Hey, I'm having annoying problems I can't seem to work out.

I've just put together my friends computer, and at first the computer started rebooting at anytime it wanted after getting into windows. No error messages or anything. Then it stopped rebooting after a while, and instead it froze hard. Specially when playing a 3D accelerated game.
Then I repartitioned and reformated the drive and installed everything clean again. It was going good for many hours without any problems.
Then suddenly it started shutting down. After it shutdown I couldn't just press the power on button in front to start it up again, I had to switch the Power supply button in the back off and on again for the front power-on button to work again.

This is how it is all the time, suddenly shutsdown.

I have tried to change power supply, and when I did it worked longer than the other one did, but now they both shut down equally frequently.

The PC has a brand new Motherboard, brand new CPU and cooler. Only thing that isn't new is Power supply, Graphic card, Harddrive, DVD-rom and DDR RAM.

(It can't be a conflict between a PC2100 266 DDR RAM and a FSB 333 CPU? The motherboard says it can use PC2100...)

Right before and right after a shutdown I quickly check the heat in the CPU and the SYSTEM.. both are located around 35 degrees celsius, so it stays cool.

Can a graphic card shutdown a computer? Or RAM? Can these be likely villans?


Appreciate all help, thx.

(Virus scan has also been done, it's clean. BIOS settings appear to be right, and visually everything looks good in the cabinet.)

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Nevarc

Welcome to http://www.pcguide.com/ubb/pcgubb.gif forums.

What are the hardware specs, what motherboard CPU video card etc.
What version of windows are you running.

The motherboard probably should be able to take PC2100 RAM with a 333MHz FSB but it may require adjusting specific settings in the BIOS. I have a similar RAM FSB setup and have to adjust RAM and CPU frequencies seperately.

You may also want to make sure the heatsink is actually securely fastened. Did you use the stock sink and themal compound or use a seperate heatsink and compound?

The specs are:

Thermaltake Volcano 9 Cooler
AMD XP2700+ Barton 333 FSB 512 Cache
MSI K7N2 DELTA-L Mainboard nForce2 Ultra400/MCP2, ATX, ATA133, LAN
TwinMos PC2100 512MB DDR RAM
IBM 40GB Deskstar ATA/100
Chieftec Dragon 360W Power Supply Midi Tower
MSI Geforce4Ti4800 SE 8x graphic card
Samsung DVD-ROM
MSI CR52x CD-Burner

That's the specs, running on a Windows XP Home with SP1 installed.

The cooler is fasten thigtly with thermal grease applied.


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Nevarc

Perhaps your PC is configured to automatically reboot when it encounters a fatal error?
Try these:

Windows XP Restarts Unexpectedly or Restarts When You Shut Down the Computer
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;320299

HOW TO: Perform Advanced Clean-Boot Troubleshooting in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;316434&Product=winxp#20

How to Troubleshoot By Using the Msconfig Utility in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;310560&Product=winxp

Well, I'll check that..

But it has restarted and shutdown even when XP isn't installed..
When first installing ,a couple of times, it shut down everytime I came to selecting a partition to install XP on..

That problem went away suddenly.. but now sometimes it also shutsdown seconds after it has booted successfully POST..

.................

Nevarc

Possible causes:

-Everything not completely seated on the motherboard.

-Overtaxed or bad power supply.

-Bad memory.

-Bad video card.

-Bad MB.

Do you have any trouble in safe mode?

Okay, I've tried a couple of things... tried to strip everything down to the bone essentials, still having problems.

Then I tried a brand new DDR RAM, now it doesn't reboot and power-off.
It merely freezes alot, specially when in 3D games.

It's strange, but I only get problems when playing 3D accelerated games. Other games has no problems. Also I ran a virus check again, and it froze half way through. I tried going into install of OS again since my new DDR, but it powers down just as its getting to the partition stage of setup. It powers down every time at that specific spot.
So, not being able to repartition and reformat from a fresh install of XP, I entered the old XP system and ran Active Smart to check the hard drive, it reports a temp. about 10 degrees lower or more than the critical temp. for a HDD. and everything else checked out OK, and passed every test, so it doesn't look like the problem is the HDD.

What I find strange is that it freezes so fast when playing 3D games.
Could it be graphic card issue, and can a graphic card reboot and power-off the system at any time?

I've set alarms for the System and Cpu temp, so that if it gets even near a critical degree, it will sound off. It doesn't give the slightest beep when something happens, and everytime I quickly check the temp after a reboot/freeze or powerdown, it says the same as always, nice and cool. So that may rule out the CPU and the COOLER.

Now, the Motherboard is brand new, and has now visual problems. Every connection seem securely fasten and set up right..

This is a wierd problem.

Sometimes you can play certain types of 3D games, like Battlefield 1942 and Splinter Cell, for as long as you want withough any problems. But if I try Jedi Knight, Unreal 2 or Command & Conquer Generals, it freezes almost immidiatly.


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Nevarc

Sure is begining to sound like a video card problem to me...

exact details on your card wouild be very welcome.

The video card is a MSI GeForce4 Ti4800SE-8X

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nevarc

That card should have a fan on the GPU heatsink....is that fan working properly?

Have you run "dxdiag" to check that your DirectX drivers are up-to-date?

The fan seems to be working correctly, and directx reports no problem, everything looks Ok.

That seems to be the theme with this problem, everything appears to be OK, but somewhere there is a fault.

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nevarc

Okay..update.. Problem is now fixed.

Shamefully to say, it was a minor glitch in the installation of the CPU fan that caused this problem..a friggin' newbie thing to do, but when in rush, we do strange mistakes..

The fan, although seemed tightly fasten, was indeed fasten 180 degrees the wrong way.

Underneath the fan is of course the step that is supposed to fit over the plastic socket with "Socket 462" marked on the plastic, and it wasn't, causing a slight slight opening that made the computer Restart, Poweroff or Freeze frequently.


Thanx for all the help ppl.


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nevarc