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[NightStalkerKiji]

I don't know if this is a hardware of soft ware problem.

Know a few days ago i talked to Pop about my computer acting up, every time i would turn it on it would work for 15 minutes then shut off, when it restarted by itself, it worked fine.

Now today i was on doing my monthly virus scan and the computer went off, i thought it to be the problem, But pop told me how to fix it so i did what he said and it hadn't given me the problem since then.

So i restart it, and re start up to virus scan, Around the same place again it did the same thing.

I started to get scared that due to this recent problem if it would burn out or break any of my hardware in the computer.

The i did not run the virus scan the 3rd time and now its working fine.




And for the record its start up is rly slow now. IDK why.

[AMDinside]

Sounds like you may have a virus.  There are viruses that can sense when a scan is being run and will do something to stop it.  Have you tried running the virus scan in safe mode?

[Popsikle]

Sounds like you may have a virus.  There are viruses that can sense when a scan is being run and will do something to stop it.  Have you tried running the virus scan in safe mode?

Yea, try this.  I only had you disable error reporting to speed up your startup times.  Reboot your computer in safe mode by holding F8 right before windows loads.  Run the virus scan from safe mode, see if it does the same thing.

It may also just be a bad sector on the disk.

[Detonator]

it honestly sounds like a bad sector on your hdd. if possible try to replace your hdd w/ new one, or if you'd wanna run a test to make sure its just that, you have 2 options. you can either run chkdsk in recovery console using your windows xp disk (this would be 1 of the many ways to check for bad sectors) OR you can swap the hdd w/ another hdd that runs windows to see if it would crash(remember when doing this, i'd recommend having the same drivers settings).

[NightStalkerKiji]

Ok some days it does it, and other days it doesn't.

I just don't want it to break my hardware.

[Musicgamer20]

Like they have said before just run a sector check on your hd or try a diffrent hd. that will not screw any hardware up.

[Flippy10x]

I seriously doubt that a bad sector on the HD will cause a shutdown.
It'll cause corruption, random programs to stop working, but a power loss? Don't think so.
And not only that, but don't hard drives have built in tolerance for failing sectors? If you get too many you get a S.M.A.R.T failure error usually.

Could honestly be a hardware issue if it's happening intermittently. Then again, it could also be a virus. Hmmm... Do the Safe Mode scan. If that comes up empty, it could be a thermal shutdown? I had that problem too, that sometimes my computer would run flawlessly, and other times it would just destroy itself. Ended up being a crappy thermal connection with the heat sink and the processor.

[doczor]

I seriously doubt that a bad sector on the HD will cause a shutdown.
It'll cause corruption, random programs to stop working, but a power loss? Don't think so.
And not only that, but don't hard drives have built in tolerance for failing sectors? If you get too many you get a S.M.A.R.T failure error usually.

Could honestly be a hardware issue if it's happening intermittently. Then again, it could also be a virus. Hmmm... Do the Safe Mode scan. If that comes up empty, it could be a thermal shutdown? I had that problem too, that sometimes my computer would run flawlessly, and other times it would just destroy itself. Ended up being a crappy thermal connection with the heat sink and the processor.

I agree with flip here. Safe mode virus scan as all the above have said.

Now when it shuts down are the cpu or gpu under any load? For that matter what are you doing most frequently when it shuts down? Virus scans? I haven't ran a virus scan on my laptop in ages and I use avast so im not sure about this but is your antivirus system intensive?

[PsiFire]

I'm willing to bet you that you are running into a COP shutdown.

A lot of new motherboards have CPU Overheat Protection (COP) or something similar. It will shutdown your PC when the CPU gets too hot to protect the die from damage. I had this problem all the time with my parent's machines. Check your CPU fan and coolers. Reseat the heatsink and make sure the grease isn't dried out (can happen with cheapie grease - get yourself some arctic silver). Also, if you have onboard monitoring, keep an eye on your temperatures. When it shuts down, restart right away and check your BIOS for the temperatures on the CPU. Anything more than high 30s (Celsius) and you have problems.

Also, are the shuts downs accompanied by a BSOD that flashes on screen for a few seconds then the machine reboots? If so, turn off your automatic reboot on error in your system setup and write down the information from the BSOD to get a better idea of the problem.

[Flippy10x]

I second Psi on all that. 

Also, it might be easier to just check the event log after the BSOD. It should give you detailed info on the error that occurred minutes beforehand. Or well, I'm pretty sure, but I could be wrong. I can't remember if BSODs come up in Event Log or if it's somewhere else.