PC shuts down due to thermal heating

[hitech0101]

My old PC shuts down suddenly & when i turn it back on i hear a beep music & a message on the monitor "PC was shut down due to thermal heating" & then it works for hours without any problem. I checked fan & cleaned dust & also operated with the side cabinet covers open still the problem exists & the pc shut downs randomly not after a specific time interval.

I am a newbie sorry if you cannot understand what i have asked.

 

[CMH]

Okay, a few questions...

What were you doing just before it shuts down?
Does it work okay immediately after it shuts down? Everytime?
What do you know about your PC? (year, processor, m/b, anything and everything pls)
A rough idea how often it shuts down? (times/day or week or whatever)

 

[Puiu]

Try putting some new thermal paste for you CPU.
First you wipe the old one off and use some alcohol to completely wipe the remaining old paste (be careful not to get the pins wet or dirty and wait for 5-10 minutes before adding the new paste). Only use a little amount of thermal paste on the middle of the CPU (look for some videos on youtube to see how much you should use).

Also don't buy cheap thermal paste.

PS: you can do the same for the GPU and northbridge if the CPU isn't the problem

 

[CMH]

can't see it being a heating problem unless it happens all the time. Probably a glitch somewhere.

I've got comps running for years without ever changing the thermal paste. Asking someone to change thermal paste to me is a waste of time if we have no clue what the problem is.

 

[Puiu]

Changing the thermal paste old PC's can reduce heat by enough to stop it from overheating. (even more so when you use a good one like the one from thermaltake). But if the fan is the one at fault than i don't know how much it can help.

 

[hitech0101]

What were you doing just before it shuts down?
Does it work okay immediately after it shuts down? Everytime?
What do you know about your PC? (year, processor
, m/b, anything and everything pls)
A rough idea how often it shuts down? (times/day or week or whatever)

Before it shut downs i have done different things sometimes surfing,watching movies or games
It works fine say after 2 mins after shutdown it does not start immediately when i to start it back "green light yellow light below power & reset button" go on then off then when i try again & again to start it back it does start & works fine.

Some system specs

2.4 GHz Pentium 4
512 mb RAM DDR-1
80 GB Hard disk
64 mb VRAM integrated
PC is about 4 years old now


I don't know what is thermal paste sorry (even i knew what it was i am sure i will damage my PC) . I did replace fan about a year ago.

Thanks for help evreyone.

 

[Puiu]

if you don't know what thermal paste is then i won't ask you to change it.

thermal paste (also known as thermal grease) is a grease like substance that is put between the cooler and the CPU chip to make the exchange of heat between them more efficient.
wiki/youtube/google for more technical details.

Your PC is old and you didn't say anything about the video card. This can also overheat in old PCs.what you need to do is check every component first (one by one) by putting them in a different PC. (HDD, video card if it's not integrated, RAM)

 

[hitech0101]

I called the guy from who i bought the PC. He repaired it saying it was some kind of loose connection I asked him about thermal paste even he said he doesn't know thermal paste.
Will never buy or service from him again he charged me too much.

 

[Puiu]

He must know about it it, but the name might be different where he's from. I am an IT analyst and i do a lot of computer repairs (hardware and software). Nobody that works with hardware repairs doesn't know about it. In the extremely unlikely case where he doesn't then it's best not to ask him to repair your PC.

 

[hitech0101]

Thanks a lot for helping.

 

[Puiu]

It's my pleasure.

 

[Ritwik7]

Also just ensure that none of the pins holding the heat sink above the processor have come loose. I had similar shutdown issues once before.

 

[CMH]

I understand why some people might think its overheating, but being an overclocker, I know exactly what problems would surface if a component was overheating.

I wouldn't rule it out, but it definitely wouldn't be my first guess, since overheating issues are always repeatable (doing the same thing causes restarts, etc).


I do suggest to hitech that you at least know what you can, can't, and shouldn't touch in the PC, would save you tons of money on repairs, and allow you to do some basic troubleshooting.

One thing you can definitely learn from this issue is that every connector in your computer can be fiddled with. RAM and graphics card can be fiddled with. All these mentioned may be loose for some reason, and should be re-plugged in if you are having restarting issues, or unknown errors. Remember that force isn't really necessary (a little bit for the RAM), and all pins go in 1 way only. Don't start modifying things because they don't fit. (Some guy actually sawed a groove on his RAM cos it doesn't fit...)

 

[hitech0101]

Thanks a lot for helping guys.Will a have look at what you all have said,PC is running fine now for 2 days no issues Thanks again!

(Some guy actually sawed a groove on his RAM cos it doesn't fit...)

I can't stop laughing at that.