Gets to windows start up screen then poof.. help

[Yadgadge]

Today I went to turn on my computer, and a bit after I pressed the power button it suddenly turned off. So I started up again, this time windows safe mode options came up, but I chose to start normally (first time I didn't have my monitor on) and I saw it get to the windows loading screen (the one with the little moving blue thing) and you know how the blue thing pauses at times when it's loading drivers and such, well, when it paused the major pause right before it gets past the loading screen it just suddenly shut off.

Now, I wasn't sure where to post this, since it could be windows causing the problem, BUT I am able to start up in safe mode, and in doing so I restored back to sunday's automatic restore point. But when starting up normally, it still did the same thing.

When windows is running, my CPU (athlon 64 3000+) gets up to about 63C, and when under heavy load I've seen it reach 69C, could it be that my CPU gets too hot under the load of starting windows? I had it running fine yesterday, but now it won't start up, I didn't install any new software (other than downloading Everquest files), and really all I did yesterday was play crap like solitare while I was downloading stuff off the internet.

I don't know what to do, as I said I restored back to sunday, but that didn't change anything. here's my specs:

Soyo CK8 Dragon Plus mobo
Athlon 64 3000+ Socket 754
Thermaltake Polo 735 HSF
Thermaltake Purepower 480 PSU
512MB PC3200 by Elixir
GeForce 2 MX 32mb (crappy I know)
Soundblaster Live! Gamer 5.1
Windows XP Home Edition SP2

I also have 4 case fans running, 2 in the front as intake, and 2 in the back as outtake, one of the intakes is half blocked by the HD because of Antecs design. If there is any other info that anyone needs, just ask.

P.S. Moderator, if you feel this should be in Software feel free to move it, I am not sure if it is a software or hardware issue.

 

[gaara]

Those temperatures are a wee bit on the hot side in my opinion, and I think that's the source of the problem. Installing a new heatsink and some thermal grease may very well fix the problem.

 

[Yadgadge]

Yeah, that seems to be the problem, after posting this I went to my computer put it on it's side and removed the HSF, it was full of dust, so I cleaned it up, and reapplied new thermal paste (after cleaning the old off of course), and now it started up. but it's still idling at about 60 - 61C atm, and my case temp is 26C (which I was told once is kinda high itself) I guess I'll start looking into a new HSF, and/or a new case as well, the case I have currently is about 3-4 years old. I just don't get why a Thermaltake HSF would do such a poor job, could their bundled thermal paste be so bad that it would cause problems? Or is the Polo 735 not ver good? or is it just that my case isn't doing the job? Thanks for the help.