Hardware problem?

spud17

My previously well behaved computer has been playing up for the last month or so, any thoughts will be gratefully received.

It reboots randomly, it's not over heating and besides I run with the side off to keep the Athlon cool.

Apart from the hard drive, all the parts are about 8/9 years old.

It's been fine for the last 3 years, but about 4 weeks ago the psu failed, I tried an old spare, just to see if it was OK, and it rebooted and everything seemed OK.

I bought a new 500w Casecom psu from ebuyer and after a few days, I'd get a BSD and error message on XP or freeze/reboot on Linux Mint.

I dual boot off the same HD.

The XP error codes pointed to a hardware problem, the HD is less than 12mths old and completely silent, so I ran memtest on the 512mb and 256mb memory sticks.

The 512mb gave errors, the other passed.

Put in another 512mb stick which passed memtest.

The reboots continue, so reinstalled using another HD, the problem still continues.

So that leaves the mainboard, could it have been damged but not terminaly when the psu failed?

Because I have an AMD athlon, I've always kept a close eye on temperatures, and I've noticed that the voltages have been low, I swapped back to a spare psu and they were still low.
This could be the fault of the software used for monitoring, 2 different types, but the same result, there is no facility in the BIOS to check voltage, to rule out the software.
Temperature in the BIOS agrees with the software.

The reboots seem to happen when it's working hard, bearing in mind the age of the machine , e.g.Sunday evening, Firefox, Thunderbird and 2 spreadsheets were in use while playing back some mp3s.
I know the temperature was OK because I have it running in the taskbar backed up with an alarm.

I have another thread about moving the processor, ideally I'd like to get the mortgage paid off (next few months), then build something decent from scratch and use Windows 7 or Linux.

Has it finally come to end of its working life?

Sorry about the ramble but I wanted to get in as much info as possible.

fwor

Have you taken a very close look at the electrolytic capacitors on the board - particularly the ones near to the CPU?

I have an Alioth motherboard of about the same age which was given to me with similar problems, and they had all failed (unusually from the base rather than popping their tops). I replaced them and it has worked fine ever since, but the job isn't that pleasant to do.

basmic

Download and run Speedfan and tell me what all your voltages are. Sounds to me like either the motherboard or psu are on their way out - given it's age, I'd say the motherboard.

spud17

basmic wrote: »

Download and run Speedfan and tell me what all your voltages are. Sounds to me like either the motherboard or psu are on their way out - given it's age, I'd say the motherboard.

The problem only started after the original psu failed.
It's got a brand new 500w psu, but even with an old spare 200w psu the voltages are almost exactly the same.
I already use SIW to keep an eye on temperatures, its voltage reading are;

core = 2.0
vin1 = 1.94
+3.3 = 1.78
+5 = 3.41
+12 = 8.32
-12 = -7.74
-5 = -4.03
+5vcch = 3.17

Hope this is what you need.

basmic

spud17 wrote: »

The problem only started after the original psu failed.
It's got a brand new 500w psu, but even with an old spare 200w psu the voltages are almost exactly the same.
I already use SIW to keep an eye on temperatures, its voltage reading are;

core = 2.0
vin1 = 1.94
+3.3 = 1.78
+5 = 3.41
+12 = 8.32
-12 = -7.74
-5 = -4.03
+5vcch = 3.17

Hope this is what you need.

It is, and look at those voltages! :eek:

Ideally you should allow for 5-10% leeway for your positive voltages - allowing for 10%, your ideal voltages should be within the following ranges:
12v = 10.9-13.2v - yours is way out at 8.32v :eek:
5v = 4.55-5.5v - yours is showing 3.41v :eek:
3.3v = 3.0-3.63v yours is showing 1.78v :eek:

Either you're using a an old PSU or a very cheap one, or your motherboard is on it's way out - or you have a LOT of additional cards and drives on a weak (ie: 200w) PSU.

What you should be doing is using another PSU and see if you get the same results. If so, then take a look at what you have in your machine. Do you have a lot of PCI cards, a high end AGP graphic card, a lot of harddrives or optical drives?

If you're still getting low voltages with just a graphic card, and the necessary PCI cards, a single harddrive and optical drive - then I'd be looking at changing your motherboard, seeing as you've already tried a 500w PSU.

Do as mentioned earlier, and look for bulging capacitors on your motherboard. I've seen these before, and they can cause problems in aging systems.

spud17

Either you're using a an old PSU or a very cheap one, or your motherboard is on it's way out - or you have a LOT of additional cards and drives on a weak (ie: 200w) PSU.

Agree, that's why I mentioned the voltages.
As I said in the post, I have a brand new 500w Casecom psu and an old 250w psu and both give very similar voltages.
The new psu was about £25, what I judged to be in line with the value of the whole PC.
I got it from ebuyer and it was the first of the 'budget' end of the market to have all positive, and recent reviews.
It has 2 HDs and a usb 2.0 card, graphics, audio and network are on-board.

spud17

I'll look at the capacitors tomorrow evening, but that's getting beyond my capabilities, but I know someone who can.
This is tied in with my other thread, by chance I have been given an old PC, just needs a new psu, it has a Mercury board which has DDR rather than SDRAM, and usb2.0, I can swap the processor, and it also has an XP pro sticker.
I keep all 'My Documents', music and photos on a separate partition so could swap HD install XPpro and carry on for the time being.

basmic

Bulging or faulty capacitors are dirt easy to spot.



They pretty much bulge at the top. In worse cases, they can leak.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitor_plague

spud17

Thanks basmic, I forgot to mention that I'd already used a meter on a spare molex connector, and all the voltages, with both the new and the spare psu's were +/- 0.1v of 12v or 5v.

So far I've changed HD, changed memory and changed psu, so the problem has to be the motherboard.

Thanks for the help, I now have a plan to swap, processor, psu and HD over to the admittedly carpy Mercury board.

The Mercury case has a XP pro COA, and should activate.

I can then have a proper look at the Gigabyte board and decide what to do.

spud17

I'd say in my expert opinion :rolleyes: that as far as I can see, all the capacitors are fine.

basmic

I'd put it down to the motherboard dying then - is the system with the components carried over working fine?

Gigabyte motherboards are decent, but I much prefer Asus personally.