PC Randomly Just Powers Down

[HTM~Bluesman]

The other thing I'll mention is that I did have an issue a while back with the Gigabyte board I had in one of my rigs. Apparently the solder joints were failing slowly due to heat cycling and my USB ports crapped out, then my on board sound. Of course all that happened after the warranty ran out. Then it just stopped booting. I read about a lot of folks that had the same issue with that board and Gigabyte did nothing to stand behind them. I replaced it with an ASROCK board, and problem solved.

[HTM|Minion]

Good points everyone. I thought for a minute about the CMOS battery, but then forgot about it again as seems to be a trend lately with me. I'll pop it out tonight and grab a new one tomorrow.

I've always had good luck with Gigabyte in the past, but things change. It very well could be the solder joints on my board causing this as well. I suppose I'll try a CMOS battery first and go from there. This PC has been steady as a rock for years with absolutely no issues, I find it weird that it just decided to crap out all at once.

If the battery doesn't fix it I'll grab a motherboard and try that.

And Foo... the HP software was a good find, but that's been on there for years with no issues. I know it wasn't a MS update because they don't do those for my old ass operating system anymore.

[cUnNiNg_StUnTs]

That's hard to troubleshoot. Does your motherboard require the additional ATX12V power connector be plugged in? Usually this is very near to the CPU on the circuit board.

[HTM|Minion]

Hi Cunning, no I do not have this connector, thanks for helping though. So last night I pulled the CMOS battery and tested it. It showed 3.2 vDC which is also what the new battery I had produced. I replaced it with the new battery anyway and still had the same issue.

Next I restored the BIOS per Blue's instruction. It worked, and said my primary bios was corrupt. It took me a while to remember how to configure my raid set up again as I haven't seen this bios screen in years. I did get it set up and it seemed good to go. I jumped in the server, played a couple maps with no issue, except a little laggy due to one of my memory modules still being removed.

I then left the server, shut down the box and installed the remaining memory module. Remounted the power supply and restarted. It ran for about an hour then shut down and restarted on its own.

I guess it's Mobo time....

[HTM~Bluesman]

Syd...I think your MOBO does have the 12V connector that Cunning was referring to. It's the 8 pin connector just to the right of the "Ultra Durable" label in the picture you posted. If you don't have anything plugged into that connector the CPU will be starved for power. That connector mainly provides power for the CPU..

[HTM|Minion]

Doh, roger that. I remember that connector now during the PS replacement. I'm almost certain it's connected. I also just realized this board has onboard video. I may pull my card and see if that makes a difference tonight.

[cUnNiNg_StUnTs]

I think it's strange that we all 3 had a similar problem all with Gigabyte motherboards. Mine is a Z97-HD3 Ultradurable or whatever.

[HTM|Minion]

So here's where the adventure is at the moment. I ordered a new main board and ram. I disassembled my PC and unboxed the main board only to find I didn't like it for a couple reasons. So I then reassembled my PC with the old main board. Did a few driver updates and it's been running for 30 minutes solid. If this actually fixes it I'm pulling the rest of my hair out.

I'm sure it will not make it through the night, but that's my goal. The only thing I did besides of course re-seating my video and sound card was to re-paste the CPU. Oh.. and the diver updates... time will tell.

[HTM~Bluesman]

We'll cross our fingers! Hopefully it was something loose that got fixed when you re-seated everything.

[HTM~Cousin_Itt]

2 times a year a take apart my PC for cleaning and re-paste the CPU every 2 years. Between the dust and the dogs/cats its kept my pc's running pretty good. Since I just bought a Gigabyte MB x570 Aorus, y'all got me a bit worried. Been using ASUS for so long I think it may have spoiled me with its reliability.

[HTM~Bluesman]

You probably change the air in your tires once a year too.

[HTM~Cousin_Itt]

Doesn't everyone?

[HTM~olde_tymer]

We don't have that problem down here, Blues, but, up north, don't y'all have to put winter air in your tires when it gets cold, and summer air when it gets warm?

[HTM|Minion]

Well folk, she didn't pull through. It bought the ranch during the night and now will not even start up with all unneeded peripherals disconnected. It has to be the board. Looks like it's time for a new box as this one is so outdated there is little compatible hardware out there.

She is moving to my garage where she will wait for a used GA-Z87X main board transplant so I can pull my data off the raid array.
87X-D
Will keep you updated.... Something may or may not be arriving at the house on Friday.

[HTM~BullyBob]

Minion I still have the Dell XPS you can have along with a pair of Logitech 935 headsets or the Pro headset...for FREE. You just need to move next door so we won't have to carry it very far. But truthfully you may want a much stronger hardware than this is. Core i5 less than $1000 may be too cheap for you. The specs are listed in another post and I can't remember where now...I'll look.

And I have a new Wolf keyboard with a gazillion keys on it (like Zen used) I'll throw in.

Found the specs:

I think the second HD I installed is :
1.0 TB Seagate
SSHD 3.5, SATA 6 G/s
7200 RPM Hybrid Drive w/8 GB Flash

This PC is at least three years old.

Specs:
DELL XPS 8910 (Silver)
Intel Core i5-6400 Processor
8GB Memory
1TB Hard Drive
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 + 8GB Memory
Windows 10
DVD-RW
Media Card Reader
HDMI & USB 3.1
Waves MaxxAudio
Dell Keyboard and Laser Mouse