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PC power loss problem

Started by ghosted Oct 22, 2006 at 11:57 AM 3 replies 1.8k views

Original Post

Oct 22, 2006 at 11:57 AM

Howdy folks, I'm having a few troubles with my PC and would welcome any thoughts/theories. It's been a stable little machine for some years now but has just recently developed a habit of losing all power completely, as if the plug was pulled. When this happens the LED on the motherboard is still lit yet the machine refuses to start up again. In order to get it booted again I need to unplug the power and wait for the LED to fade out (draining all remaining charge in the motherboard). Simply unplugging, and plugging back in will not suffice I need to wait a few seconds. Having said that, while writing this very post it has just reset itself, rather than completely shut down. Gah! There's no real pattern to these blackouts and I've not been experiencing any lockups or hangs, just the complete power loss. I've checked all the connections and nothing is loose. I'm kinda ruling out any overheating issue as it's done it even within minutes of booting and not having run anything but I'm open to opinions otherwise. Anyway, my suspicions lie with the motherboard simply dying a slow death, but I'd welcome any thoughts/opinions. Cheers. Spec: P4 2.4Ghz ASUS P4P800s Powercolor X800 Pro 512Mb DDR3200 Win XP

Shae

Oct 22, 2006 at 1:03 PM

It sounds like it is either the motherboard crapping out or a problem caused by a PS problem. Could you test your machine with a different powersupply or motherboard?

wilhil

Oct 22, 2006 at 1:50 PM

I have done a lot of repairs over the past few years, from what you have said, I personally believe it is one of 3 things (it could be more as subcomponent faults, however it is most likly the following).

1) problems with power unit, if it has had had good use over the past few years, it could need replacing.

2) Overheating CPU, this would explain it turning off suddenly without warning, and it rather than waiting for leds to go out, it is simply the time needed to cool back down and restart.

3) faulty motherboard, many many motherboards from 2-3 years ago (and older, and some brands still), suffer from faulty capicators that blow. This may be the most likly from the age of your pc, I know that I had a few people in a few weeks ago with a P4 2.2 that had bad capicators, so it is the same sort of generation as when this fault was big.

... I see you are in the UK, if you need any help PM me, and if you get a new pc/parts, try and remember the friendly person on Gamedev who helps you out!

ghosted

Oct 23, 2006 at 3:17 AM

@Shae: Yeah, I'm gonna try rob a PSU from work today and take that home to try as it's far less faff to replace the that than the motherboard but I'm not overly optimistic.

@wilhil: I'm fairly sure it's not the CPU for two reasons. Firstly Intel chips have an onboard themometer which automatically drops the clockspeed if it gets too hot. If this were the case, the overheating would slow the machine and then hang rather than simply blackout without warning. Secondly, even if I leave it for hours and come back to it I cannot boot up again until I've unplugged for a few seconds to drain the reamining power in the board so it's not a cooling issue. Besides, I've checked the CPU temp and its fine.

It's seeming more and more likely that the board is simply on it's way out but I'll keep my fingers crossed that a replacement PSU could still solve matters.

Cheers guys.

Lenolian

Oct 23, 2006 at 3:51 AM

It may be caused by something external to your PC. Some device tends to pollute mains a lot, fridge are a good example, this can cause your PSU to fail. You can try putting a filter on mains before your PSU, or buy an UPS which will guarantee you get a perfect signal on your PSU.

ECM problems are very difficult to diagnosize (spelling?) as they are often random. Where i worked we had a problem with a PC shutting down randomly, it took a week to understand what was happening. In another room there was a copying machine, each time the copy button was pressed, it was polluting the mains which caused a PSU failure on the PC.

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