Help! Hardware blinks in and out in Device Manager

[CK]

Hi! I have a problem where it seems like my hardware blinks in and out in
device mgr. everything under my computer name blinks on and off and I get
that kerplunk! sound like hardware is loading and unloading.

I have an Asus P4PE motherboard and running Windows XP SP3 also had same
problem with SP2. At first I thought it was one of my USB devices but I
tried unplugging and plugging devices back in and still had the problem. Now
I'm wondering if there is a problem with my motherboard. It seems to be
intermittent sometimes I get that kerplunk sound 10 or 15 times in a row and
at other times it can be quiet for half an hour or just get one kerplunk.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

CK

 

[Alec S.]

CK wrote (in

Hi! I have a problem where it seems like my hardware blinks in and out in
device mgr. everything under my computer name blinks on and off and I get
that kerplunk! sound like hardware is loading and unloading.

Do you know which devices went missing/showed up? Select the computer and press
the * key on the numpad to expand everything. You can also try doing a screen
cap before and after to compare. You can also try something like Nirsoft’s
System Exporter (http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/sysexp.html) to capture the whole
tree as text before and after to compare (much easier than comparing graphics).

Also try setting the Device Manager view to “Devices by Connection”. It displays
the tree from a different perspective which is sometimes more helpful.

 

[CK]

Thanks for your response, the computers been behaving it self for a while
now, but it started to act up again this morning I opened device manager as
you suggested and when it blinks in and out the whole tree everything blinks
in and out and it happens instantly. It blinks out with kerplunk sound and
instantly blinks in again with the sound like installing again.

 

[Alec S.]

CK wrote (in

Thanks for your response, the computers been behaving it self for a while
now, but it started to act up again this morning I opened device manager as
you suggested and when it blinks in and out the whole tree everything blinks
in and out and it happens instantly. It blinks out with kerplunk sound and
instantly blinks in again with the sound like installing again.

Try removing as many peripherals as you can, one at a time. You said that you
tried removing devices and plugging them back in, but you should try removing
them period. If you remove something and it stops, then that is your culprit:
either the device or its port has a problem of some sort. If not, then remove
another one. (Alternately you could remove everything and add them back one at a
time.)