CPU 100% Random Power Off

[DragonReborn]

OK, so here's what's going on:

My HTPC is acting up. I am running XPsp2 on an older athlon chip/board (asus k266a and a xp2100+). I actually having beeng using this setup for almost a year flawlessly. Just last night my computer decides to power off by itself. At first it seemed random but now it happens every time I try and playback video. This leads me to a overheating problem.

Here's where I get snagged: I have a geforce mx440 little crappy vid card just for the s-video out to go to my TV. the weird thing is that when my computer boots, I don't get any of the POST screens/bios, etc. It's like the computer is no connected to the TV until it boots into windows and then everything is super. I am guessing for some reason, it needs windows to access the cards svideo output? Either way, I want to go into the BIOS and check the CPU temp and see what the shutoff limit is. I've downloaded some cpu temp programs but none give me a solid answer.


Please help!! =)

 

[fuzzynavel]

Overheating may be the cause.....but it could also be your power supply on the way out....or even your RAM......does it just shut down when viewing video files?? or does it do it when playing a game.....or will it reset if you leave itidle for a few hours.......

Is it a certain type of video...i.e xvid/avi/mpeg etc that causes it to die?

go ito the bios and look around....from your post it sounds like you are a bit worried to go poking around....

 

[DragonReborn]

I'm worried to go poking around? I like poking around, I enjoy it usually.

My problem is that I cannot see my bios screen. My computer is hooked up to my TV and I do not see the ENTIRE booting process from the second I press power to when Widnows finally boots up to the login screen.

To further clarify, the computer will shut off when I just leave it on for awhile and while I do have somewhat intensive programs running (snapstream btv) I'm not doing any crazy folding programs. I can though boot into windows and use the computer like nothing is wrong but then when I go into BTV and try and play one of the recorded shows it automatically freezes up, kick cpu usage up to 100%, and does quite a hard stall, and finally after a minute just powers off.

I'm thinking heat but I guess it could be the PS or Ram...

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Be methodical, first the entire interior should be dusted, T.I.M. reapplied, make certain the cooler's fan is spinning and touch it under load while running to see how hot it is getting. None of that resolves the problem then my money is on the PSU dying since random shutdowns is the classic symptom.

 

[DragonReborn]

Yeah, bummer. Ok, well first thank you both for trying to help out.

I also wanted to add some more info to the puzzle: after it powers off I have to unplug the power cable from the PS AND switch the PS to off, wait about 20 seconds, THEN plug it back into the PS, switch it on and hopefully it will fire to life.

Does that narrow down anything or could it still be anything and the computer just needs to discharge the electricity before booting up again?

 

[DragonReborn]

bump...any more ideas?

I will try cleaning up inside tonight and post back results

 

[DragonReborn]

Ok, so I took the case off and put it in front of the air conditioner. Temps obviously went down but I am still experiencing an odd problem. When I start Snapstream and choose to watch a recorded show, the CPU usage cranks up 100% and the computer freezes. It's just weird since I haven't updated this BTV and it has been working perfectly for around a month. Any ideas what would make the cpu usage go 100% (virus?). I have a pretty clean system with only a few programs running.

 

[DragonReborn]

Wow...OK, so here we go:

took off case cover and then uninstalled BTV completely. I think the program was looking for a file that didn't exist/corrupted and was stalling the entire system.

Deleted the file(s) and it "looks" like it is working.