PC Reboots sporadically and freezes - any suggestions ?

[MissyEd]

Hi there

I'm running a 466mhz celeron pc with windows 98 se. I've been experiencing problems since christmas with the PC just rebooting itself while it's switched on. I tried disabling the power mgt options, but they don't seem to have made any difference. It also freezes occasionally, especially just after you boot up. It also reboots itself in scandisk at startup. This morning, it rebooted itself in windows, started running scandisk, rebooted itself there, then succesfully ran scandisk, but froze in Windows while I was connecting to the NAI website.

I have tried adding a new 20GB harddrive to create some room on my primary 8GB harddrive. I also changed the IDE cables connecting the hard drives and the CD rom to the motherboard. I noticed when I added the new HD and IDE cables, the problems eased for about 1week. I also added 128mb (total 192mb) but it although the extra RAM is picked up in Windows, there is not noticeable improvement.

I've run a virus scan and picked up nothing, although my DAT is about 4 months old. I've updated it this morning and will run another scan shortly.

Since the PC is out of warranty, I cant get any tech support. Anyone have any suggestions ?

Much appreciated

Missy Ed
Looking to exchange ideas and tips on VB and MS Access development as well as office 97 development. Drop me a line: msedbbw@hotmail.com

 

[CitrixEngineer]

Try creating a fixed-size swapfile.

Go to the virtual memory settings, and simply set the initial size to be the same as the maximum size.

Make the size of the swapfile equal to 1.5 X physical RAM (in your case, you could round it up to 300Mb).

What you describe sounds like a paging/fragmantation issue, but could be a driver (you can never tell with Windows!).

I hope this helps - good luck!

 

[Hairfarmer]

Sounds like a hardware conflict to me. Have you added any new hardware recently besides the memory and HD? A good culprit somethings can be a sound card conflicting with a video card. What types of apps. are you running when this problem usually occurs? Check the Control Panel | System | Device Manager to see if there are any conflicts flagged.

 

[JMagg]

Ive had the same prob. Turned out to be a nic card hardware conflict.

 

[wix5ie]

I've seen this problem a couple of times in one case it was a faulty memory module so you could try swapping it out this would cause the 'freezing'. In the other case it was a faulty power supply i.e the PC would sporadically restart itself without warning, again it's worth changing the power supply to test.

 

[TalkingGoat]

I agree with the last thing that wix5ie said. It could be the power supply. I've seen it twice before on other computers. Try swiching it out.

 

[Repairs]

I know it sounds unrelated, but try setting up your Dialup Networking to obtain IP address automatically, i.e. don't use assigned IP address' for your dial-up.

Remember, each computer is different and it may not work in your situation.

A customer of ours was experiencing the same thing for appx 3 months and because it locked up randomly, but mostly when trying too/during/or/after attempting/using the Internet or Outlook-EX.

One does not need to manually set an IP, unless it is ATT or some "NET Service". I set it up for Auto and now.....
a happy customer, and less wasted "benchtime" for us.

 

[MissyEd]

Thanks for all the help. I have decided to start afresh with a new hd after checking all the bios settings. I'll let you know if it works. Missy Ed
Looking to exchange ideas and tips on VB and MS Access development as well as office 97 development. Drop me a line: msedbbw@hotmail.com

 

[teknoguy]

my friend got a new motherboard so i installed it for him. after getting everything connected etc etc I booted the computer, seconds later the computer shut off. hmm. so i checked all the connections again, jumper settings etc etc. after days of trying to get the darn thing to start normally, i decided to take out the motherboard and start from fresh again. only this time i noticed a motherboard screw which wasn't supposed to be there because there was no hole on the motherboard. So... it was the darn screw shorting out on the motherboard.

Try different memory or power supply.

 

[quadt]

First off if it was around Christmas time, what new software or games did you get for Christmas? I would start with removing anything you added around that time software or hardware (along with all accompanying drivers).

I'd pay attention and see if it seems to happen at the same point during boot or where ever it happens (running a particular app). I've see corrupt system files cause this error also, especially at boot.

Re-install IE

Another thing I would try is to pull your 64MB of RAM DIMM and use just the 128MB, there by eliminating a problem with the ram.

If you can get into window, use the system file checker to scan you system files for corrupt files. (start, programs, accessories, system tools, system information, tools, system file checker; I think that's right, don't use 98 anymore so I can't check). Also you can use "msconfig" and disable programs from starting up at boot.

another thing you can do is boot to dos safe mode and delete win386.swp This is your swap file, don't worry windows will recreate it when you restart windows. I've done it alot of times and found it fix quite a few problems, because the swap file was corrupt.

Good luck
quadt

 

[ShaithisDanoveur]

Think back to Christmastime and remember - what was changed from a HARDWARE perspective?

If this was where your harddrive was first installed, and where you changed IDE cables as well, I wonder if you haven't gotten yourself a bad IDE cable. Bad IDE cable will cause everything you're describing. So will a cable that isn't properly seated or socketed. So check everything out to make sure it's tight first. Then try switching out the IDE cables for new ones in case you got a bad batch (it happens more than you think).

While you are at it and the power is off - pick that case up and give it a healthy shake, bump it on an edge on the bench/floor - you're trying to ascertain if somehow a screw has managed to partly lodge itself back behind your motherboard (common occurrence when replacing hard drives). Visually expect from the edge-down on the board if you can. The mirror out of an old makeup compact works well for seeing in tighter places btw. If you hear a clank noise when you are shaking, start looking for that errant screw

Make sure your fans all work - motherboards with CPU Temp detection will shut down when they get too warm, which they will at varying rates depending on the load on the processor. Visually verify their operation.

If you've done all these and still have the problem, start looking at power supplies being bad, power cords being improperly plugged in, faulty UPS/line conditioning equipment.

 

[techas]

I have been experiencing the same type of problems only I'm running Dell OptiPlex G1's and GX50's with Celeron 400's using 3com 3C920 nic's on a 2000 server running w2k Pro. Computers will suddenly reboot in the middle of our applications, especially after any user input (ie: "I hit enter and it rebooted&quot I have checked the bios settings for allowing the nic to power up or down remotely and they are disabled and have replaced the power strips and have tested the plug but still it reboots periodically throughout the day. As far as asigning IP address automatically, our DHCP server works fine, and since it's w2k, pagefile.sys could still be an issue but I doubt it. They are proprietary systems so power supply problems sound remote. Everything I have tried has failed to solve the problem, so I was wondering first if anyone had heard about this type of problem with any dell's or 3com nic's or even w2k itself, and next if anyone thinks it could be a modem/telephoney/com+ issue.
If anyone has any comments or suggestions, please post
Techass

 

[ceh4702]

you could have a corrupt files in Win98. Try reinstalling windows.

You also might want to reformat the drive. Just be careful to save all your drivers.

I wouldn't spend good hard-earned money on a 486. Any Celeron will outperform a 486. It may be time to think about replacing the 486. Some program could have replaced a config.sys or autoexec.bat file. If you do not like my post feel free to point out your opinion or my errors.

 

[IMRevbudgreen]

The problem seems completely hardware related. You have added power hungry items (new HDD), (More Memory). That puts an additional draw on the power supply. Just a few millivolts extra draw on a weak or underpowered supply will cause complete system power problems (Such as reboots). I see it all the time in my shop.
REPLACE THE POWER SUPPLY FIRST. Good clean power can never hurt. At least a 350~400W supply.
Good luck