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Head-Scratcher
Golly this group has gone quiet lately. This has always been my go-to
place for help with my computers, but now...Paul, are you still here? About three years ago I built a desktop machine around an old Asus P5Q Pro Turbo MBO I had lying around and donated it to a local nonprofit. I set it up with Win10 and two accounts -- an administrator account I use as a volunteer to reproduce their CDs and DVDs and to print their photos on a large-format printer, and a guest account anybody can use when I'm not around, which is most of the time. I think it's seldom used that way, but who knows? I'm not around most of the time. The computer has been working fine since 2015, but the other day I was hoping to burn some CDs on it and the computer's power kept cutting out. I couldn't get it to power up at all at first, so I fiddled with the power button and the power cord and power supply switch and plugged and unplugged and suddenly it started. And as Win10 was loading, the power cut off. Then back on, then off...so I brought the thing home to work on it. At first it powered right up, then the power cut off. And then I noticed the case power button was sitting cockeyed...aha! So I fiddled with it for a minute and the power came on and voila! Problem solved. Or so I thought...because the weirdnesses continued. As long as I had the thing at home I figured I ought to go ahead and update the OS to the latest version as Win10 kept nagging me to do, so off to the races I went, only to be told after an inordinately long (I thought) download and update process, Win10 reverted to its older version with an apology that the update had failed. So I tried again and after a few hours I got the same Windows apology. Just for the heck of it, I ran a Memcheck test and found no problems on 32 gigabytes of RAM. All right, but before I tried anything else I figured I'd better back up what I had. Since I would be backing up a C: drive, I plugged a spare SATA drive onto the MBO (to hold the backup) and booted from my Acronis True Image 2014 boot disk. Didn't boot Windows--booted from CD and so far, so good. But after setting up the backup parameters and starting the backup process, just as files began copying -- snap, the computer power went off. Dead. Just like that. But the case power button turned things back on and I tried again and at exactly the same point in the backup process...snap, the power went off again. It was a sudden total shutdown with no warning. So...desperate for a backup now, I booted into Win10 and just copied all my important files onto that backup drive, and with them safely stored away I re-installed Win10 on the computer. It was a fresh install on the original hard drive, with the old partitions deleted -- nothing left over on the hard drive. And Win10 (ver. 1709) installed in a breeze and I copied all my important files back onto it and I began installing all the programs I needed and they installed without a hitch and things were going great last night when I shut it all down to go to bed and pick up this morning where I left off. Just a few more programs to get right, and I can take this thing back to the nonprofit. And then this morning when I booted the computer by pressing the spacebar (I did NOT touch that power button) the power came on for at most a second and a half, then went off. And as I stood there looking at it, the power came on again, then off. And again and again and again...this wasn't going to stop. Just cycling on/off/on/off. So I pushed the power button and held it in and soon the cycling stopped with power off. Then I pushed the button again and the power came on and the cycling started again. Pushed the button...power went off. Pushed the button, power came on and stayed on. And it has remained on with no problems at all for about the past hour. So what's the problem? Can't be Win10 as the power cycling is taking place well before the computer even posts. Case power button? I no longer think so, as it was untouched after shutdown last night and power up this morning. I used the Asus boot with spacebar feature in BIOS...not that button. Motherboard? Possibly. Loose cable? Possibly, though I've checked connections throughout the system. Power supply? Probably, I guess, though that computer is running steadily over there right now with no apparent issues at all. I suppose I'll try to track down a power supply in town today, though things like that are getting harder to find locally these days. I may have to use Newegg or Amazon. But I'd hate to buy a new power supply only to learn it was something else. Ideas? Ever experienced anything like this yourself? -- Bill Anderson I am the Mighty Favog |
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