MichaelM Posted December 17, 2004 Share Posted December 17, 2004 I'm looking for any ideas on what would cause my laptop to shutdown at various times out of the blue. This started earlier this week and continues every now and then. While all processing stops, the latop doesn't fully shutdown as I have to hold the power button down to fully shutdown then power on again. I have never had a virus on this machine and have recently run scans to make sure. Any ideas? Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jbooma Posted December 17, 2004 Share Posted December 17, 2004 Originally posted by MichaelM I'm looking for any ideas on what would cause my laptop to shutdown at various times out of the blue. This started earlier this week and continues every now and then. While all processing stops, the latop doesn't fully shutdown as I have to hold the power button down to fully shutdown then power on again. I have never had a virus on this machine and have recently run scans to make sure. Any ideas? Thanks. Have you installed anything recently? Could be a power issues but then it would shutdown comepletely. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevenaa Posted December 17, 2004 Share Posted December 17, 2004 What Operating System are you running. When it locks up, does the numlock key work? Usually hangs like this are hardware related. Let me know the OS and I'll give you some suggestions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SonnyRules Posted December 17, 2004 Share Posted December 17, 2004 I've had a similar problem. It ended up being the input plug for the power became intermitent. Resoldered and all is fine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichaelM Posted December 17, 2004 Author Share Posted December 17, 2004 Originally posted by stevenaa What Operating System are you running. When it locks up, does the numlock key work? Usually hangs like this are hardware related. Let me know the OS and I'll give you some suggestions. My OS is XP Pro. The keyboard does not work at all when it happens. The one thing that makes me think it is something power related is that the battery light comes on after this happens even though it may or may not be plugged in, but it has happened when on battery power only. So far it is just very aggrivating, but when I lose something I am working on, I will be ticked off. The first time it happened, I had recently installed Thunderbird to give it a try instead of Outlook. I was importing all of my folders and it shutdown. I uninstalled Thuderbird, ran a virus scan, but it shut down again. I went in under the safe mode and the same thing happened. I started up again and it worked fine. It seems to do it about three times in a row then work fine the rest of the day. Thanks for the help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kilmer17 Posted December 17, 2004 Share Posted December 17, 2004 Years ago we would have thought your computer was possessed by an evil being, but now we know that this is caused by a frog or perhaps a small gnome living in it's belly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Art Posted December 17, 2004 Share Posted December 17, 2004 It sounds to me like you're simply entering suspend mode. Right click anywhere on the open space of your desktop. Go to properties and left click. Left click the screen saver tab. Then go down to the button that says "Power". Left click that button. See if your system is set to enter standby after a period of time or set to hibernate which is another tab. My guess is that's all you're seeing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Destino Posted December 17, 2004 Share Posted December 17, 2004 Originally posted by Kilmer17 Years ago we would have thought your computer was possessed by an evil being, but now we know that this is caused by a frog or perhaps a small gnome living in it's belly. You know, not many people appreciate completely off the wall nerdy humor. But I do. :laugh: :laugh: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jbooma Posted December 17, 2004 Share Posted December 17, 2004 Originally posted by Destino You know, not many people appreciate completely off the wall nerdy humor. But I do. :laugh: :laugh: Destino that wasn't humor, remlik was serious Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jenmdixon Posted December 17, 2004 Share Posted December 17, 2004 Originally posted by MichaelM My OS is XP Pro. The keyboard does not work at all when it happens. The one thing that makes me think it is something power related is that the battery light comes on after this happens even though it may or may not be plugged in, but it has happened when on battery power only. So far it is just very aggrivating, but when I lose something I am working on, I will be ticked off. The first time it happened, I had recently installed Thunderbird to give it a try instead of Outlook. I was importing all of my folders and it shutdown. I uninstalled Thuderbird, ran a virus scan, but it shut down again. I went in under the safe mode and the same thing happened. I started up again and it worked fine. It seems to do it about three times in a row then work fine the rest of the day. Thanks for the help. What brand/model is your laptop, and have you checked their support website to make sure that it isn't a known issue with a fix or workaround? How often do you let your battery run down to close to 0%? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichaelM Posted December 17, 2004 Author Share Posted December 17, 2004 Originally posted by jenmdixon What brand/model is your laptop, and have you checked their support website to make sure that it isn't a known issue with a fix or workaround? How often do you let your battery run down to close to 0%? The laptop is a Dell Inspiron 1150. I haven't checked the website to see if this is something that is happening to others, but will give it a go. I don't normally run down the battery close to 0%. Generally, when I travel, I will find a plug in the airport, so it normally doesn't go below 50% or so. I use a lot of USB devices, including backup drive, USB hub, camera, and two different wireless mouses. Is there any chance taking these devices out so often has created some type of short somewhere? I really have no idea what the issue is. Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichaelM Posted December 17, 2004 Author Share Posted December 17, 2004 Also, after it does this, I have to log back into every site than normally saves my log in info, such as this site. I don't know if this helps at all or if when it shuts down, it is just wiping out all of the cookies and stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Woofer Posted December 18, 2004 Share Posted December 18, 2004 Originally posted by Kilmer17 Years ago we would have thought your computer was possessed by an evil being, but now we know that this is caused by a frog or perhaps a small gnome living in it's belly. Don't be silly. Science has proven that gnomes do not exist. It has to be a frog or perhaps a toad. MichaelM - Have you ever swallowed a live tadpole? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichaelM Posted December 18, 2004 Author Share Posted December 18, 2004 Well, that must have been my warning as the laptop crashed tonight. All I can get now is a blue screen saying it is shutting down to prevent damage to the computer. I can't get into anything at all, no matter which options I try. It's a good thing I did a backup on Wed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevenaa Posted December 18, 2004 Share Posted December 18, 2004 When it bluescreens it gives a series of hex numbers like 0x00000050 (3-4 sets of numbers in parenthesis.) Give me all the numbers accurately and any file names mentioned on the blue screen. When it bluescreens does it do a count to 100%, or just display the message and stop there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevenaa Posted December 18, 2004 Share Posted December 18, 2004 Boot the computer and press F8 to get to safe mode options. Select Last Known Good Configurartion. Read all the verbage on each screen before proceeding. At the bottom of the second option screen, you will be prompted to press either L or D and then enter. If it says to press L, do that and press enter. If it says to press D, just press enter. Let me know what happens. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The X-Factor Posted December 18, 2004 Share Posted December 18, 2004 Originally posted by MichaelM Well, that must have been my warning as the laptop crashed tonight. All I can get now is a blue screen saying it is shutting down to prevent damage to the computer. I can't get into anything at all, no matter which options I try. It's a good thing I did a backup on Wed. This could be a problem with one of the RAM sticks. A sector of it could be corrupted causing crashes. If you have two different sticks, try removing one of them and see if the computer stays stable. If not, try to the other one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SlobberknockerSkinsFan Posted December 18, 2004 Share Posted December 18, 2004 Originally posted by MichaelM The laptop is a Dell Inspiron 1150. I haven't checked the website to see if this is something that is happening to others, but will give it a go. I don't normally run down the battery close to 0%. Generally, when I travel, I will find a plug in the airport, so it normally doesn't go below 50% or so. I use a lot of USB devices, including backup drive, USB hub, camera, and two different wireless mouses. Is there any chance taking these devices out so often has created some type of short somewhere? I really have no idea what the issue is. Thanks. Therein lies your problem....You got a Dell....... You+HP....invent.....(Shameless Company Plug designed to increase profits and maintain job security) HAIL TO THE REDSKINS HAIL VICTORY :notworthy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BG Posted December 18, 2004 Share Posted December 18, 2004 I think so....... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichaelM Posted December 18, 2004 Author Share Posted December 18, 2004 Originally posted by stevenaa Boot the computer and press F8 to get to safe mode options. Select Last Known Good Configurartion. Read all the verbage on each screen before proceeding. At the bottom of the second option screen, you will be prompted to press either L or D and then enter. If it says to press L, do that and press enter. If it says to press D, just press enter. Let me know what happens. I can't get into safe mode at all. No matter what option I try, I continue to get the blue screen. I have gone into diagnostics and run tests. It failed the DST short test. Also on the hard drive Read Test, I received an error code of 0f00:0244, uncorrectable data error; on the verify test, I received a similar error, 0F00:1A44, message block 6622818 uncorrectable data error. No luck even getting to a command prompt to wipe it and try starting from scratch. I appreciate all the responses and help. It seems like over the years, problems always happen on the weekend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jbooma Posted December 18, 2004 Share Posted December 18, 2004 Originally posted by SlobberknockerSkinsFan Therein lies your problem....You got a Dell....... You+HP....invent.....(Shameless Company Plug designed to increase profits and maintain job security) HAIL TO THE REDSKINS HAIL VICTORY :notworthy we had too many battery problems with the HP's and don't even start talking about compaqs Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevenaa Posted December 18, 2004 Share Posted December 18, 2004 Does the bluescreen give you hex numbers. If so What are they. Now, it sounds like you have corruption on your disk, or a failling disk or controller. What we need to do is boot to the recovery console and run check disk. Here are the steps. 1) Put in your Windows Xp Cd and reboot. It should boot from the CD. You may see a prompt to press any key to boot from the CD. If you do, press a key. If it doesn't boot to the CD, Let me know. We'll have to set the boot order in your bios. 2) When you boot from the CD. Windows setup will start and you'll see files being copied. This is good. 3) You'll come to a selection screen. Press R for repair. On the next screen press C for Recovery Console 4) The next screen will be a DOS looking screen. You'll be prompted for the Administrator Password. 5) You'll then select the OS. It will be choice 1 6)If all goes well you'll end up at a C: prompt 7) Type chkdsk /p and hit enter. 8) When check disk completes you will likely see that it found and corrected errors. 9) Keep re-running it until no errors are found. At this point, type exit and boot back to normal mode and see if you get in. Good luck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Baculus Posted December 18, 2004 Share Posted December 18, 2004 As someone mentioned, it is possible this is related to a bad RAM module. Memory issues can cause all sorts of crazy things. But the random shutoff, to me, sounds like a power source issue as well, though that can also happen in relation to a CPU issue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichaelM Posted December 18, 2004 Author Share Posted December 18, 2004 Originally posted by stevenaa Does the bluescreen give you hex numbers. If so What are they. Now, it sounds like you have corruption on your disk, or a failling disk or controller. What we need to do is boot to the recovery console and run check disk. Here are the steps. 1) Put in your Windows Xp Cd and reboot. It should boot from the CD. You may see a prompt to press any key to boot from the CD. If you do, press a key. If it doesn't boot to the CD, Let me know. We'll have to set the boot order in your bios. 2) When you boot from the CD. Windows setup will start and you'll see files being copied. This is good. 3) You'll come to a selection screen. Press R for repair. On the next screen press C for Recovery Console 4) The next screen will be a DOS looking screen. You'll be prompted for the Administrator Password. 5) You'll then select the OS. It will be choice 1 6)If all goes well you'll end up at a C: prompt 7) Type chkdsk /p and hit enter. 8) When check disk completes you will likely see that it found and corrected errors. 9) Keep re-running it until no errors are found. At this point, type exit and boot back to normal mode and see if you get in. Good luck Thanks for the info. I left the CD's and backup drive in my office, so I'm stuck until getting in on Monday. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevenaa Posted December 18, 2004 Share Posted December 18, 2004 Random shutdowns are usually hardware issues. And, that will usually cause corruption of the drive. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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