Hp pavilion locking up / restarting

[chaznsc]

Hi,
My family computer is suffering from random system halting and sometimes restarting. No rhyme or reason. Considering the os might have been crapped out, I upgraded to windows 7 professional from Vista. Did a fresh format/install BTW. System has a 300 gb hard drive and 4gb ram. It's just a family pc so we don't game or anything weird. Ive checked things like hibernation settings, etc and no dice.

Power supply?
Ram?

Thoughts appreciated.

Chaz

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

First, one of the worst things you can do to try and fix a computer problem is to load a new OS.

Please post your specs. Can you give any further information on the problem? When does it usually happen? Any error messages?

Could be as simple as cleaning out the PC.
Reseat all components and cables.

Could be failing HDD. Run manufs. utility and chkdsk
Could be failing PSU. Check with multimeter or replace

 

[chaznsc]

HP Pavilion a6242n
3.0gb RAM
AMD Athalon 64 x2 4800+ 2.5ghz
Windows 7 32 bit
Hitachi HDT725030VLA Drive (SATA 2 I think)

The system has been LOCKING UP where I will come to it after not using it an the keyboard lights are flashing on and off and there is no system response. Sometimes there is a screen, sometimes its blank (black)

No messages of any kind.

Recently, its been randomly restarting. I have cleaned and reseated everything. It just restarted on its own 10 minutes ago. I dont have a blank CD so I cant run memtest or hard drive diagnostics today.

 

[RebateMonger]

The symptoms sound like failing capacitors on the motherboard. That's not the only possibility, but I'd certainly take a look for bulged or leaking caps.

 

[chaznsc]

I checked and rechecked everything. Put a new PSU i n this afternoon and the system seems back to normal. Thanks for all the input.

 

[chaznsc]

Machine is still acting up. I have tested the memory (memtest) and attempted to install a KNOWN working hard drive and it refuses to boot. Installed a fresh drive, formatted and installed windows but it halts about 80% the way thru the process. No blown or leaking caps on the MOBO.

I can get the original HD to boot (sometimes) but it locks up after a short period of use. It will also reboot when it feels like it.

 

[blastingcap]

Machine is still acting up. I have tested the memory (memtest) and attempted to install a KNOWN working hard drive and it refuses to boot. Installed a fresh drive, formatted and installed windows but it halts about 80% the way thru the process. No blown or leaking caps on the MOBO.

I can get the original HD to boot (sometimes) but it locks up after a short period of use. It will also reboot when it feels like it.

This happened to me when my video card failed.

Try changing one thing at a time to isolate the source of the problem.

 

[chaznsc]

UPDATE:
My Board has 4 ram slots. I can populate the board with 2 of them and the system boots most of the time. I can populate all 4 and it refuses. I can run MEMTEST from the CD and it passes either pair of dimms.

My hard drive will not boot my workstation. I have a USB converter kit and set the bios to boot from the USB. Windows starts, then I get a second of a BSOD, then it reboots. Then it wants to go into setup recovery, which it does, and we start the process all over again.

Possibly a bad board AND a bad drive? (Since the BSOD seems to refuse any of the secondary drives I have installed). I can access the drive, however, from my USB kit and extract data. I just cant seem to boot from it.

EDIT: 216PM - Windows scan-disk and Acronis health monitor report a healthy drive. Perhaps a bad boot record?

 

[Gunbuster]

That blue screen is likely due to the storage driver mode not being the same on the other machine. IDE vs AHCI/RAID