Machine keeps randomly restarting

**penfold** · 11th April 2011, 03:09 PM

I've had a report that a staff's computer keeps restarting. Apparently there is no message, just a cut in power and the machine shuts down. I've had a look through the event log and it shows nothing odd. In fact it doesn't show anything for when the problem last occured.

As this is a random event, and I dont see anything in the logs are there any suggestions about what else I can check?

Machine is WindowsXP and problem has been there for a long time(although not reported).

**dhicks** · 11th April 2011, 03:15 PM

Originally Posted by penfold

are there any suggestions about what else I can check?

Overheating? If the machine's clogged with dust it could just be getting too hot.

**Sheridan** · 11th April 2011, 03:20 PM

We had a few that did this, it was the graphics card overheating. In this case the graphics cards had their own fans which had ground to a halt due to age and dust. As dhicks says if the machine is choked with dust anyone of the components might overheat and cause random reboots.

When ours did this there was no error logged, it just like the power cable had been pulled out.

**Gurra** · 11th April 2011, 03:32 PM

I second overheating. On desktops I've had this very issue both with overheating graphics cards, and with overheating CPU, the latter has been caused by poor thermal connection between the CPU and the fansink in a number of cases. I've had laptops with bad fans (HP), with heatsinks clogged with dirt (early dells), and with just plainly poor thermal design where prolonged high CPU load causes it (dell studio 1537)

**penfold** · 11th April 2011, 04:16 PM

Ok, I'll check the inside, but the machine is less than a year old and in an office so there should be no/little dust to get clogged. My only other thought was faulty hardware but I dont have any spare to swap.

I've also just downloaded software to monitor system temperatures so I'll give that a try to see if it picks up anything next time the error happens.

Thanks all.

**mac_shinobi** · 11th April 2011, 04:19 PM

Originally Posted by penfold

Ok, I'll check the inside, but the machine is less than a year old and in an office so there should be no/little dust to get clogged. My only other thought was faulty hardware but I dont have any spare to swap.

Had this issue with a brand new desktop ( will not mention the company name ) but the heat sink was not firmly seated on the CPU.

Go into the bios and see what CPU temps you are getting and if they are within the correct temp ranges for the cpu you have ?

Also if you disable automatic reboot ( pressing F8 until you get the safe mode menu --> select the disable automatic reboot option ) and see what BSOD you get if any ?

**sukh** · 11th April 2011, 04:49 PM

Hi

Does the machine actually shutdown or reboot?
Have you run AV to check for viruses?
Is it up to date with SP and updates?
Can you reproduce the issue?

Sukh