automatic restart on athlon

saessy

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i got a little annoying problem with my athlon system:
i'm using an athlon 900 together with a geforce 2. i only have a 250W powersupply, but for a year it was sufficient.
the problem is: sometimes my system, after it was idle for a few minutes, automatically reboots (resets) when i move my mouse.
what could be the problem?
i don't think it's the power supply, because when using much of the resources my computer stays stable.
 
G

Guest

Guest
I have had the same problem twice, and I tracked it down to two different problems.

1) When you "undervolt" your CPU, or overclock without adequately raising the core voltage, reboots can occur at weird times.

2) Another time, I experienced brownouts from the power company. If you have a good quality power supply, it normally has a lot of capacitors to smooth out the line, and those help along during brownouts. An APC helps as well.
 

saessy

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i didn't overclock my cpu, the power company is stable - otherwise my friends here must have the same problem.
i experienced this automatic restart under win2000 and now under winXP. it doesn't matter for how long i used my pc, because it rebooted after 10 minutes after first logon and about 2h after logon. the problem is, if virtually no task is running for a few minutes and i move my mouse it crashes.
 

blue_heart

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did you tweak your memory in the bios? if so then back it to the default.

change your mouse, if you installed mouse driver (some scroll type mouse needs driver and maybe the driver is causing the porblem)

go to desktop/properties/screen saver/power/power scheme....choose home/office desk, and choose never for the other options..........do not enable the hibernate.
and lets see what will happened

wish if there was UnDo in the life
 

svol

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Although you say that the powersupply works good, you should check your Voltages to see if anything is wrong there.

My case has so many fans that it hovers above the ground :eek: .
 

Kelledin

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It sounds like it might be some power management feature screwing you over. I'd suggest completely disabling power management in WinXP and see if that helps.

<i>If a server crashes in a server farm and no one pings it, does it still cost four figures to fix?
 

BrainStorm

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If not done already, uncheck the "automaticly reboot after a system failure" (or something like that). Go in control panel, System, Startup. You will probably see a blue screen instead of having a reboot. It will be more usefull to track down the problem.

It's better to be rich and healthy than poor and sick!
 

CoOLMaNX

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yeah i agree, sounds like a PSU problem. 250 watts doesn't sound like enough in the first place, but you say its been runnin for a year? also this problem just started? so think back to the last thing you installed, tweaked or changed around before it started to crash. Otherwise try a new PSU, i'd suggest a enermax 300watt for ure puter, shoud suit ya just fine my friend..

didnt have one of em electronic pens so ill just type my name,<i>CoOoLMaNX</i>
 

Tiberius13

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Please post a complete system component list if you can. I have had the SAME basic problems on my computer!! I am trying to troubleshoot it right now. My computer will crash after a period of time when it is left running, and also often crashes right after I come back to it (similar to your problem where you moving the mouse causes it). Do you happen to have a wireless mouse? Just curious since I do... maybe it is involved... ?

http://forumz.tomshardware.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=faq&notfound=1&code=1

Anyways... here is the thread I started a week or so back outlining my problem. Let me know if it sounds the same as yours, and definitely let me know if you fix your problem!!!
 

LastStop

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Those symtoms sounds just like the problem I had when I changed my memory timing to anything but normal (Fast, Faster, Fastest, etc...). Talk about a cheap pos PC3000 ram.
 

saessy

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thanks for your advises, i changed my bios mem settings
- i hope it won't crash anymore.
i've got pc133 mem - is it more stable to set the frequency down to 100mhz?
it's hard to prove, because the crashes don't happen quite often.
i will change to a 300 or 350 watt psu. i thought about the enermax - has anyone experiences with it? i'm looking for a quiet psu, does anyone know others?

here comes my config:
o amd athlon 900mhz
o asus a7v 100mhz fsb
o 2x 128mb ram and 1x512 mb ram
o elsa gladiac geforce 2 gts
o plextor cdr 16/10/40 on ide
o teac cd 54x on ide
o ibm (don't know wich) hd 60gb on ata100
o standard keyboard wired
o standard mouse wired
o accton 100mbit networkcard
o sb live soundcard

well that's it!
 

blue_heart

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u r using 3 sticks of ram?........are you sure they all are equal in the specifications?......it is always recommended to use the same size and the same quality.......so if the problem did not vanish......then try to remove your the 512mb ram.

also sb live sound card has compatibility issue, maybe some users will be more helpful for you than me on this regard, however also try to remove if the problems kept occuring (try to use on borad sound if it is exist on your mb)

wish if there was UnDo in the life
 

Zlash

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I think Creative is getting more bad press than they should here, everytime i see someone say they have a SB card someone mentions compatability issues hehe.

I have the same board as him A7V and never had any issues, in this PC or many others.

...
 

blue_heart

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zlash........actually i do not have sb, i only use on board sound, but i always here from amd users with sb that there is a problem.....i even asked my friend who is working computer shop that he faces some problem with sb cards.

some people say when you install via's latency patch the problem may solve but i do not know if it really help or not.

many people also say that amd and its platforms is crap....but for me it is great, i have 3 amd systems 600 duron, 1000tb and 1700+ and all are running like horses without any problems at alllll.....maybe it a luck? loool i do not think so

wish if there was UnDo in the life
 

Zlash

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I've got 2 amd systems here running just fine with X-Gamers that have ran fine under 98,2k, and XP. And there's a SB card in every PC at school and i haven't had any problems with them either hehe.

...
 

Tiberius13

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I think I fixed my crashing problems (knock on wood). Taking out my old ram and putting in a new 256 stick SEEMS to have done the trick. I also put that stick into the other DIMM slot on my motherboard - so it could have been a bad DIMM slot (or poorly seated RAM... whatever). I will further test the other DIMM slot, etc. to narrow it down.

ALSO, I had turned off the power settings in BIOS previously, and some settings elsewhere in the Operating System. However, just before this 'fix' I had disabled the power saving feature for my monitor (it used to go into power saving mode after 20 minutes, and now it just stays on 24/7 unless I turn it off manually). Therefore, it also might be power management related - I would suggest turning off ALL power management features when troubleshooting a problem (in BIOS and OS)... they are scattered everywhere so look around for them (even the NIC and mouse and such seem to have power down features now)

I hope my experiences help someone else out there.. (and I hope my computer hasn't crashed by the time I get home - negating all of this joy I am feeling)
 

eden

Champion
I also need help yall.
I just got such problem, because after it restarted, Windows said it had recovered from a failure and if I wanna send the report.
My system is as follows:
AXP 1600
Epox 8KHA+
256DDR PC2400 OCZ running at PC2100 by mobo setting default
Asus GF3 Ti200
Antex P303X 300W
SB LIVE
WinXP
This time my bro had the prob when it happened, he was on MSN chatting when out of nowhere it restarted! It had to have been a blue screen cuz it gave the error report so I disabled that option to see next time the blue screen instead of restart.
Please what could be wrong? I had the system for 3 weeks now!

--
The other day I heard an explosion from the other side of town.... It was a 486 booting up...