Computer just randomly turns off and reboots

This all started about a week ago :( I dont know what is causing it, but my computer just turns off (it doesnt go through the shutdown process or anything) It just turns off, and boots back up. At first I thought I had some sort of werid virus, so I did a reformat and reinstalled (plus I wanted a fresh install with SP1 anyway) but it still happens. It seemed to be happening with video related things (Like palying a game or re-encoding a movie) but then it 's happened to me once or twice now when I was just at my desktop.

I've tried reseating my video card, reseating my RAM but nothing seems to be help it. I even put my OC back to default, but still it happens. My specs are the same in my sig, with Windows XP and SP1 installed (and yes this was happening before I installed SP1. It just seems to happen at anytime though, not like a certiain amount of time passes and then it happens. But like I said it's happened mainly when doing intensive stuff.

I dont know if this would have anything to do with it, but awhile back when I was taking my comp apart, I was taking my heatsink off, and it managed to bend mone of my CPU pins. Well i carefully put the pin back in the right position and everything seemed to be working fine for atleast 3-4 months. Thats what I dont think that has anything do with it.

How about your settings under System Properties. How are your "Startup and Recovery" Settings (from the Advanced Tab)? Under "System Failure", is "Automatically Restart" checked?

Yes it's checked. But I think it's always been checked, and like I said this is just something that statrted happening recently. I've unchecked it just to see if this changes anything, but I guess I'll have to wait and see.

BTW wouldnt system failure just be like a BSOD or something? Or does anyoone care to enlighten me :D

Random Reboots = Bad PSU, but looks like you have a high quality one.

I had three dump files in my minidump folder, all of them from the times it just randomly rebooted today. Are these ONLY generated when you have a system failure, or do they get dumped other times as well? BTW am I correct in assuming that system failure is just a BSOD? becuase nothing ever came up when this happens, just comp turns off and reboots :(

I have had it reboot without warning on a system failure. I did have to uncheck that setting on a previous XP install. I can't even remember if XP has ever gone to a BSOD on me, but it has rebooted like yours.

I've had reboots on critical errors and it does display a BSOD for a few seconds before rebooting. (turn it off anyway, just in case).
Do you by chance have any overheating protection enabled? (BIOS)
Might just be running too hot and woopsie reboot.
Could be a dead/dying PSU.

Checked my BIOS, and there is no shutdown temperture enabled. So that rules that out. Would you guys suggest that I go ahead and RMA this PSU to Antec, or should I wait and see if it dies, if that is the case.

A video card going bad or a CPU going bad wouldnt cause random reboots though would it? I just want to make sure, as I dont have any other parts lying around to throughly test anything :(

Well, diagnosing your particular problem can be difficult since it seems to happen at any time (rather than during particular tasks).

I got a system in the house with a similar problem.
Replaced PSU, no go, video card, no change, tried DIMMs single, no luck, new ethernet card, nope not the problem, waiting for new mobo/cpu in mail. PCs can be a pain to troubleshoot.

Probably it's the power supply or its cables. I once worked on a rig with a problem just like yours. The cause turned out to be the pins at the end of the main cable harness from the psu to the mobo. Three female pin connectors had opened up and were occasionally breaking contact with the mobo's male pins. I just bent them back in with a small scewdriver and the problem went away.

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Originally posted by Skywize
Well, diagnosing your particular problem can be difficult since it seems to happen at any time (rather than during particular tasks).

I got a system in the house with a similar problem.
Replaced PSU, no go, video card, no change, tried DIMMs single, no luck, new ethernet card, nope not the problem, waiting for new mobo/cpu in mail. PCs can be a pain to troubleshoot.

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Yeah I agree
Actually I have the same PSU as you Whitman and Ive been having the same problems. In your situation I would actually be hoping to get a BSOD and then check out the stop code. For right now you can check your event log and under system, look for anything red around the time your computer reboots automatically. The problem on my computer actually had nothing to do with the power supply, heat, ram, cpu or anything like that. My problem had more to do with IRQL. Might be a driver too if it hasnt been verified by MS to work on XP. There are many possibilities.

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Originally posted by KickerKid


Yeah I agree
Actually I have the same PSU as you Whitman and Ive been having the same problems. In your situation I would actually be hoping to get a BSOD and then check out the stop code. For right now you can check your event log and under system, look for anything red around the time your computer reboots automatically. The problem on my computer actually had nothing to do with the power supply, heat, ram, cpu or anything like that. My problem had more to do with IRQL. Might be a driver too if it hasnt been verified by MS to work on XP. There are many possibilities.

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Yea that's the worst thing about building your own computer, troubleshooting. Theres just too many things that can cause a problem ,and determinig the cause when you dont have the right tools or parts can be rather annoying. But as of now, it hasn't rebooted since yesterday. And the only thing that I have done is disable the "Automatic Reboot" when a system failure occurs. But I dont get it, I mean it was enabled for well over 6 months and never had an issue, and then all of a sudden it just starts happening. Still don't know for sure whteher or not this has fixed it though, but I guess I'll just have to wait and see.

Having it set to automatically reboot isn't the problem. All this does is reset the sytem if you get a fatal error, instead of hanging or giving you a BSOD. If you disable it you should get an error message if the system hangs, and you can use this to work out the actual problem.

Sometimes that happens to me but just when Im startiong a game or somethin. The screen will turn black, you'll hear a click then, BAM! It restarts.

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Originally posted by JustWhitman
I've tried reseating my video card, reseating my RAM but nothing seems to be help it. I even put my OC back to default, but still it happens. My specs are the same in my sig, with Windows XP and SP1 installed (and yes this was happening before I installed SP1. It just seems to happen at anytime though, not like a certiain amount of time passes and then it happens. But like I said it's happened mainly when doing intensive stuff.

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This makes it sound like a heat related issue. Do you have any motherboard monitoring software to monitor the fan speeds and CPU temperature? It could be things overheating due to a CPU fan not working as well as it should.

PCs are great until they go wrong. Diagnosing the problem can be a definate chore!

Good luck.