Question about random reboots

T

Triple B

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jul 13, 2004
Messages
192
Ok, the basic problem I'm having that started a couple days ago is that the computer will just randomly reboot from anything I'm doing. Originally I could just get back into Windows and have no problem. Then last night it rebooted, started up Windows but then after the loading screen (with the blue bar moving across the bottom) and before the Welcome screen, it flashed a blue screen of death then rebooted. This time it brought me to the Safe Mode menu. Tried last known good configuration, that didn't work, same problem as before. Tried Safe Mode, that worked. Did a quick run of AdAware, took out about 80 things, rebooted. Regular boot to Windows was ok, then again out of nowhere it rebooted. To make a long story short, I am at the point where Safe Mode With Networking, Last Known Config, and Start Windows Normally all give me a flashed BSOD before rebooting. Safe Mode isn't even an option to fall back on as it will either reboot as soon as all the safe mode files are loaded or just randomly after getting into Safe Mode. I know this is very vague, but does anyone have any ideas? I'm going nuts :(
 
Fragment and error check your harddrive/s, then scan for viruses (make sure the definitions are up-to-date). These are more of the common errors associated with problems like this. Try these first.
 
Another thing, did you change anything a couple days ago, before it started rebooting? Install new hardware, new drivers, windows patches or anything like that? If so, whatever you did could be the culprit. Otherwise, pull down memtest to see if your RAM is going bad, or it could be the PSU. Lastly, it could be Windows itself, you may need to reinstall. If you have a spare hard drive, or have access to one, install it instead of the one you currently have and install Windows from scratch to see if you still have problems. If so, it's definitely a hardware issue. If not, it's something to do with your software/drivers/Windows... ;)
 
Go System Properties -> Advanced -> Startup & Recovery.
Turn off auto-restart after system failure.
That way it will sit in the BSOD and you can write down the stop code etc, etc.
Then look it up at Microsoft support.

Luck........... :D
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Ooh thanks for that tip... hopefully it will last long enough to do that. Amazingly it lasted long enough for me to purchase, download and install a copy of NAV2k5. Then rebooted during the system scan. I'm thinking I might need to just reinstall XP, I'll try that as well if the BSOD message turns up nothing.
 
Oh excellent... I went to reinstall XP, got to the partition listings, deleted my main partition, did a quick format of the drive and got a message saying I couldn't install XP cuz there was a problem with the drive. So being the technical genius I am, I decided that maybe it was just the quick format not working for me. Deleted that partition, went to format the drive and bam! Reboot again! I'm learning to love this...

Gonna try the memory, see if that's my problem. I don't think it's the PSU, too random a reboot scenario I've got going on for it to be any specific jumps in power usage causing the problem.

Oh, and the MS Knowledge Base doesn't have my specific stop code listed from the BSOD. Shocker.
 
Friend is having exact same problem. He turns his computer on and whilst XP loads up it just shuts down...gave him XP Disk to format and install but he hasnt spoken to me since...bad PSU or RAM Im guessing because he upgraded Ram from stock settings so it might not have been too compatible.

Try testing your ram and hard drives on another machine? Don't know Im not too good at solving problems things kinda go smoothly for me.

Good Luck.
 
When the same thing happened to one of my computers, way back when, and I could'nt
fix it myself, I took it into a store to have it fixed and it turned out to be a bad stick of ram.
 
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