Advent QT5500
Windows Vista Home Premium
1GB DDR 667
100GB WD Hard Drive
Pentium Core Duo 2 1.66ghz

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Having a strange problem with this laptop and was wondering if anyone can help me diagnose the symptoms.

The laptop will boot into vista fine from cold and will operate as normal for a limited amount of time, sometime 10 minutes, sometimes up to an hour when all of a sudden it will switch itself off - dead. Its not whilst doing anything specific, the laptop can be completely idol and will still switch itself off.

The next thing is when you try to switch it on, it powers on, theres noise from the CPU fan spinning up but then nothing! nothing on the screen at all, no POST just completely dead.

This goes on if you keep switching it on and off using the power button.

If you leave the laptop for 10 minutes or so, it will again switch on and boot into vista. After a limited amount of time, it switches itself off, and wont switch itself back on again.

I've never seen anything like this before.

The windows system error log just states: error - the system was unexpectedly shut down. No clues there, It isn't blue screening as I have auto restart disabled.

As an additiional note, its not a virus or spyware problem as its a clean format.

Another symptom (possibly unrelated) is erratic behaviour of the laptops built in wireless internet. Sometimes windows says no connections available even though there is, sometimes "local only" when all other computers are connected to the net fine. Troubleshooting/diagnose connection brings up no problems.

If anyone can help me with this I'd be very grateful.

Hello Hampo. Welcome back to PCHF. Fairly new Laptop I see. Did you use the recovery disks to reinstall windows? Have you looked at the boot log to see is anything is amiss there? I'm sorry I have so little knowledge of VISTA. Was this what originally came with the laptop? I believe this could go either way as it could be hardware or software. What do you think?


LC

yes its vista that originally came with the laptop.

All seems normal in the boot log.

Its about a year and a half old, been running fine the problems just started this week. Nothings changed.

I ran speedfan and it was running constant at around 57 degrees. I thought maybe a heat issue as it would appear it only switches on again when its cooled down maybe?

I've ran all the processor stress, memory tests, hard drive tests under the sun and they arent bringing up anything.

Hi hampo , do you or anyone else who uses the laptop , lay on the floor with it ?
closing down after a certain lengh of time could mean an overheating problem, and laying it on a carpet would mean it picks up dust more quickly.
so i would suggest that you clean all the vents and make sure they are free of dust ,

it could also be a memory problem as vista is pretty hungry on memory usage ,
have a read at this article How much RAM does Vista really need? - VISTA.BLORGE

but dont go doing anything drastic for now , im sure a tech will give you some more things to try,before resorting to upgrading the ram

BBJ

Hmmm...Battery perhaps? Tell you What. If I may, I will mark this thread open to so we can get the Techs and USERs in on this.

LC

how long have you had the laptop. Try unplugging the ac adapter and letting the computer release all it's battery power. then recharge the battery. if it still does it it's not the battery or the ac adapter. Does the bottom of the computer get so hot you can't set it on your lap? Is this a relatively new computer?

my son has the exact same computer with the exact same problem owned from new for around 2 years but has been doing this for around 8 months now ,except that his does blue screen when the laptop is picked up whilst on.

i have looked at the computer a few times changed the hard drive and both memory modules

his also when picked up sometimes artifacts on the screen

i think it is a mother board fault somewhere around the on board graphics chip which is cooled by the cpu cooler .

if you press slightly on the bottom in the area around the graphics chip the pc shuts down

you can also tell when it is going to boot correctly as the fan breifly spins and then it boots up

if the fan continues to spin the the pc wont boot , power light comes on but thats it doesnt even post .

i would love to find out the problem and if possible save over £100 on a second hand motherboard