Random Powering Off

[aplefka]

I've noticed within just the past couple days that my computer randomly powers off. I've never been in the room to see it happen (just now I was taking out the garbage and came back to find it off). It's done this 3 times in the past 20ish hours. I'm only inferring here, but I'm fairly sure that it's not going through the proper shutdown sequence since every time I have to choose to load Windows normally.

A few days back we had a major storm here, and although I had the computer powered off, I hadn't turned off my switchboard. The house/city's power shut off at one point after lightning hit a building nearby. Is it possible that somehow I've got a weird short going in within my PSU?

Specs:
Windows Vista Home Basic 64-bit
AMD Phenom II X3 720 2.8GHz
MSI GeForce 8600GTS
Thermaltake TR2 430w PSU
6GB RAM
2HDDs, 1 optical drive

UPDATE:
Bought a new PSU today, even jumped from 430w to 500w and went back to the Antec brand. I noticed on my old PSU that one of the molex connectors seemed like it had been shorted out since there was black around one of the pins. I thought all would be fine, wanted to test it out so I went in the other room to watch a movie for a couple hours and when I came back my computer had powered itself down again. I'm seriously at my wit's (and budget's) end and I've got plenty of work to get done this weekend so any help is appreciated.

 

[nboy22]

Two things immediately come to mind.

1. PSU is on it's way out.

2. Overheating.

Were you doing anything strenuous when it shuts down? For example, something that uses the CPU 100%? I recently had an issue where my processor was overheating, but it had never overheated itself in 8 months or more.. Turns out it was because I was rendering 3D and my shut down temp in the bios was set low.

 

[aplefka]

I'd be surprised if it was overheating. I rarely find myself at CPU 100%; mostly when SETI is running at full throttle. Each time it has shut off little to no programs/operations have been running. SETI would only be running off of the GPU. This morning all I had running was Firefox and iTunes. It has never done it while I've been playing a game or movie.

 

[aplefka]

Bumping this since I was fine for the past month and a half then two days ago this problem jumped up again.

The only additional information I can provide is that the majority of the time it shuts down while using just iTunes/Firefox, but it has powered down a couple times while playing a game or watching a movie now whereas previously it did not. It also usually seems to happen right around 30 minutes of being powered on.

Any way I can double-check the PSU without having to buy any equipment?

 

[nboy22]

I know that fry's electronics here in phoenix carries a PSU-checker for like 20 bucks or so.. of course you're spending money for that. Not sure how to test it otherwise, but maybe if an electrician person sees this thread they can give you some extra advise.

 

[aplefka]

I was fine for another couple weeks and now it's acting up again. I think it's time to do things the right way instead of the cheap way unfortunately. When you say a PSU checker, do you mean something that I wouldn't have to remove the connectors for? Cuz for $20 that'd be awesome.

 

[aplefka]

Bought a new PSU today, even jumped from 430w to 500w and went back to the Antec brand. I noticed on my old PSU that one of the molex connectors seemed like it had been shorted out since there was black around one of the pins. I thought all would be fine, wanted to test it out so I went in the other room to watch a movie for a couple hours and when I came back my computer had powered itself down again. I'm seriously at my wit's (and budget's) end and I've got plenty of work to get done this weekend so any help is appreciated.

 

[Maverick6969]

I'd be surprised if it was overheating. I rarely find myself at CPU 100%;

CPU usage 100% is rare. And secondly, the usage does NOT have to be at 100% for overheating to occur.

I agree with nboy22. System shutdowns are often caused by overheating issues or poor quality PSU. Since you've already swapped out the PSU, the next thing to check is the CPU. How old is your system? Is it entirely possible the thermal paste needs to be reapplied. Or if it was improperly applied when it was originally built, it could lead to situations like this.

Did this problem occur out of the blues? Or did you add some new hardware recently? (like perhaps new RAM....)

 

[aplefka]

Out of the blue. System is approximately a year and a half old. I ran Memtest86 and it found nothing wrong. I might try downloading Mobo Monitor and see if I can get some accurate temp readings from that. Any other suggestions?