Idling problem

Hi guys, I seem to have a problem and could do with some assistance in tracking it down.

Everytime my computer is left idle for a period of time >30mins it seems to die. Doesnt reset itself, but the screen hangs and then the monitor goes into standby (no signal?). Wierd thing is, when I'm using it it's 100% stable.
Running at stock speeds all day, mixture of games/music/encoding & prime 95 and it doesnt even flinch. I leave for work this morning and before 10 its down. Same thing if I leave it on overnight.

After powering up the machine again, windows tells me it's recovered from a serious error and this may have been caused by a device failure. Here are the specs:

IS7-E
P4 3.0C
2*256 Twinmos PC3200
1* Maxtor SATA Diamondplus9 (200gb)
1* IBM 120GXP (120gb)
1* IBM 180GXP (120gb)
Radeon 9700non-pro
Antec 550w Truepower
LG CDRW

I, personally think it's a fault hardware related (gut feeling). But not sure which device, as its only happening when the system is idle, under stress its fine.

Does this sound familiar to anyone at all? 1 thing which possible could be causing it, is that the chip doesnt seem to idle properly (IMO) temperature wise.

Ambient is about 25°C. Case temp 30-35°C
CPU idle is 45/46°C, full load (P95) is 51°C...this is with a Thermalright SP94 & 92mm fan. Case temps and airflow is a little poor due to my current case situ, but the difference in temps idle:load doesnt add up in my eyes, yet in the BOIS/Windows ACPI etc check out ok.


Any assistance much appreciated :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Discotheque

Hi guys, I seem to have a problem and could do with some assistance in tracking it down.

Everytime my computer is left idle for a period of time >30mins it seems to die. Doesnt reset itself, but the screen hangs and then the monitor goes into standby (no signal?). Wierd thing is, when I'm using it it's 100% stable.
Running at stock speeds all day, mixture of games/music/encoding & prime 95 and it doesnt even flinch. I leave for work this morning and before 10 its down. Same thing if I leave it on overnight.

After powering up the machine again, windows tells me it's recovered from a serious error and this may have been caused by a device failure. Here are the specs:

IS7-E
P4 3.0C
2*256 Twinmos PC3200
1* Maxtor SATA Diamondplus9 (200gb)
1* IBM 120GXP (120gb)
1* IBM 180GXP (120gb)
Radeon 9700non-pro
Antec 550w Truepower
LG CDRW

I, personally think it's a fault hardware related (gut feeling). But not sure which device, as its only happening when the system is idle, under stress its fine.

Does this sound familiar to anyone at all? 1 thing which possible could be causing it, is that the chip doesnt seem to idle properly (IMO) temperature wise.

Ambient is about 25°C. Case temp 30-35°C
CPU idle is 45/46°C, full load (P95) is 51°C...this is with a Thermalright SP94 & 92mm fan. Case temps and airflow is a little poor due to my current case situ, but the difference in temps idle:load doesnt add up in my eyes, yet in the BOIS/Windows ACPI etc check out ok.

Any assistance much appreciated :)

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I suffered this exact same problem a couple of years ago on an old Abit Athlon (non-DDR VIA chipset) board - the situation almost faded away when I upgraded to a 550 Enermax PSU ... however, it still did it periodically.

Some differences in the system when it's idling are:

Hardware
Vcore (+ chipset) may be different (usually higher) than when the system is under load

Software
Screen Saver may attempt to kick-in
Power saving options may cause problems

Can't think of anything else off hand, but have you also tried running it in safe mode and leaving it idle - does this also produce the same result?

I would also suggest taking a look at the power saving options. I used to have a setup that died whenever going to suspend/sleep mode (whatever it's called) due to the PSU not being able to cope with it (although your PSU shouldn't have any problems!). It could be worth a try disabling them.

I'll give it a go, but all power saving options AFAIK are off, except to turn the monitor off after 30mins.

What about the idle:load on the cpu, sound about right?

The CPU temps seems to be OK, but then I only know Athlon temps and they can get pretty high. The case temp seems a little excessive though... Do you have any case fans?

:edit: Ignore that, it can't be due to system temp as you're problems are when idling. Everyone knows that when a machine idle's it gets cooler! ;)

Do you have a screensaver running? It's gotta be to do with the power saving options... at least that's the only thing I can think of right now!

Nope, I'll disable all the options though and try a full format if that dont work

If you do get to the stage where you are start swapping hardware I would change the PSU first. Maybe you can borrow a spare off a friend?

I'm sure I can sort something out.
Voltages are 5v 4.98, 3.3v 3.31, 12v 11.8

Taken from the bios, tend to fluctuate a little under load however