What could be the cause of...

[Zenoth]

Hi.

Since yesterday I'm getting a random boot problem.

I never, ever had that problem before.

My D Drive (Slave) started to make a strange, loud sound last night. This morning I un-plugged it. I configured the BIOS to make it so it doesn't need to recognize it anymore (for a test). My OS is installed on my C, so I've let my C as Single, and I started up my PC. It works alright. The strange sound is no more.

But after approximately one or two hours, my PC boots up. Without any warning or error messages at all. It just magically boots up.

I ran a Spybot Search & Destroy scan, an Ad-Aware SE scan and a Symantec Corporate A-V scan, all with the latest definition rules and viruses updates. The only thing it found (Symantec) was a Trojan.ByteVerify. But the A-V said it had successfully put it in Quarantine. And I looked in it, and it was there indeed.

Then, I scanned my Registry with HiJackThis 1.99.1, and I found nothing suspect. Then I ran a CWShredder scan, and it found nothing.

And finally, I ran a Registry cleaner software (Registry Mechanic), and it removed all un-wanted and useless entries.

I did all that in Safe Mode.

And I still get the random boots.

I've checked my CPU temperature, and it never goes higher than 45º Celsius. And that's rare when it reaches that.

Could it be the Power Supply that's starting to die out ?

I'm using a generic 420 Watts PSU, but I never had problems with it before. I've been using it since October 2003.

And I always turn my PC off, completely, at least one time per week, for a night period (around 8 to 10 hours off). It never ran constantly for more than 5 or 6 days. And with that "routine", I didn't have any problems.

But, still, is it possible that a dying PSU can cause random boot ups ?

Thanks for your time.

 

[jackschmittusa]

Have you checked fans and heatsinks on the vid card and northbridge; clean, working? It could be the psu or ram as well.

 

[Stonesoldier]

sounds more like you have something wakeing up your comp
like a network card or a modem
items like that
check your bios and see if you have anything set to wake your comp up

 

[daniel49]

I would guess ps, but on the nortons byteverify I been seeing that regular too and think maybe it was just reporting a vulnerability as half the time the file was in its own folders. I upgraded my java program to see if that patches the vulnerability.
the latest from sun is Version 1.5.0 (build 1.5.0_02-b09)

 

[jackschmittusa]

Stonesoldier

I think he means re-boot. Says he leaves it on all of the time.

 

[Fern]

Zenoth

If you meant "re-boot' (I'm a bit confused by the descrition as well ), put motherboard monitor on there. Enable the "sys log" feature. Have it record at one second intervals and write it to a text.doc.

When it reboots on you, go have a look in the text doc for your voltages and temps. See if you can then identify the cause

Fern

 

[stevty2889]

Exactly what brand is your generic PSU, I would be suspicious of it. Also, right click on my computer, click properties, go the the advanced tab, settings for startup and recovery, and uncheck the automaticly restart box.