Continuous Restart Looping

[glowingnissan07]

-AMD Duron, 1.35 GHz. Put the thing together myself. Its got a
PCchips K7 Motherboard (model M863AG/G), 256 MB RAM, 15 GB Hard Drive, and CD/DVD Player.

Today my second major crash has occured. The PC had been on and working for several hours, until it was in midsong on Media Player. No response from any input, frozen screen, and constant hard disk activity. I restarted the PC, but it locked up again as soon as login screen appeared. Now, I cant even get that far. The PC will get up to the Windows loading screen, and will automatically restart, no matter what i do. I've tried Safe Mode, Last Known Configuration, unplugging my guitar stuff from the PC, etc. etc.

Notworthy previous problems

A similar problem occured when i had my 40 GB and 15 GB hard disk working together. There was a loud annoying clicking noise coming from the hard disk. Constant hard disk activity (even tho no apps were running) and then crashing. Blue screens saying it was physically dumping my memory due to problems. fortunately i was able to transfer the files i needed from the 40 GB storage drive to the 15GB (where windows runs off of). Immediately afterwards, the 40GB became nonexistent. I scanned the 15GB afterwards and found no viruses. Thing were working well...

For about a week ive heard a fast repetive quiet clicking within my computer, and I just assumed it was my case rattling since i didnt have it screwed on fully. But even if its taken off, i still hear it. I have not been able to locate the source, but im guessing its coming from some loose part inside, not from the hard disk. It has not hindered PC performance.

I use a DigiTech Guitar Workstation hooked up via USB to my PC to record songs. It came with a Cd, which gave 2 programs(ProTracksPlus 2.2 and X-Edit, [which i havent gotten to work at all]). It also came with some drivers for the USB so it could send MIDI signals to and from the Guitar. I've had many bad installations with this included CD, but i just figured my PC wasnt meant for recording and i was having difficulty with my 40GB. Once I got it to work though, life was sweet, except for the occasionally nonspecific error, causing it to close. No big deal, I just restarted the program and continued where i left off. I;m not sure if this program with its drivers is causing the problems.

CPU Temp is around 114F (is that too high?)
Found some dust bunnies too, but its all dusted out and my PC still doesnt work.

any ideas? (be specific in ur responses, im not good with computerS!)

-Spudster

 

[SCHUMIinSA]

Does your pc freeze or does it restart?

If it restarts can you hear a clicking sound from you Power Supply?

I had a faulty Power Supply a while ago and it sometimes but not always would do multiple restarts whilst Windows was still loading. Ususally I could hear a click just before the restart. If you can he a click to then try using a friend's power supply, preferably a friend who know knows more about pc's than you so that he can help you with installation. If the issues are gone then you obviously have a dying power supply on you hands, if not then I can't offer any more help.

Or maybe just take the pc to a pc fix-up place and allow them to determine if it is the power supply or not.

 

[Ruder]

nissan dude: Your PC might be overheating, make sure there is a cooler on top of the CPU, that it is seated properly with a TIM, and that it works.

Schumi: Power supply clicking is simply the overload protection resetting the power supply. Your PSU broke because it was overloaded.

 

[SCHUMIinSA]

Why on earth would a Power Supply after two years of running suddenly become overloaded? No hardware changes were made in those two years.

It may just be that, but it is a still symptom of dieing psu.

 

[glowingnissan07]

i think i fixed it!

whoa, those sounds pretty bad.

I sure hope thats not it. I doubt its my power supply though. its not a clicking its more like rattling, really faint though, like a loose screw wiggling around, which would make sense since ive taken this thing apart like 4 times and did a not so super job putting it back together.

FFor the mean time, though, i have no idea why, but i got it to work again. On bootup I ran System Restore through dos, doing some disk diagnosistics and some scanning. It said it found an error, but it was unspecific in telling me what it was or what was causing it. after doing a dskchk I did a dskscan or something and when i ran diskchk again it said it was clean and now it runs like a beauty again.

I still dont know whats going on though, and it could very well be it might happen again. I'll keep you posted. THanks for the hep anywayz.