Computer keeps restarting

[MrYAK]

I havent had any major probs with my computer for months until today. My wife booted up the computer this morning when we got up and i noticed that the lights inside the case were not on. I opened up the case and pushed the conectors in to make sure they were all seated properly. Sure enough, the lights came on, then my wife asked me if i restarted the computer on purposed. At the this point i was thinking to my self, "wtf is she talking aobut?". Thats when i looked up to find the computer had restarted. As it was booting up again and got the part where the green slider was going across the screen, it restarted again...and again....and again. I went to my bios to make sure nothing changed after it hickuped and everything looked good. Shut the computer down for 20sec then restarted. and it came up with a harddrive error. Cant remember what it all said at the moment, but it said something to the degree of raid, sector, and boot i belive. it was a black screen with two lines across the top of what it said. I didnt have time to run a boot sector repair cause i had to go to work.

So i'm at work now and was thinking it is 1 of 2 things, not enough PSU juice or bad harddrive sector.
This computer is used for gaming 60% of the time its on and internet/email 40%(when my wife is on it) I try to avoid downloading anything i dont know much about, but i do use IMESH when i download something, i havent heard any bad things about it. I run ad-aware and hijackthis about everyday.I'm just wondering if anyone has anythoughts on this before i go home mess with my computer.

My specs:
Windows XP Home
Asus P4S800 mobo
3.2 P4 Cooled by a ThermalTake Aquarious II
1Gig pc3200
Radeon All-In-Wonder 9800
40G Maxtor Harddrive 7200rpm
CD R/W
DVD player
Ultra PC Vent II with 2 LED 45mm Fans PCI System Exhaust
Ultra 5.25" Bay Freezer with 2 - 60mm Cooling Fans Exaust System
ThermalTake Xaser III V1000D case(this case comes stock with 7 fans, just the front 2 fans hae been replaced with 2 Sunon Tornado 80x80x38mm 84CFM fans in the front)
2 12" UV cold cathode lights and 2 6" blue cold cathode lights
4 port USB hub i use for my mouse and keyboard
ThermalTake 420W PSU

 

[Fencer128]

Hi,

I read your post and there's a couple of bits of info that might help people diagnise your problem that I couldn't find.

1. Did you reseat/push any of the cables you mention whilst the machine was powered up (or even switched on at the wall/PSU)?

2. You mention RAID briefly - are you using a RAID array of any sort?

Good luck,

Andy

 

[MrYAK]

1. Yes i did, i didnt think it would restart/power down my computer since there are switches on the lights that allow to turn the lights on and off while the computer is running. I have turned them on and off while the computer was running before and nothing happened then. So i find it odd that it did that this time.

2. No i'm not running any type of RAID array.

 

[Fencer128]

Hi,

One more thing - you mention lights in the case - are these cold cathode mod type lights, or something else?

Good luck,

Andy

 

[MrYAK]

Mod? i guess it is. her is the link for what the lights are.
http://www.case-mod.com/store/product_info.php?cPath=26_62&products_id=619

 

[Fencer128]

I could be very wrong here, but I'm wondering if when you plugged in the light, it caused some sort of power surge that affected the data on your HD (or maybe the HD itself)?

1. Use the Maxtor diagnostic utility (free download from Maxtor) to test the drive.
2. Try using Windows recovery console to rewrite the boot files (fixboot).
3. Try rebuilding the MBR (fixmbr) using the recovery console - only needed if can't get to OS loading screen.
3. Try an ASR backup if you have a recent one.
4. If the data is important use a utility to pull it off (like SpinRite) or if it's not reformat and reinstall.

Good luck,

Andy

 

[MrYAK]

Here is some new news i have. I called home to have my wife boot up from Windows disc and it was doing its thing then goes to a BLUE screen and says the following with "windows set up" in the top left.



Windows set up





The file ACPI.sys is corrupted.
press any key to continue







====================A solid white strip goes here across the screen=================

 

[Fencer128]

Hi,

Just seen this.

It may be your problem.

Good luck,

Andy

 

[MrYAK]

Hey thanks alot fencer, when i get home from work i'll try it/all out and let you know if it works. if not i'll be back here at the same time at work.


YAK

 

[dclive]

Originally posted by: MrYAK
I havent had any major probs with my computer for months until today. My wife booted up the computer this morning when we got up and i noticed that the lights inside the case were not on. I opened up the case and pushed the conectors in to make sure they were all seated properly. Sure enough, the lights came on, then my wife asked me if i restarted the computer on purposed. At the this point i was thinking to my self, "wtf is she talking aobut?". Thats when i looked up to find the computer had restarted. As it was booting up again and got the part where the green slider was going across the screen, it restarted again...and again....and again. I went to my bios to make sure nothing changed after it hickuped and everything looked good. Shut the computer down for 20sec then restarted. and it came up with a harddrive error. Cant remember what it all said at the moment, but it said something to the degree of raid, sector, and boot i belive. it was a black screen with two lines across the top of what it said. I didnt have time to run a boot sector repair cause i had to go to work.

So i'm at work now and was thinking it is 1 of 2 things, not enough PSU juice or bad harddrive sector.
This computer is used for gaming 60% of the time its on and internet/email 40%(when my wife is on it) I try to avoid downloading anything i dont know much about, but i do use IMESH when i download something, i havent heard any bad things about it. I run ad-aware and hijackthis about everyday.I'm just wondering if anyone has anythoughts on this before i go home mess with my computer.

My specs:
Windows XP Home
Asus P4S800 mobo
3.2 P4 Cooled by a ThermalTake Aquarious II
1Gig pc3200
Radeon All-In-Wonder 9800
40G Maxtor Harddrive 7200rpm
CD R/W
DVD player
Ultra PC Vent II with 2 LED 45mm Fans PCI System Exhaust
Ultra 5.25" Bay Freezer with 2 - 60mm Cooling Fans Exaust System
ThermalTake Xaser III V1000D case(this case comes stock with 7 fans, just the front 2 fans hae been replaced with 2 Sunon Tornado 80x80x38mm 84CFM fans in the front)
2 12" UV cold cathode lights and 2 6" blue cold cathode lights
4 port USB hub i use for my mouse and keyboard
ThermalTake 420W PSU

My 250W PS handles 6 hard drives and 1 optical drive, so I suspect your 420W PS will handle a drive, some RAM, 2 opticals, etc. just fine.

So, the machine reboots. Before you get into Windows.... can you give us the exact error you got?

By "boot up from Windows disc and it was doing its thing" --- were you doing a fast repair? A repair install? A reformat and reinstall? Details please!

 

[MrYAK]

Hey guys,

I got some new info. Yesterday when i got home from work i went into my bios to make sure everything was ok. I set the HD to "Auto" instead of "user HDD", and for some reason that got me past all my previous errors....why? i dont know, but thats ok to me. So when it was booting up and when it got the windows load screen where the green slider was going across the screen, that is where its restarting, everytime, thats the only thing i cant get past, i figure its the PSU because thats where most of hardware and software are powering up. Can anyone think of anything else that might be causing this? Or am i right about this?

Thanks, YAK

 

[dclive]

Originally posted by: MrYAK
Hey guys,

I got some new info. Yesterday when i got home from work i went into my bios to make sure everything was ok. I set the HD to "Auto" instead of "user HDD", and for some reason that got me past all my previous errors....why? i dont know, but thats ok to me. So when it was booting up and when it got the windows load screen where the green slider was going across the screen, that is where its restarting, everytime, thats the only thing i cant get past, i figure its the PSU because thats where most of hardware and software are powering up. Can anyone think of anything else that might be causing this? Or am i right about this?

Thanks, YAK

Problem: Windows was rebooting at the green-slider screen.
Solution: You changed the HDD settings from "User" (ie the user defines sectors/tracks/etc. to "Auto" (the computer reads this information from the drive)

That was the solution. I don't see how it could be related to a power supply issue at all.

 

[Darvil]

try a new PSU.

I've had problems like these a couple times and it always ends up being the PSU.

 

[dclive]

Hmm...sorry....I thought you said the problem was fixed when you went from 'user' to 'auto' HDD settings....

 

[MrYAK]

Yeah, its still restarting, but with no errors from yesterday, just restarting at windows load screen.
So what do you think is the prob, dclive?

 

[PsharkJF]

test the ram. google "memtest86" and make a bootable floppy, let it run.
if you get 2 passes with no errors, memory is a-ok.

 

[daveybrat]

i'll bet money that it's your hard drive that's gone bad. I just had a computer with the exact same symptoms, constant rebooting like yours and after testing the hard drive it came up bad. Replaced it with a new Seagate, works like a champ. It's not your power supply, that should be sufficient.

 

[MrYAK]

OK, TY all for yer help on solving this with me, i cant express how much i LOVE YOU ALL!!!:laugh:
I slapped in an old HD and it worked today and it booted up fine even though that HD is starting to go bad(its VERY slow and wont let me reformat it) so i'm off to get a new HD.

 

[dclive]

Originally posted by: MrYAK
OK, TY all for yer help on solving this with me, i cant express how much i LOVE YOU ALL!!!:laugh:
I slapped in an old HD and it worked today and it booted up fine even though that HD is starting to go bad(its VERY slow and wont let me reformat it) so i'm off to get a new HD.

OK, so the previous HDD was taken out, a new one put in, and you installed an OS on it, and now that OS works.

So we know the power (and other PC hardware) is fine, but it could be a problem with either the old HDD (hardware-wise) or software-wise; we really don't know.

Sounds like you're OK with rebuilding with a new hard drive, but if the only problem is that the machine is rebooting at the windows screen, I'd be first in line to say that's a software issue. If you'd like to troubleshoot it as a software issue, I'd be happy to help. Basically we'd confirm safe mode and last know good don't work, then swap the registry with the one from your c:\windows\repair directory (see URL in my sig for details on that), and that may or may not boot the box. If that worked, we know your registry is bad or has an issue - or a third party service you've installed has a problem; if it didn't work, we'd know your files on the box have a problem, most likely.

Any easy way to look at this is to put that HDD back into another system, and send me the c:\windows\minidump\*.dmp file you have in there, so I can tell you what's wrong. See my .sig for more info on that.

There are lots of things to do that don't require a rebuild....FYI....

(Is my understanding of the problem correct?)