette in it. DISCLAIMER: i am not responsible for your baguette.

try to get it to stop shutting off

did you try deleting your beard's system 32 folder?

The power supply is generally the weakest link. Never go cheap or undersized. Ever.

yea sounds like there's a short somewhere

i bet you dropped it on purpose...time for a new computer.

did I tell you that story?
That was my work laptop and the station's laptop.

Anyhow, I loaded up primer95 and got it to die in under 2 minutes.

did you check the heatsink?

yep, check the heatsink and check your CPU temps in the BIOS. right now i'd say CPU overheating or power supply, or both.

ok, it was off and is running at 81C. let me run primer until it reboots and I'll see again. 81C seems a little warm, no?

sounds about right for an intel chip! seriously though, check to see that the cpu fan is spinning, and if it is, make sure the heatsink is in solid contact with the chip

yeah it should stay in the 70s. see if your BIOS has an auto-shutdown temperature threshold. it could be shutting down because of that, or legitimate overheats.

ok, primer95 until it rebooted and now it's 92C.

oh and make sure your heatsink doesn't look like this:


If it does, just buy a laptop. lol

I was just coming to post that. I'm still thinking of getting a i7-2820QM laptop. I just wish that they would make a cheaper dell with it. Right now, my choices are HP or Cybertexh.

ok, I cleaned out the above cat parts, cleaned off the thermal paste, put some new thermal paste, banged the CPU fan back on and it's run through 4 primer95 cycles sofar.

You're just looking for an excuse to justify the laptop purchase to yourself. Don't fucking lie to us.

are you kidding me?!? of course I want a new laptop. the new sandy bridge Hp laptops score a 8K on passmarks where my laptop gets a 1.1K and my quadcore (q9550) gets a 4K. The RTTP server gets a 3.9K.


Anyhow, I ran primer95 for over ten minutes, rebooted and looked at the bios. 46C.
problem solved I would sya.

ok, so ark is the one that gave me the points to fix this so everyone needs to suck his dick? kay?

yeah i think we double-teamed you

no, it was the BIOS tip for the temp that got me to figure it out.

Gaucher is now a Knight of RTTP. (Order of the Deleted System32)

Definitely sounds like overheating. I'm not using the rest of the thread. Just delete your system32 folder.

SO MUCH BETTER! processing 32 pictures at a time with 3-6 seconds each.

my computer is fast FINALLY.

Glad you got the centipedes out of your vagina, Aaron.

What exactly did you do?

Swap out the power supply first to check.

do not place penis near fan

1UP has always been the greatest danger to CPU, you're absolutely right.

cleaned off the CPU/heatsink/fan, and then fapped.

cuntfuckious say, get a ram doubler

Why spend money on replacing hardware as a first step when there's more you can do to diagnose a potential heat issue for free?