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Unwanted Reboot

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I have a NT Workstation that decides it wants to reboot whenever it wants to, whether a user is working on it or not. Norton Antivirus Corporate Edition is running on this machine, and no viruses have been identified. Also it is up to date with security updates. Does anyone have an idea what could be making this workstation reboot by itself?

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Unwanted Reboot

In reply to Unwanted Reboot

The processor could be overheating. Check the processor fan to make sure it’s working properly. Even if it appears okay, blow it clean with one of those nifty cans of air. You could replace it for around ten bucks.

Also check the power supply fanto make sure it’s working as well.

Actually, the power supply itself could be the problem. I’ve seen this kind of rebooting symptom because of a bad power supply. This could be replaced for around $30-$50.

Unwanted Reboot

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Thank you. I checked all the fans and they are all working. However I did blow all the dust out of the machine. Maybe that will help.

Unwanted Reboot

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what’s in event viewer?

Unwanted Reboot

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Unwanted Reboot

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Check your event log for entries at the time of reboot. Problems could be memory related or as mentioned before a faulty powersupply. Check memory with e.g. a tool like : Docmemory. This can be downloaded from :

http://tinyurl.com/b2x1

Unwanted Reboot

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Poster rated this answer

Unwanted Reboot

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I agree it’s likely to be hardware, but the hardware may not be bad – it may be seated poorly. Take it apart, blow it clean, put it back together. I spent months fretting over a personal PC I had with the same symptom – random reboots.

It turned out to be reseating the processor.

Unwanted Reboot

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So far this is the best suggestion. I have reseated everything, and blown all the dust out of it. It has only rebooted once since then.
Thank you…

Unwanted Reboot

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Another possible cause could be STOP errors if the machine is set to automatically reboot when a STOP error occurs. If you have the latest service packs installed, you should see a message in the System event log at the time of the reboot showing that a STOP error occurred and giving you the basic info on the cause of the error. If you’re not getting this message, right click on My Computer, go to Properties and change the startup/shutdown properties to NOT reboot automatically when a STOP error occurs. That way, you’ll see the blue screen and can troubleshoot from there. Hope this helps!

Unwanted Reboot

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Unwanted Reboot

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What was the last software installed on your system before the problem started? Uninstall that software and check to see if the problem remains…

NT 4.0 is notorious for rebooting when you have a process that doesn’t run…

Unwanted Reboot

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Unwanted Reboot

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