Well im pretty bad at installing and problems with computers but,
everytime i play games such as example: cd rom games you buy at the store and such my computer shuts down. It gets an error message also ) the whoel computer shuts down complety).

"Hardware monitor found an error please enter power setup menu for details"

I do as it said and saw my cpu tempeture thing, it was 105C!!/221F!!

Does this mean my fan is dead?

It runs and all but when i play those games it shuts down 5-10 min later and keeps shutting down every 1 min or so..

If it is the fan or anything else is the product or products hard to install
and if a person like me should just bring it to the place whree i bought my computer? and how long do you think it will take them? thanks! please respond a.s.a.p

Hello and welcome to Techspot.

Would you feel cofident enough to take the side panel off your case and have a look at the fan on your cpu?

If you do you can switch your computer on and see if the fan turns.

If you don`t want to start taking your case apart then that`s ok but in that case I would reccomend that you take it to your local pc shop and have them look at it for you.

Also other than a quick check I wouldn`t reccomend that you try to run your computer as this could cause serious damage to your cpu or mother board.

Please let us know what you intend to do then we can advise you further.

Regards Howard :wave: :wave:

Thanks and with my computer on i check and the fan runs because i saw it and felt the air, do you think best buy or circuit city would help at all? if so post please.

I`m not familiar with either of those probably because I live in the uk.

But the best way is to talk to people you konw in your area that have computers and let them advise you where the best place is to take your pc.

Regards and good luck Howard :grinthumb

If your CPU temp was 221F then you have a serious fan problem or your sofware is way off. Either way i try to aviod turning it on at all costs. Best buy is prob. not the best place to take it. (altough if it is all you have) Look in the phonebook and get a local repair shop that knows what they are doing.

Good Luck
Sean :darth:

221F !!!!!! (105 C) My god man, you're lucky it's running at all.

yea i think your software might of been off, either that or you are incredibly lucky (if it still runs) Be sure to keep us updated




Sean :darth:

Well, i brong it to best buy 60 bucks just to look at it,.. i just left.. circuit city has nothing there to help, i went to Staples there was a Sh... load of dust my comp worked fine when i played my games now it starts to shut down again and its at 104C.. the guy at staples told me to go to CompUSA anyone know if thats good?

do you have a local pc repair shop? You might find better results there.
Good Luck

Sean :darth:

CompNoob,
Where do you live? if it's anywhere near Dallas I can take a look at it
for you... for free. I hate paying big $$'s for a checkup! it aint right.

theres a place called" Computer-Exchange" near my house kind of, but i i dont think they repair everything else is pretty far away im goign to check phone book again for something decently close :-\ and i dont live in dallas and no where near it

Then bestbuy is prob your best option! Good luck

UPDATE!!!!!:

I took the side panel off like the guy did at staples to clean it i saw more dust in the heat sink took the fan off it was dust bunny galore.. so then i cleaned it out now problem fixed! thanks guys!

Cool! You're on your way to becoming a computer tech! You wouldn't believe how many computer probs are pretty simple to fix.

Yeah thats true, well im going to try to learn more thx guys for all help

Automatic Shutdown

I have a dell dimension 4500 and after having the machine on for about 30 min, it will just shut down. no warning or anything, no error message either. the PS was changed. i was able to reinstall xp pro (reson for this: thought it was a virus running in the background), updates some porgrams then it shut down. left it over night, next day installed office 03, updates then it shut down again. then the memory was added and then diff memory was put in. i was wandering some other possible causes. also, is there a good utility that i can download that will monitor the temp of the internals (ie. motherboard, processor etc....). may help me get to the bottom of this. thank you.

Bishop,
Sounds like a heat problem. Download "Motherboard Monitor" for temps and such. But first, open the case and check the CPU fan as stated above. If it is a heat problem, then you'll want to run the computer as little as you can until the problem is fixed.

well the problem is the heatsink on the cpu is not a fan, its one of those steel looking ones (dont know how to describe it). the machine is a dell dimension 4500. so i bought a new cpu fans but the slot for it is not right (and i got the fan specified for the mobo its a socket 478). the slot only fits the specific heatsink that came with the dell. so i just ordered a new mobo and cpu (Asus A7V400-MX Socket A w/ AMD Sempron 2500). thank you for the help though. any other suggestions would be helpful, maybe something else to fix the existing hardware so i wont have to install new mobo and cpu. thanks again.

Same Problem as above

I have a Dell Dimension 4600 which is about 3 yrs old.
P4 2.6 GB processor and 1.5 GB of Ram.

To start, I know my way around a PC and am comfortable making changes and upgrades on my own.

Lately I'll log onto my PC, be logged in for anywhere from 10 to 30 mins and then the PC will just shut down for no apparant reason. Weather I'm on the internet, playing a game, or just checking email.

The front LED on the tower will then flash green and not allow me to turn the pc back on.

I leave it alone for a few hours or until the next day and I'm able to boot the PC up again but will only get another 10-30 mins out of it once again.

I have done all of the following:

-Confirmed the fan is running on both the power supply and the video card.
-Changed out the power supply....same thing happens
-changed out the memory...same thing happens
-changed out the motherboard...same thing happens
-completely disconnected everything from the motherboard and reseated all of it....again same thing happens.

I've spoken to the morons at Dell Support, who have provided no help.

I can't imagine that 3 yrs is the life span on a PC these days.
Escpecially since I am still running a P3 700 MHZ w/ 256MB of ram with no problem. This PC is for basic use though, internet, email, word docs, etc.

I need my main pc up and running.

Please help.