Certainly sounds like it could be the power supply. You may want to
invest the $30 or so to find out. If the system just shuts down by
itself, it may be due to the processor overheating. How is the air
ciruclation there? Also, something else you may want to look at last is
upgrading the BIOS. First, you may want to check just general
connections: Is your RAM seeded properly? Are power cables on your
hard drives pushed in all the way? Those are the kind of things that I
would look at. You know what? I recall having a similar situation with
one of the systems I fixed after I added new RAM. Try changing the slot
that your RAM is in (if possible) or take one of the pieces out. I
found it to be a faulty memory socket on the motherboard. Anyway, lots
of suggestions... Try the least expensive and least risky first (i.e.
don't do the BIOS first).

- Con-cert-o

"mr x" wrote in
:

Old PC Occasionally Won't Start, Doesn't Power Down all the time
--------------------------------------------------------------------

I have several computers, but I am having a problem with an old
computer I keep around for testing/experimenting purposes (trying out
new OS's, and generally tinkering with).

This computer is an old gateway g6-300, Pentium II 300, 128MB ram, 8.4
maxtor hdd

A couple of weeks ago I hit the power button and nothing happened. I
hit it again and again. nothing. I was getting ready to leave to do
some errands and didn't have time to fool with it, so I left it for
the time being.

A day or two later I went to start it and it started no problem. It
currently has win98se with most of the MS win98 updates installed. I
also noticed if I choose "restart" for the shut down menu, it acts
like it's going to shut down, you see the win 98 "your computer is
shutting down." screen, the screen goes black, but the computer
doesn't shut down (lights are still on and I hear the fans going).

However if I choose "shut down" from the shut down menu, it does
actually power down all the way.

Last night it also did a strange thing where after I pressed the power
button, it began to power up and then shut itself off after about 4-6
seconds. I hit the power button again and it did the same thing. Again
and it did it a third time. I un plugged in and plugged it back in and
hit the power button again and suddenly it powered on normally.

I am guessing perhaps the power supply is starting to go, and I am
wondering if anyone out there has experienced a total or partial power
supply failure. I have never actually had a power supply go on me
before. Does this sound like what might be happening? I don't have
another power supply lying around to swap out and see if it makes a
difference. I also don't have a multimeter or any equipment to test
the power supply on hand ( I guess I know what I may need to get if I
really want to get to the bottom of this).

Thoughts?

-- A