Eeek! My Pc keeps falling asleep!?!

bex88

Hi all

I have a pretty old Acer aspire m7200 pc. Today my step dad switched off the electric to sort some sockets out in the house and my pc was on (in sleep mode). This evening I've powered it back on, but now it's randomly going into sleep mode, sometimes I can even get it out of sleep and it will instantly go back into sleep again. And just now I've rebooted it and it was going into sleep mode whilst booting!

Any ideas? I might try see if I can get to go back to a restore point.

Edit: Its doing system restore right now, so far it's staying awake. Fingers crossed.

Edit2: Its still in system restore (started it around 1am, it's now almost 3..), been on "system restore is restoring the registry" for aaages. I'm gonna just go bad and leave it and see what it's doing in the morning. Main thing us its still awake haha.

EveryWhere

What OS are you running?

that

bex88, the easiest way (if you are a techie) us to boot off usb that has a live version of linux mint or Manjaro on it, and if it still happens running this then you know it is the laptop, rather than windows.

if it is windows, the often power & sleep (win 10) is the main culprit

arciere

that wrote: »

bex88, the easiest way (if you are a techie) us to boot off usb that has a live version of linux mint or Manjaro on it, and if it still happens running this then you know it is the laptop, rather than windows.

if it is windows, the often power & sleep (win 10) is the main culprit

It's a desktop computer, if I am not mistaken.

It would be very helpful if you could check the event log (Event Viewer) to see what initiates the sleep mode.

If it was a laptop, and it went into sleep mode while you were using it (for example), it was possible that the magnet that senses when the lid is closed got damaged or misplaced, but since it's a desktop computer, there are no sensors.

So it could either be: A) a program that initiates the sleep mode (and you should be able to find the culprit in the event log); a faulty/stuck power button or a stuck function key on the keyboard.

bex88

Hi again all, well the system restore didn't work, just got stuck at the same bit for near 3 hours so just turned it off and back on. It loaded up and said system restore had failed but nothing was effected. The pc then worked fine all yesterday. Today I've gone back on it (woke it up from sleep just now) and it was doing it again. Couldn't even get to log in, as soon as i woke it up again and I saw the login screen it would sleep again.

I held power button to turn it off. It started back up, did it again in middle of booting up and now I've managed to log on and it's ok at the min. I'll have a look at how to do the event log thing.

Oh and yep it's a desktop, used to be Vista but updated it to 10 last year as many programs were not being supported on vista anymore and some wouldn't update.

Edit: Ok well I have the event viewer up but I have no idea what I'm looking at on it XD

Edit2: So I've looked it up and found I'm looking for Event ID 42. Kernel - Power. I've had a look and the most say:

"The system is entering sleep.
Sleep Reason: Button or Lid"

and the odd couple say:

"The system is entering sleep.
Sleep Reason: Application API"

psychic_teabag

Does windows still have a safe mode ? I'd probably try booting into that to see if the same symptom appears. If it stops, that might point to misbehaviour of some loaded code. If it persists, might be something more fundamental.

Though clearly since it's an intermittent problem, it would hard to be sure.

grumpycrab

Safe mode :- https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/12376/windows-10-start-your-pc-in-safe-mode
I'd probably not mess around and do an inplace repair/upgrade with 1803 from media (keeeping data AND apps). Could be a dodgy desktop power supply (although if it was ok before the accidental switch off should be ok now).

that

go to and adminstrative dos prompt, in there type
powercfg -a
... and what do you get?

bex88

Just got back from work. Trying to get on to PC again and it's turning on and off (sleep) constantly. Struggling to even log in. If I can I will try get to do the power-cfg thing. Will try boot into safe mode also.

Edit: Still Really struggling to stay logged on. Just keeps turning off (sleeping) I don't know what to do. I've tried unplugged power lead for 30 secs and putting it back in. Unplugged graphics card cable, back in. Sometimes it's even turning itself on without me even moving the mouse or pressing the button or keyboard. It's just gone crazy.

Not even bring up the login pin bit now. When i click the background just make a bbbblling sound then turns off again.

I can make it go into the setup on boot and it's absolutely fine in that but as soon as it goes to load up windows it plays up.

that

bex88 wrote: »

Just got back from work. Trying to get on to PC again and it's turning on and off (sleep) constantly. Struggling to even log in. If I can I will try get to do the power-cfg thing. Will try boot into safe mode also.

Some one has to ask the stupid question... How do you know it is sleep and not just switching off, or loosing power? I could be a power supply too?

your model is a aspire m7200, not Aspire M7720?

bex88

that wrote: »

Some one has to ask the stupid question... How do you know it is sleep and not just switching off, or loosing power? I could be a power supply too?

your model is a aspire m7200, not Aspire M7720?

Well I'm assuming it's sleep, as it does the exact same thing as when I click to put it into sleep. Fan speeds up a sec then it all stops and screen goes off. Then any mouse movement or keyboard touch or press of power button brings it back on again.

Yep it's the M7200.
It has AMD Phenom II X4 Quad processor.
ATI Radeon HD4850
4GB DDR2
The Power supply was replaced roughly 6-7 years ago when the original one stopped working. It has a Power X3 Pro edition in it now.

Strangely, perhaps a coincidence, ive unplugged the the external hdd that's connect via usb and this time I'm logged in and stayed on at the mo... hmm

Here's what it says in the cmd for powercfg -a

"The following sleep states are available on this system:
Standby (S3)
Hibernate
Hybrid Sleep
Fast Startup

The following sleep states are not available on this system:
Standby (S1)
The system firmware does not support this standby state.

Standby (S2)
The system firmware does not support this standby state.

Standby (S0 Low Power Idle)
The system firmware does not support this standby state."