Random power shut-down problem

[Wolfshanze]

Hello... I was trouble-shooting a friend's Compaq the other day and ran across a very strange problem that I can't seem to track down.

His computer which otherwise seems to run okay, just randomly shuts itself off at random times for no apparent reason. When I say "shutdown" I mean it's like somebody just pulled the plug on the system, or hit the power switch, as the power supply just turns off.

This random shutdown seems to happen for no apparent reason... the computer might be reading a CD, or it might be in the middle of startup, or it might just be sitting there doing nothing at all.

The shutdowns happen at random times, but the system never seems to stay on for longer then an hour or so, and shutdowns can happen as often as every five minutes or so.

Obviously the system is pretty messed up, but I can't find the problem. My first suspect was the PSU. His Compaq has a 200w proprietary PSU, but I had a spare 300w ATX PSU just floating around the house, so I sat my PSU next to his computer and ran all the power through it... no dice... same shutdown problem... so it's obviously not the PSU.

He took the computer back, so I don't have it in front of me, but if memory serves me correctly it's a 1700+AMD system on a NVidia NForce1 motherboard (methinks).

Any clue what could be the culprit? Would like to help him out if I could, but this one has me puzzled.

 

[Mattd46612]

Is he overclocking? I had the same problem for a few months now i think my processor is done. Be interested to hear some peoples ideas on this.

 

[lonewolf6465]

I had this problem with my laptop (toshiba satelite) at one point. I sent it back to them and the report came back as a internal grounding issue. I know you mentioned you switched power supplies, but perhaps it is the connection on his mobo?

 

[Wolfshanze]

No... he's not overclocking at all... the guy is a total non-tech kind of person.

I've wondered about some kind of short or grounding issue, but I'm not sure how to fix something like that or how to be sure.

Any help or advice would be appreciated... I believe he is past his warranty if someone were to mention sending it back.

 

[Wolfshanze]

Anybody else got ideas?

 

[Wolfshanze]

I take it nobody has a clue??!?!??

 

[vertigo220]

memory (prime95, memtest86), temps, PSU (I know you tried a different one, but perhaps that one is bad/not enough too). To check for shorts, one thing you can do is turn the lights off and look for sparks, but you can also take the mobo out and put it on a nonconductive material, like the packaging it came in, and run the computer like that. That'll tell you if it's making contact with the case that it shouldn't be.

 

[DanTMWTMP]

If it's shutting down like that, then it's super obvious that it's a grounding issue. Take it apart and put it back together again.