Computer Random Restarts Help from experts only! Or anyone that had this problem!

[kangshi17]

I've been having problems with my computer. It keeps restarting itself randomly. At first I thought it was a ram problem. So I went ahead and tested all three rams and two failed. I thought that was weird so i retested those two rams in another computer and it pasted! Now I knew it was a motherboard problem. So I figured I would try to reset the cmos battery since thats the only thing I can do. Once it reset I retested the Ram and all three rams passed. I thought I fixed the problem but again it restarted when I was playing Starcraft. Now I was truely stumped. So I decided to deassemble the computer and dust all the components. I've moved the hard drive to a cooler location and reapplied thermal paste to my cpu. Again it didn't help! I've also tried to update bios, checked for virus, ran spybot and ad-aware with no luck! I've alot of stress on my cpu with prime95 with no restarts. Its totally random! Please any advise would help. Please note that I've unchecked automatic restart under system and recovery. (no blue screen). Also my power supply is a thermal take 480 W butterfly which was purchased less than 2 months ago.

Here are my specs

Windows XP (service pack 1)
Gigabyte sinxp1394 (motherboard)
2X512 Samsung Ram + 256 Elixir Ram
P4 2.53 MHZ (Not overclocked)
128 Sapphire Radeon 9800
1 120 gig Serial ATA Hard drive Maxtor
1 120 gig IDE Hitachi Hard drive (set to primary master)
Sony Dru - 530A DVDRW (set to primary slave)
Plextor 48x24x48 CD-rw (set to secondary master)
Sony DVD drive (Set to secondary slave)
Soundblaster Live Gamer Edition

Please help I've never been this stumped on a computer problem before. Thanks

 

[beedubaya]

Hmmm...sounds like a power supply problem to me. Maybe the one you got was defective. Try a different one and see if it works.

 

[kangshi17]

Since it only 2 months old i'm gonna try to exchange it tomorrow. Is it possible my power supply to overheat. Thermaltake Pure power Butterfly comes with a fan control which can be hooked up to the psu. If I put it on low settings I get more random restarts. And also it restarts only twice or so at night as opposed to 7-10 during the day. I was thinking that it might be Bad voltage in my house aka (dirty voltage). Is there a device that will give me stable power to my computer? Thanks for your help!

 

[Kangaroo]

It depends on which test your memory fails on within memtest86+

Please be aware of the fact that memtest86+ tests your CPU, L1 Cache and L2 Cache.

If it fails on Test 5 then I suggest stepping your FSB MHz down a few - this should solve your problem.

 

[kangshi17]

Well like I said after resetting the cmos battery all 3 rams past the test. Thanks for the reply =)

 

[geo3tech]

OH OH OH OH
i might have the answer for that

my computer randomly restarted for no reason and i had no idea wtf it was. it came out to be a f****** annoying virus that somehow got passed my firewall and antivirus 2003 program.

it was quite hard to terminate it but it still worked =)

try running your virus programs which has been updrated to find up to date viruses

 

[Nikkon]

I hesitate to suggest this but some bios systems allow you to set an automatic shut down when the cpu reaches a certain temp. Perphaps you have this set on a low temp and thats why it seems to shut down for no reason...

 

[kangshi17]

Everyone Thanks for the great suggestions but I checked bios and the only thing close to reset is cpu fail warning which was disabled and also I've updated norton antivirus 2004 and rescanned my computer with no luck. I'm starting to think its a heating problem. Since it mostly happens during 12-7pm. So what could be overheating? Graphic Card ? PSU? CPU? any suggestions?

 

[Nikkon]

Do you have any thermal sensors in your computer and if so give up some temps.

 

[kangshi17]

I don't have a thermal sensor for my case but I do have one for the cpu. I'll record that by tonight. Hopefully I can reslove this quickly its starting to aggreviate me