Hi guys, a computing.net newbie here. I have recently started having problems with my system and I am fairly sure it is a hardware fault. At random intervals the system shuts down as though it has been told to power off but I cannot restart without taking down the mains power for a few seconds although there is still power from the PSU as I have a wireless keyboard and the active light on the receiver stays on. Have tried disconnecting and reconnecting the PSU connectors to the MB but that hasn't cured it. Someone suggested it might be a memory problem so ran Memcheck98+ today and that was fine . . until the system exhibited the fault and powered down. Any suggestions would be much appeciated. regards, Scubaguy

First suspect would be overheating; the CPU gets to a certain temp and shuts down to protect the CPU from meltdown. This temperature is usually set in the BIOS under PC HEALTH. Remove the side cover and clean the unit thoroughly: look for dust inside the CPU heatsink fins, on the different fan blades, and the rear air exhaust fans and ports. Also, important, make double-dog sure that all fans are spinning up to RPM; may be that one fan has quit on you. Also check your video card if you have one, that the small fan on the card's heatsink is working (if you have a fan on your vid.card). Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime; Then industry pollutes the water and kills all the fish.

How is power management configured in Control Panel?

Also try swapping out the keyboard - don't know why but I've come across a couple of instances of faulty keyboards causing log-offs & shut-downs. "I know that I'm mad, I've always been mad"

Thanks for the suggestions so far guys - lots to think about. The CPU is running at 46°C and the case it at 38°C and both are fairly stable at that and the cpu fan is running about 3700 rpm. The vid is onboard so no added fan - although I might consider a case fan to help a little. However, there seems to be no specific action to cause the 'shutdown', it can just be sitting there doing nothing and occur. Power management is just set as the default for the system, I have never adjusted any of the settings and the system has been running fine for 10 months since new, just starting to go wrong in the last week. Will consider going back to the wired keyboard as a later option if I can't track something down to inside the case. However, the wireless keyboard is only a few months old, not even as old as the rest of the system and it appear to be working fine. Will try a clean out over the weekend to see if it is dust and reseat all my memory etc BTW, the motherboard is a PC CHIPS M863G. Thanks Scubaguy

Just a note to tell you all what the problem was - a power supply fault. I had it out this week and resoldered all the joints on the circuit board and it hasn't fallen over since! Cheers for the help. Scubaguy