Random restarts

[Andrew S]

Alright, its back, but i put my modem back in, i was just laying in bed watching tv and looked over and saw my pc restart, i wasnt even using it, and i wasnt even online at the time.  My temp was at 50 Celcius, what would cause this? its really making me mad.  I want to fix it ...for good with a nice size hammer. lol... please help

[Carskick]

I doubt it's heat. My HP is in a pretty enclosed desk area, and the CPU and GPU sometimes get up to 70 degrees celcius, but this doesn't seem to cause any problems. I'd doubt it's your power supply, otherwise you'd have problems more often. It could be power surges or sags. Do you have your computer plugged into the wall, a UPS, or a surge protector? If your home is known to have unstable power, then that could be the cause. You never know. You have to consider everything.

[Andrew S]

My pc is plugged into a powerstrip surge protector thingy, but our house seems to have stable power, no other computer in our house has this problem.  Its plugged into the powerstrip with a monitor, printer, and speakers.   Now i dont think it would be the modem, since it randomly restarted while not doing anything at all not even online, just sitting there in screen saver screen thiingy and it restarted.  so i am clueless now.

[Andrew S]

HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
haha

I tryed calling the actual support number for ASUS for once, and i never got though, they said all there people were busy but they took my name and number and never called back


HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Mark H]

Did you ever test your memory?

Mark H

[Andrew S]

Yea, it tested fine, I found an old power supply (ATX 300 watt) but the one i have in it is 400 watt, willthe 100 watt difference make a big difference?, but i am trying the power supply to see if that could cause it , but i doubt it..but its possible i think

[Mark H]

For your configuration, 300 watts should be fine for testing out the power supply.

Mark H

[Chandler]

Alright, its back, but i put my modem back in, i was just laying in bed watching tv and looked over and saw my pc restart, i wasnt even using it, and i wasnt even online at the time.  My temp was at 50 Celcius, what would cause this? its really making me mad.  I want to fix it ...for good with a nice size hammer. lol... please help

So the computer works fine with the external modem but not with the internal modem, right?  If that's the case then it's a resource or driver problem.  If there are problems you may get reboots even if you're not online, the modem is still in use by Windows.

[Mark H]

In addition to a possible driver problem, it could be a flakey modem as well. What model modem is it?

Mark H

[Andrew S]

Alright, this is what i've got so far.  I changed modems back and forth and it does it with both modems, and i changed power supplies (out of extra parts i had) and it does it with both modems, and both power supply.  The one power supply i usually run is 400 watt, the other is 300 watt, but it still does it.  Both the modems are U.S. Robotics 56 K V.90 V.92 ready (or somethign) but ones external.....  
I went though the entire system properites, and i cant find one resource conflict or driver conflict (at least windows isnt saying its a problem)
I am clueless now

[Chandler]

What graphics card do you have and what driver version?

Have you installed AGP chipset drivers?

Also try loading the Defaults in the BIOS.

What anti-virus software do you use?

What firewall software do you use?

[Mark H]

Also, have you verified you don't have the front side bus overclocked? It should be set to 166 Mhz.

Mark H

[Andrew S]

I dont think its a "brand name" graphics card but what i have is  
XTASY

GeForce4
MX420
64 MB Memory
AGP 2.0 Compliant Socket
350MHz RAMDAC processor (what ever that is????)

I installed w/e drivers came with it.. Not sure what they are to be honest  
And windows still uses the modems even with out being online or trying to connect?

[Chandler]

Try installing the latest ForceWare drivers from:
ForceWare 53.03

There are known issues with the older drivers, and Windows XP.

Yes, the modem is still being accessed by windows, it just isn't sending or receiving data.  But the device itself is always active, and Windows always loads the drivers.

One other thing to try would be to disable Write Combining in Advanced Display Properties.

[Andrew S]

My FSB is 333, but the setting in bios should be at 166 (but i'm not sure what its at ), i'm gonna go mess around in BIOS for while too see if anythigns not right..  I use nortons antivirus and it updates virus defintions all the time,  and i use no special firewall other then what xp has built in

[Andrew S]

I disabled that write thing, but what does it do?

[Andrew S]

i've been in bios, and nothigns overclocked that i can see

However My resources controleld by: is auto(escd) or something, so i cant manually change my IRQ's in windows, but can i change that to manual?

Under system, it says My modem and my "Creative EMU10k1 Audio Processor" are sharing IRQ 16, but nothign else is sharing the same IRQ, can i change that one thing to manual and change the IRQ on the modem to something else so its not sharing, and still has no conflicts?

[Mark H]

You might try changing to a different COM port if windows will let you. That will change the IRQ. I had to do this on a system before to resolve a hardware conflict.

Mark H

[Andrew S]

I chagned the COM, it was on COM3 and i changed it to COM4 then to COM5 and neither one of them changed the IRQ

[Andrew S]

I just dont get this pc, i've built probably 15 computers, for myself and others, 3 of them using the exact motherboard and processor i'm using, and not one of them 3 has crashed or gave me any problems except for the one i am using now

[Carskick]

I believe the RAMDAC is what converts the video card's "drawings" into a signal your monitor can understand. Also, even though you've build 3 other comps using the same parts, it is possible for a small part on one component to have failed or was defective. This could be a good excuse to get broadband.  :)

[Mark H]

If you have ruled out virtually everything on your PC, you might have a defective chip on the motherboard. Eventually, troubleshooting leads you there when everything else is checking out. Have you tried your PC without the modem to see if it doesn't crash anymore (I know no internet would suck, but it would rule out the modems)?

Mark H

[Whizbang]

I apologize for being lax here, but my systems have both been under attack the last few days.  I have never seen so much trash trying to get into my systems, but I also rarely surf that much looking for tech help on line.  That is the price to pay for the desire for perfect system.

1)  The CPU heat may not directly affect the CPU functionality but can add to the overall system heat and cause reboot.  It has happened to me when I had my case fan pulling in air from the back of case that had just been vented from the power supply and CPU--->blue screen/reboot within 15 minutes.
2  Run msconfig to see what is loading.  If something cannot be identified, poast it here.  Within the last three weeks, I have had two different malware/trojans prevent normal bootup; and no normal antivirus detected them initially.  The second one, DownloadWare, or dw.exe, is still resident on my other system and cannot be detected by adaware, SpyBot 1.2, AVG, or PC-Cillin House Call.  I just deactivated it in startup by running msconfig and looking at Startup.
3)  Turn off anything in Taskbar that is not needed.  Programs that have bad memory allocation can cause errors to be generated.  If each is run by itself, no anomalies might be detected.

My first list check would be the malware/trojan in msconfig.

[Andrew S]

What is:
3cpipe-USRpda      in   C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\USRmlnkA.exe RunServices \Device\3cpipe-USRpda

and

nwiz      nwiz.exe /install

Those are in startup in msconfig and i do not recognize them

[saoirse]

USRmlnkA.exe is a US Robotics modem driver.
Nwiz.exe is a portion of nVidia's display driver.

I'm inclined to agree with Mark here, it could be a problem with the mainboard or possibly, a faulty video card.  

saoirse

[Whizbang]

If you have a Windows CPU monitoring program, turn it on and watch it to see what the percentage usage is on CPU after initial stabilization and on idle.  I have never seen a CPU while idling go that high.  My XP 2600+ is running at 111?F (43?C) right now with a case bottom temp (monitored by case LCD on front panel) of 83?F and a central system temp of 95?F.  If you do not have a Windows based monitor, try the freebie

SpeedFan

If the CPU is running that hot, I would suspect another problem that is keeping it at less than a nominal use level.  XP or 2000 at idle usually run less than 1%.  Win98 runs very erratically but usually 20% or so on idle.

[Andrew S]

My cpu usage is at 0% when idle, just sitting back watching it, and my temp right now for cpu is 50 celciuse (122 f) and my motherboard is 40 celcius (104 F)

[Whizbang]

I think I would first examine air flow and heatsink contact.  But just a guess would be that the real problem is not the CPU heat but the overall system heat that keeps the CPU temp that high, and it will elevate it by almost the same amount as the degree to which the overall system heat is elevated.  The hot air is likely being recirculated back over the heatsink.  Unless you have an overall positive or negative pressure in the case, pockets of hot air will build up.  Negative pressure clears it out best but also attracts a lot of dust through the cracks.  Some HP units minimize system heat influence by installing a plastic or PVC duct from the CPU to the outside so as to bypass mixing the air with the heated system air.  It also makes sense and is a way to minimize added fans and noise.

[Andrew S]

WHen i first designed this system, heat never crossed my mind as a future problem, but the way the fans on my pc are set up as, the one is an exhaust from the powersupply, i have one underneath the powersupply blowing into the pc, and one on the side blowing out.
But i was thinking, that the one in the back blowing in, is blowing in all the heat that just came out of the powersupply exhaust, and i was thinking of chaning the air flow, make the one on the side blow in and the back blow out so i dont pull in any extra heat
SOund good???

[pat]

yes