system reboots by itself

[Jeff Wernicke]

What does Windows Vista Home Premium 64 bit o.s. do when I am not actively
using the computer? The hard drive stays active for at least about a good
10-15 minutes after booting. My machine has been rebooting all by itself
and when it restarts it doesn't boot up because the hard drive boot priority
changes in the BIOS all by itself. It only reboots when I'm not doing
anything on the system. The only background tasks running when it reboots
is antivirus and the usual Vista services. Every time when I'm using the
computer, playing the latest games, performing video editing and conversion,
watching DVD's, etc, the computer works fine and this is using it for a good
6-8 hours straight of pretty steady use.

I have 4 GB. of DDR2 RAM
Intel Quad Core Q6600
EVGA 8800 GTX
EVGA 680i based motherboard.

I don't suspect the power supply to be defective because the computer never
resets itself when I'm actually using the computer even when using demanding
applications. It only resets as mentioned above. I have this problem when
running the machine under default BIOS settings and when over clocking it.
My machine is stable when over clocking except as mentioned above. I
suspect that whatever Vista does when I'm not actively using the computer,
it runs into some corrupt file(s) which causes the system to reboot? Based
on what I have described, any theories out there? I would hate to reinstall
everything from scratch. I can not perform a repair install as I have the
OEM version of Vista and I have SP1 installed and have chosen to remove the
uninstall files for SP1.

 

[Adam Albright]

What does Windows Vista Home Premium 64 bit o.s. do when I am not actively
using the computer? The hard drive stays active for at least about a good
10-15 minutes after booting. My machine has been rebooting all by itself
and when it restarts it doesn't boot up because the hard drive boot priority
changes in the BIOS all by itself. It only reboots when I'm not doing
anything on the system. The only background tasks running when it reboots
is antivirus and the usual Vista services. Every time when I'm using the
computer, playing the latest games, performing video editing and conversion,
watching DVD's, etc, the computer works fine and this is using it for a good
6-8 hours straight of pretty steady use.

I have 4 GB. of DDR2 RAM
Intel Quad Core Q6600
EVGA 8800 GTX
EVGA 680i based motherboard.

I don't suspect the power supply to be defective because the computer never
resets itself when I'm actually using the computer even when using demanding
applications. It only resets as mentioned above. I have this problem when
running the machine under default BIOS settings and when over clocking it.
My machine is stable when over clocking except as mentioned above. I
suspect that whatever Vista does when I'm not actively using the computer,
it runs into some corrupt file(s) which causes the system to reboot? Based
on what I have described, any theories out there? I would hate to reinstall
everything from scratch. I can not perform a repair install as I have the
OEM version of Vista and I have SP1 installed and have chosen to remove the
uninstall files for SP1.

Auto rebooting if Vista encounters a problem according to Microsoft is
suppose to be a "feature". While the default mode, you can change it
so it halts and hopefully at least you'll be able to read any BSOD or
other message.

Have you looked in the Event Logs to get a clue? Access can be had
from Control Panel. These now provide a wealth of information not
offered in prior Windows versions.

To prevent Vista from rebooting on it's own when something goes wrong:

Click on the start Orb, then right click on computer, then properties.
Now click on advanced system settings in the left pane, from the
advanced tab you'll see way at the bottom, click Startup and Recovery
then Settings, then finally uncheck automatic restart under System
Failure.

I have no idea why they make it so hard to get to. ;-)

 

[Mark L. Ferguson]

You have some good tools in Vista to help you identify those 'restart on
error' problems. Click Start, and type:
perfmon /rel
Click the latest 'red x' in the output, and note the errors and especially
the filename of the driver or other file causing the error. Right clicking
that file for Properties will show you who made the file, and give you help
in identifying this restart cause.
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Mark L. Ferguson
..