HELP!! My Computer Randomly Restarts Itself!! (1 Viewer)

[Andrew_Sch]

Yeah, I'll just be sitting here, surfing the net, minding my own business, and *click* it's restart time. Sometimes it restarts before I even get a chance to log on the net, or do anything for that matter. When the desk check runs after the reboot, it usually brings up some files (mostly temporary internet files) and says, "first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated." Any idea what could be causing this odd problem? Oh by the way, I'm running Windows XP Home on a Dell Dimension 4300. I've got plenty of free hard-drive space and RAM, so those aren't the problems.

 

[Colin Dunn]

Usually, this problem is caused by:

- bad RAM
- CPU overheating
- corrupted OS/drivers
- bad motherboard

If you recently added RAM and started encountering this problem, the new RAM is probably the culprit.

If this is the RAM you've always had, I would next check that the heat sink is properly installed over the CPU, and that there is adequate air flow to keep the CPU cool. (A Pentium 4 should throttle back if it overheats, rather than rebooting entirely. AMD platforms will just spontaneously reboot or lock up when they overheat.)

If the RAM, CPU, and cooling are all good, you may have a corrupted driver or operating system causing the crashes. This problem tends to compound itself as you get a spontaneous reboot, a forced disk check, and then some more lost/damaged files.

If you reinstall cleanly and still experience this problem, then your motherboard is likely bad and needs to be replaced.

 

[Rob Gardiner]

Andrew,

Your mention of the "allocation unit" error messages tells me you might need to SCANDISC your PC.

 

[RudyN]

My computer used to do the same and I took it back to Gateway and they replaced the motherboard and power supply and I haven't had any problems since.

 

[Andrew_Sch]

I read Microsoft's reccomendations, and they suggested it might be a driver problem with new software or hardware. I uninstalled the only new software (ESPNMotion) I've installed in a while and it hasn't done it since then, so I'll keep my fingers crossed.

 

[SteveMc]

on the desktop, right click on my computer and select properties, click Advanced tab, Startup and Recovery, and uncheck the Automatically Reboot option in the system failure. In the Win98 days of BSOD (Blue Screen of Death) you got an error message with the blue screen, but with that option checked in XP, it'll reboot before the BSOD comeup and hence not able to see what caused it. If you actually get a blue screen, i doubt the problem it power related, but still possibly bad RAM or something else.

 

[Shane Martin]

I had this happen recently, it was a bad stick of Ram.