I have the strangest problem with my new PC (the first one I built from scratch btw)... sometimes when I turn the darn thing on it starts up like everything is normal (fans running... disk spinning up etc.) but then 2-3 seconds into the process, it shuts itself off again... (I have noticed that during normal startups the PC gives a little beep... this beep is missing when it fails booting) The problem is sporadic and only affects the startup, once the PC is up and running it is rock solid (temps look fairly normal too). Any idea what might be wrong ? System Specs: (no overclocking done... yet ) 2.6 GHz intel northwood CPU (with HT), standard box fan installed, 512 MB corsair XMS DDR 3200 RAM, Abit IS7 motherboard, Antec TruePower 430W PSU, Sapphire Radeon 9600XT (256MB) Graphics, WD caviar special edition 120GB HDD (8MB cache) LiteOn 40x CD burner (LTR 40125s) RealTek 100Mbit NIC (RTL8139) Hope someone can help
Hmm, I would try reseting the bios back to its defualt values. It should beep to say that it has booted properly. If that beep is missing then I would have said you've overcloked it too far, but as you havent done that yet it might be some other setting in bios. It's weird that it only does it sporadically. Does it do it from cold boot or does it only happen when you reset it? You might also want to try flashing the latest bios onto it
So far I have only seen the problem during cold boots.... furthermore its a problem that has only popped up recently.... the first month after I built the thing there where no problems what so ever I will consider that as a last resort.... dont want to risk a dead bios because it shuts down during flashing. BTW... just checked all internal connectors [superficially] (in case something came loose during transport to the last LAN party)... everything seems to be in order.
If its only just recently started doing it have you changed anything recently: changed any bios settings, removed/added/changed any hardware. Look through the motherboard maunal to find out how to reset the CMOS. That will set the bios back to it's default settings and might clear the problem
None of the above Will try that tonight... though I doubt that is the problem as I havnt fiddled much with the bios settings at all (meaning after reset it will probably just set itself back to the exact same settings as now) Thanks for the help so far... I will keep you posted if something changes
Just read Shamblas post ... might this be the problem afflicting me ? (will try to reach shambla directly too but thought someone else might have some experience with this) sorry for the noob questions... but I am pretty new at this hardware thing... my speciality is software (I'm a programmer ) EDIT: been looking at the voltages they are: Rails: + 3.3v @ 3.29v + 5v @ 4.99v + 12v @ 11.91 ... ok ? CPU, DDR and AGP voltages (set to and messurred by bios) CPU core: 1.525v @ 1.47v (looks low) DDR sd ram: 2.6v @ 2.56v (little low, but ok ?) AGP: 1.55v @ 1.52v (little low, but ok ?) Should i change anything ?
Well the Power Supply was my first thought due to the sporadic occurences etc. Another is heat. I know you said the heat looked normal and that it works sometimes without issue, but the problem you are describing is so perfectly similar to CPU overheating. I just ran through 3+ hours of troubleshooting my nieces computer I built, (my 6 or 7 computer) and in the end it was my stupid assembly of the heatsink and fan that was wrong! I had turned the fan and heatsink the wrong way and it wasn't seated on the CPU correctly. It would overheat as soon as enough load was put on and the heat spiked! Instant shutoff out of nowhere. Yours just may be strange enough to be that, but who knows?
