Help with my computer - please!

[SureShot]

Ok, it seems that whenever my computer is doing some kind of very memory/processor intensive application it shuts down. What happens is the monitor will turn off, but still has a signal - it's as if my computer isn't turned on but the monitor is. Also, my computer will stay running but the red and green light just stay lit but there is no action from the hard drive as none of the components are spinning.


I am guessing 1 of 4 things:

1. The computer is overheating and I need some new fans
2. My processor is on it's way to being fried
3. I have some bad ram and it can't take the processes I am throwing at it anymore
4. My hard drive is just very fragged and needs to be looked after or is on it's way out also

What are your thoughts? I am hoping it's not #2 or #4. Any suggestions?

Thanks!

[jerez_z]

I think you should get a mobo info program and check your CPU temp. That'll solve that one. If its overheating, you might be having fan problems, or something might be up with your heat-transfer gel. You can also get memory checkers to see if your ram is bad. Did you recently put in new ram or something like that?

[foodpk]

Here's a post I wrote at a thread where a person had very similar problems to yours.

Freezing suggests overheating. Restarting suggests RAM problems or driver problems. Go to your Control Panel -> System -> Advanced tab -> Startup and Recovery Settings and uncheck automatically restart upon system failure. That way instead of your computer restarting, it will show up a blue screen and provide info. Sometimes it can provide info pointing to a specific driver or device and you can go from there.
Also check your memory. It might be faulty (I had faulty memory several times and it restarted all the time). Do that by going to www.memtest86.com and downloading memtest86 and then booting up with it.
btw it's good to run memtest86 for at least an hour

[SureShot]

Hey guys, thanks for the quick replys :)

I am going to go home tonight and download both the ram checker and the mobo program to try and monitor it.

It's strange because it never happens when I just leave the machine on overnight or am doing some surfing or design but as soon as I run a program like Quick Par or try converting a .xvid to a dvd format that it seems to malfunction.

[SureShot]

Well, I ran a MOBO monitor last night and found out some numbers.

With my case off, and a big desk fan blowing into the machine I was getting numbers of about 50 degrees c. and the overall box temp was 70-72 degrees c.

That seems kind of hot to me. Am I right?

[eilsoe]

wow :h:

yeah that's pretty hot :lol: my alarm goes bananas when the CPU temp. goes over 62 C...

usually it idles at around 40C's...

[SlowRoasted]

whats the wattage on your power supply? Did you just install anything new that might be going over the recommendations for that kind of power supply? If so it could be kicking off when the fans turn on high mode. It could be one of your fans dying out too, i saw that on a power supply this week and work and the computer would just shut off because of it.

[SureShot]

yah Eilsoe, that is pretty hot and it has me a weee bit worried.

SlowRoasted, I don't know if it is the power supply as I have a 350 and haven't really hooked anything up in the last couple months that's new. I have 2 hard drives, 2 burners (a dvd and a cd) and my video card hooked up to it...

Besides, if it was the power supply, wouldn't it just shut the entire computer down?

[G]

I'd say it is overheating no doubt about that, the PC I had before this was doing the same thing my brother suggested I bought a fan kit and I did installed it and never had the problem again - my motherboard had like a safe mode where if the components went over a collective heat it would shut down.

I'd definatley get some fans theey are only like £20 for a good one or two, I'm guessing that heat does massive damage to your computer.