PC turned off, now it won't stay on for more than a few seconds.

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ZacharyS

Gawd
Joined
Jan 27, 2006
Messages
758
I've had my PC for quite a few years now, and it has been perfectly stable AFAIK, and my temperatures have always been quite low. I was watching Netflix and it just turned itself off. Not like regular shutdown, but as if you turned the switch off on the PSU. The parts are in my signature.

Right after it happened, when I would hit the power button it would come on for just a split second (enough for the fans to move, but not even make a full turn) then instantly off again. Now, it comes on for a few seconds like everything is fine, but nothing ever comes on the display and then it turns off again. What's strange is it turns itself back on and off like that until I switch the power off manually. I have tried another PSU now, and the same thing happens (and I know it works because the PC it was in works still after I put it back).

I'm curious if anyone can help me narrow it down further though. I have a feeling its the motherboard, but I really hope that it isn't. I don't have any extra RAM available atm, but I don't know if that could even cause something like this. I've been googling it, but almost all of the results are from people with new builds that just needed to securely plug in their cables or they didn't have their fans plugged in fully, and I've already checked that.
 
Since you have already ruled out the PSU, it could be your motherboard or absolutely anything that is plugged into your motherboard.

I have seen this happen with:
motherboard
processor
video card
hard drive
ram
fan - yes, a shorted out fan can cause this
keyboard - yes, this actually happened on one of my computers way, way, way back in the day
printer
shorted reset or power button

Start by having the bare minimum plugged into the motherboard (CPU, RAM, video card). If the RAM is causing it, you can try with each stick by itself.
 
I actually have a power button on my motherboard, so I don't think its that. I'm kind of glad and sad that you've seen this problem from so many things though. I just feel like its not worth buying a new motherboard for this processor, but all of the other parts I could easily take with me to another build in some form. Thanks for your quick reply, I'll start going through the checklist tomorrow morning. I would've done RAM tonight, but they are covered by my CPU heatsink and didn't feel like messing with that right now.
 
Check the HSF on your CPU. A loose connection or deteriorated contact can cause the temperature safety to trip and shut your PC down to prevent damage. You should also take the opportunity to check that the copper plate is still perfectly flat.
 
If it was the hard drive I would think you would at least be able to access the bios before the system looks for the HD on boot. Since you cannot I personally would eliminate the HD as a problem.

Like said above I would reset the cmos by pulling the battery out of the MB for 10 seconds then putting back. If that doesn't work pull one stick of memory out and try. Then try the other stick by itself.


And if that fails then pull out the cpu and re-seat it back in with proper grease for the heatsink on top.

if that fails I would say your MB is toast or the cpu is, but my bet is the MB. Mother boards fail more than cpu's
 
So I pulled out one of my RAM sticks this morning and everything worked fine. I put it back and its still working just fine. I'm not really sure if it just got loose somehow over time or if it was something else, but its been working for a few hours now.

My temps while playing WoW atm is mid 40s for CPU (2 cores are below 40) and 85 for my 6950. 6950 seems to be running a little warmer than I remember, but that is still a relatively safe range AFAIK.
 
ZacharyS said:
So I pulled out one of my RAM sticks this morning and everything worked fine. I put it back and its still working just fine. I'm not really sure if it just got loose somehow over time or if it was something else, but its been working for a few hours now.

My temps while playing WoW atm is mid 40s for CPU (2 cores are below 40) and 85 for my 6950. 6950 seems to be running a little warmer than I remember, but that is still a relatively safe range AFAIK.
Click to expand...
I have had a DIMM slot die on me before, but it never caused a hard shutdown before I was able to figure out the problem. Weird.
 
I have had PSU's do that to me. It can literally be anything. Crossed fingers reseating stuff fixed it.
 
I see information about my workplace techs in the field and the fixes. There are a decent amount of reseat fixes.
 
Yup, definitely had this happen because of ram before. In my case a stick suddenly died on me but it had me scratching my head for a couple hours. Swapped them out one by one until it started working again.
 
ZacharyS said:
So I pulled out one of my RAM sticks this morning and everything worked fine. I put it back and its still working just fine. I'm not really sure if it just got loose somehow over time or if it was something else, but its been working for a few hours now.

My temps while playing WoW atm is mid 40s for CPU (2 cores are below 40) and 85 for my 6950. 6950 seems to be running a little warmer than I remember, but that is still a relatively safe range AFAIK.
Click to expand...

Good deal man!

*crosses fingers

I was worried about this thread last night expecting the worst....

You're one lucky S.O.B. heh
 
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