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Help me stop getting turned off!

ArchArch Neat-o, mosquito!Registered User regular
edited September 2010 in Help / Advice Forum
No, this isn't about sex. You may all breathe a collective sigh of relief.

What this REALLY is about is such: My roommate has an HP Pavilion DV5000 notebook PC

Specs
Intel Centrino Duo (2x1.73 GHz)
1 gig RAM
80 GB hard drive
nvidia GEFORCE GO 7400

Running Vista (har har this is the problem right there har har)

Okay so the problem is thus- the computer inexplicably shuts down. It is akin to if it was, say running out of batteries or overheating but neither of those things are (I think) the problem. How do I know this?

Well I have it angled at about 45 degrees, on a cooling pad, and it is plugged in. The battery is also completely charged and the computer stays on when I unplug it.

It is just that, after a certain amount of time (no answers here- it has turned off after five minutes, twelve minutes, and forty-five minutes. I timed it) it just shuts off. Completely.

When I start it back up, I don't get a "This computer shut down incorrectly, restart in safemode?" query like you would expect if it shut down, so I suspect that, for whatever reason, the computer activates a sleep or shutdown sequence unbidden.

Virus/malware scan came up clean (running PANDA cloud antivirus, and also ran AdAware and Spybot- all negative).

Help me get this to work because there is a prize for me inside- my fiancee can borrow it indefinitely to play LOTRO with me as our roommate has another (better) laptop.

Possibly related- the touchpad "bugs out" occasionally, and just doesn't respond.

Anyway, thanks in advance!

Arch on

Posts

  • IrohIroh Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    My money is on overheating, but it might help to know if you are able to restart it immediately after it shuts down on its own. My Dell 1501 has awful heat issues and it will not restart until I let it cool down for a few.

    Iroh on
    [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
  • ArchArch Neat-o, mosquito! Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    Yeah, I can turn it back on immediately after, and it isn't hot to the touch at all. In fact, I am on this laptop right now, and it isn't warm. It did just shut down about twelve minutes ago, and when I touched it it wasn't hot.

    I admit it DOES sound like a heat problem, but I really doubt that is the case. Is there a way to check WHY it shut down?

    Arch on
  • ArchArch Neat-o, mosquito! Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    So I just downloaded and installed Everest monitoring, and at idle the laptop is running at about 50-60 degrees celsius. Additionally, about 700mb of the 1021mb of physical memory are taken up by this monitoring program and simply running firefox.

    So overheating is back on as a possible candidate, as well as the possibility that it is simply running out of physical memory and shutting down. Are either of these reasonable answers, and how can I solve the first one given that it is already elevated and on a cooling pad?

    Arch on
  • DeShadowCDeShadowC Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    Check your event viewer. Not sure where it is in vista, but in XP its in control panel -> administrative tools -> event viewer. Possibly try start > run > eventvwr

    If nothing comes up there and even if it does check your temps. I prefer NVidia's system monitor which you can get from their site.

    Now also did you state that if its plugged in this doesn't ever happen?

    DeShadowC on
  • DeShadowCDeShadowC Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    Also what components are running at what temps. Case, CPU, GPU, MOBO etc.

    DeShadowC on
  • ArchArch Neat-o, mosquito! Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    DeShadowC wrote: »
    Check your event viewer. Not sure where it is in vista, but in XP its in control panel -> administrative tools -> event viewer. Possibly try start > run > eventvwr

    If nothing comes up there and even if it does check your temps. I prefer NVidia's system monitor which you can get from their site.

    Now also did you state that if its plugged in this doesn't ever happen?

    What events am I looking for? I checked it but there were a bunch of things that, frankly, I don't understand

    Also this is the CPU running temp, I can't seem to get temps for all the others

    And yes it happens even when plugged in

    Arch on
  • DeShadowCDeShadowC Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    The main thing is to compare the events at the time stamps and see if any of them are corresponding the with computer turning off. Yeah that's hot for a CPU so follow Sark's advice in [chat].

    DeShadowC on
  • ArchArch Neat-o, mosquito! Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    Possibly related? About a bazillion error 3031 messages at a timestamp very nearly before it crashed out

    Arch on
  • DeShadowCDeShadowC Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    What's the detail of the error?

    DeShadowC on
  • SynaesthesiacSynaesthesiac Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    So...looking on Google, I find that there is little to none thermal paste installed on the CPU at the factory. Get yourself some Arctic Silver 5, open up that beast, and slather that stuff on. And by slather I mean read instructions on how to apply it properly.

    Here ya go.

    Arctic Silver instructions - http://www.arcticsilver.com/instructions.htm

    The service manual to your laptop. Shows you how to crack it open. http://h10032.www1.hp.com/ctg/Manual/c00700959.pdf

    Synaesthesiac on
  • PailryderPailryder Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    for 1 gig of ram that laptop shouldn't be running vista (or win7). everyone else has covered the heating issue quite well which is 97.2% likely the problem.

    Pailryder on
  • ArchArch Neat-o, mosquito! Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    Pailryder wrote: »
    for 1 gig of ram that laptop shouldn't be running vista (or win7). everyone else has covered the heating issue quite well which is 97.2% likely the problem.

    Yeah, I know that. It is out of my hands, and I don't know WHY vista is on there, to be honest.

    If I had access to a copy of XP it would go on there in a heartbeat, but I don't really wanna break the bank to fix this thing.

    T:Synaesthesiac thanks for the manual link, I will try cracking it open when I get home, and throwing on some thermal paste after I blow all the dust out.

    Arch on
  • ChanusChanus Harbinger of the Spicy Rooster Apocalypse The Flames of a Thousand Collapsed StarsRegistered User regular
    edited September 2010
    You might be able to toss another GB of RAM in there for fairly cheap, assuming it has a slot for it. With 1GB, you might as well be running Vista on an Atari 2500.

    Chanus on
    Allegedly a voice of reason.
  • ArchArch Neat-o, mosquito! Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    Chanus wrote: »
    You might be able to toss another GB of RAM in there for fairly cheap, assuming it has a slot for it. With 1GB, you might as well be running Vista on an Atari 2500.

    It does have the slots, and I had considered this as well

    Arch on
  • ChanusChanus Harbinger of the Spicy Rooster Apocalypse The Flames of a Thousand Collapsed StarsRegistered User regular
    edited September 2010
    Arch wrote: »
    Chanus wrote: »
    You might be able to toss another GB of RAM in there for fairly cheap, assuming it has a slot for it. With 1GB, you might as well be running Vista on an Atari 2500.

    It does have the slots, and I had considered this as well

    Yeah, I didn't see any specs online, but you can probably go on somewhere like TigerDirect or NewEgg and just look for the same chip as the one that's already in there.

    Or if you can get a higher memory chip that fits, you'd want to put that in the existing slot and move the current one to the slot that's empty right now.

    Chanus on
    Allegedly a voice of reason.
  • ArchArch Neat-o, mosquito! Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    Chanus wrote: »
    Arch wrote: »
    Chanus wrote: »
    You might be able to toss another GB of RAM in there for fairly cheap, assuming it has a slot for it. With 1GB, you might as well be running Vista on an Atari 2500.

    It does have the slots, and I had considered this as well

    Yeah, I didn't see any specs online, but you can probably go on somewhere like TigerDirect or NewEgg and just look for the same chip as the one that's already in there.

    Or if you can get a higher memory chip that fits, you'd want to put that in the existing slot and move the current one to the slot that's empty right now.

    Right now it is rocking two 512s ( I opened it up and checked)

    I feel that if I can get over the overheating problem, and increase the RAM, this computer can be pretty good.

    Arch on
  • ChanusChanus Harbinger of the Spicy Rooster Apocalypse The Flames of a Thousand Collapsed StarsRegistered User regular
    edited September 2010
    The RAM may even help with the overheating problem.

    Chanus on
    Allegedly a voice of reason.
  • ApogeeApogee Lancks In Every Game Ever Registered User regular
    edited September 2010
    Yeah, 1 GB of ram on Vista is a sin. It will run twice as fast with 2 GB or more. My money is on heat as well, or possibly a shoddy power supply if it still crashes out after cleaning/heatsink re-fitting.

    Apogee on
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