Desktop randomly restarting with horizontal lines on monitor when rebooted

batmang

Honorable
Jul 6, 2012
14
0
10,510
Hey guys starting a few days ago, a friend's desktop work computer started randomly restarting with horizontal lines going across the screen on reboot (pic: https://imgur.com/Vq9wvuZ) There is nothing stressing the hardware (no games video, or anything requiring fast CPU/memory). Basically the only thing being done on this computer is excel documents and outlook. I haven't been able to replicate the issue but I'm not able to get to the office to troubleshoot there so I need to resolve the issue while the computer is at my place if possible.

EDIT: The issue just started happening for me at home. The computer will randomly restart but will fail to reboot 3-5 times. It will start the reboot but then power off again and the restart process starts up again and then 1-2 seconds after it will restart again until after 3-5 tries it boots up into windows. The artifacts on the screen change from horizontal lines to colored blocks and everything in between. Also, the monitor light turns to orange and then back to blue when rebooting. The monitor power light never disappears. Thanks for the help!


Computer details:

Windows 7 64 bit
Powerspec maker, all stock components
Intel i3-4340 CPU @ 3.6 GHz
4 GB single stick ram
Display adapter: Intel HD graphics 4600


Troubleshooting completed:

Moved computer to my house
Different power strip
Cleaned dust out
Reseated all cables to motherboard, power supply, and monitor
Successfully completed windows memory diagnostic twice
Ran a good 2-3 hours of Furmark GPU test with no errors
Turned off windows automatic updating (it was on before)


Event log critical error copied details:

- System

- Provider

[ Name] Microsoft-Windows-Kernel-Power
[ Guid] {331C3B3A-2005-44C2-AC5E-77220C37D6B4}

EventID 41

Version 2

Level 1

Task 63

Opcode 0

Keywords 0x8000000000000002

- TimeCreated

[ SystemTime] 2018-03-05T19:26:08.624035300Z

EventRecordID 309000

Correlation

- Execution

[ ProcessID] 4
[ ThreadID] 8

Channel System

Computer WHF-Sheri-DT.WOODHILL.local

- Security

[ UserID] S-1-5-18


- EventData

BugcheckCode 0
BugcheckParameter1 0x0
BugcheckParameter2 0x0
BugcheckParameter3 0x0
BugcheckParameter4 0x0
SleepInProgress false
PowerButtonTimestamp 0
 
Solution
If I had to single out a most probable cause of this issue I would say it's the motherboard. The motherboard is responsible for both the graphics output and also is likely at fault for the random resets. Only a hardware issue can cause resets like that.

My workflow to this issue would be to access a known working power supply and try that. If that doesn't help, I would replace the motherboard with a cheap LGA1150 Z97 motherboard. This would have to be sourced on eBay another 3rd party source as they are not sold on places such as Amazon anymore. This may be difficult if this is a prebuilt PC; especially a Dell as they use proprietary parts. Those are the only two pieces of hardware besides graphics cards (not applicable in this case)...

jr9

Estimable
I would start by updating the chipset and Intel integrated graphics drivers inside Windows.

Does this PC not have a graphics card? If it doesn't and randomly resets with graphical errors like that then I'd suspect failing hardware. As the crash is hard to reproduce and random it will be difficult and also time consuming to identify which part is at fault. Sometimes stress testing is actually useless in situations like this especially Furmark. Random resets are generally either the motherboard or power supply if you have no graphics card. Crash logs are not going to give you any information either because Windows doesn't log any useful information when the PC suddenly resets.

If you have spare parts I would try playing the "swap a part out and see if it crashes" game. Or pay a shop to perform a diagnostic as they will have the PSU motherboard CPU everything to identify the problem part.
 

batmang

Honorable
Jul 6, 2012
14
0
10,510


Correct, no discreet card. I ran the furmark because of the artifacts on the monitor on reboot.
 

jr9

Estimable
If I had to single out a most probable cause of this issue I would say it's the motherboard. The motherboard is responsible for both the graphics output and also is likely at fault for the random resets. Only a hardware issue can cause resets like that.

My workflow to this issue would be to access a known working power supply and try that. If that doesn't help, I would replace the motherboard with a cheap LGA1150 Z97 motherboard. This would have to be sourced on eBay another 3rd party source as they are not sold on places such as Amazon anymore. This may be difficult if this is a prebuilt PC; especially a Dell as they use proprietary parts. Those are the only two pieces of hardware besides graphics cards (not applicable in this case) that can cause sudden resets. The log file Windows gives indicates a failure at electrical level so this is not a case of software, driver, or operating system level malfunction.
 
Solution