PC automatically restarts when the monitor shuts down

Hello all,

Since last week, if I leave the computer for around 20-30 minutes+ (usual time for computer to go into hibernation? standby? Monitor shutting itself off? A bit confused on the difference), it automatically restarts itself. Then Windows tells me it has recovered from a serious error. This began after my Norton found a trojan during a background system scan, but I don't think this has much to do with it; there was only one trojan file, and I scanned with Avast AND Norton afterward just to make sure it was gone.

I have checked the drivers and don't see any of them needing updates, etc. One thing I thought of that could be part of this is that I recently got a new mouse. It is a rechargeable mouse that goes in a cradle. Since the mouse died, but the cradle and such still work, I got a mouse that still works and use it for that cradle, and it works fine. A few days before I got the new mouse (sans cradle) I used a simple usb plugin mouse. Someone advised me to simply turn off the option for the monitor to go shut off after 20 minutes, and it worked, but that's not actually fixing the problem. I'm considering cleaning out the tower with that canned air, but I don't know if that is directly related to it restarting like clockwork when the monitor goes off. Can anyone help me out?

BTW: Norton Antivirus runs a scan in the background when I am gone for a bit. It is what found the trojan when I was gone. Idk if that's helpful...

 

Hi,
Well buddy first change your monitor and see if it does the same means you have problem with CPU. If new monitors works normally means your monitor needs maintenance.

 

It could possibly be the monitor, but I haven't known a monitor to have such an effect.

You made some changes in Power Options, that's where I would investigate first. I suggest you look for motherboard/chipset driver updates at the system manufacturer's website. You need good chipset drivers for power saving to work correctly. I don't recommend clicking "look for driver updates" in Device Manager because they could be the wrong ones. Manufacturer's websites, like Dell, HP, etc, have methods of identifying the specific hardware/drivers for your system.

In Device Manager you can highlight anything listed for Monitor and uninstall it, it will be automatically reinstalled when you restart the computer.

Power saving options could be clashing with graphics system. Power saving tells the monitor to shut down which might crash the graphics.

A workaround while you are testing, set a screensaver, but set it to Blank, if you don't want the monitor "working" all the time.

Yes, look at cleaning out the interior of the tower, but as I said, it should be relatively simple for the system to turn off the monitor.

Matt

 

Thank you for the responses.

I had this desktop put together by a third party; would I just get the drivers from the motherboard site?

Also, I don't understand why I should uninstall something from the monitor drivers?

I think the power saving option is clashing with the graphics system... what will fix this? Updating my drivers?

Also, does this situation sound like it merits my backing up data from my desktop?

 

Yes, look up the model number in their driver downloads section. We could help you look, so I suggest you put your system specs in your user profile
http://www.windowsbbs.com/adding_system_specifications.html

If it happens when you have a power setting to shut down the monitor, you need to find if it might be the system or the monitor that is causing it. The drivers are the interface between them so you need to check those as well. Monitor drivers are a "no risk" set of drivers to uninstall, Windows will automatically reinstall them when you reboot. One way of telling the monitor drivers are wrong is if they are described "Default Monitor ", that means Windows has not been able to identify it correctly. The monitor drivers should at least be "Plug and Play Monitor ", mine say "Generic Plug and Play Monitor ". If you see "Default Monitor" they will be wrong, I just uninstall any listing under Monitor, as I said, they are reinstalled automatically.

If that is the case, we can't tell if it is the power saving "drivers" or the graphics drivers. Leave the graphics drivers till last, unlike the monitor drivers, they are quite complex. Leave the graphics drivers till later, when and if another cause cannot be found. Update the chipset drivers first.

Yes, anything could happen. It could be signs of worse things to come, but we hope not. Always imagine that your hard disk drive could fail tomorrow, how would you get back to a working system and one that has all your data?

I see Arie has suggested checking for debugging dumps, that sounds good. I had it at the back of my mind, but it seems specifically like driver problems. I don't see any harm in updating/reinstalling a few basic drivers (which, I hope, might zap the problem...I try a few easy "possible fixes" first).

Matt

 

Hello again, all

I've kept my desktop off for two weeks because I've been busy with final quarter stuff at school, but I checked recently and found this error appearing in my logs:

The device, \Device\Harddisk0\D, has a bad block.

My UPS is also turned off, though I don't know if it was ever set up properly to begin with?

Also, this warning:

An error was detected on device \Device\Harddisk0\D during a paging operation.

I'm not sure if it's worth trying anything else, should I reformat my hdd or is it not salvageable?

 

You need to run Check Disk (CHKDSK) on the HDD. Open My Computer, right-click on the Windows drive (C:?) and select Properties -> Tools tab -> Error Checking, put checks in the boxes (scan the surface). It will run when you reboot. A Bad Block could mean the surface of the disk is starting to break down, CHKDSK will mark it as bad, but expect more to appear and you could lose data or Windows could stop working altogether. Check the information/log when CHKDSK finishes.

Matt
Note: CHKDSK will take many hours if you have a large drive or if it needs to try to recover data. Leave it to run overnight.

 

I did the CHKDKS, thanks. It found some stuff, but I don't know if it really fixed anything. I still get more errors than I used in the event viewer, and for some reason especially when I plug in devices or plug them out.

 

First off, we need to know information about your computer, you need to put your system specifications in your WindowsBBS User Profile
http://www.windowsbbs.com/adding_system_specifications.html

The system was "paging" at the time of the error report, which might mean the paging file is still corrupt.

What is the amount of Free Space and Used Space on your Windows (C:?) drive?

Do you disconnect devices that might create a drive letter (E:, F:, G:, etc) by going to Safely Remove Hardware in the Notification Tray (the icons beside the time). If you just pull them out, it can upset anything that was accessing them (and cause errors in Event Viewer). It might also corrupt the drive. If you find it says "...try disconnecting later" or similar wording, you might have a window open that is accessing the device.

Look in Control Panel -> Power Options for how your system is set to go into power saving mode. If only the monitor is set to shut down, yes, it could be a monitor problem. If the hard drive/s are set to shut down, that could be a reason for the errors and the reason why it won't go into power saving mode.

Matt

 

Hello again, I must be getting annoying around here. XD I finally put in the specs from that program, and the only issue I have now is the bad block errors. I don't allow my monitor to shut off, and I get paging warnings, and bad block errors. I usually hear a slight clicking noise for a minute, the computer lags a bit, and I get a bad block error. I've backed up my stuff from here, CHDSK didn't do much, but idk what else to do.

I've only used 61/236 gb on my hdd, so it's not filled too much.

I'm doubting this is a drivers problem. I'd rather not mess with my drivers, and hopefully the only thing that could be wrong is within my internal hdd, which can be replaced. Should I simply reformat?

 

Sorry to double post. I just had my computer stutter a bit while I was in game, and had a paging error. The harddrive said it was 100% when it obviously isn't. I checked My Computer and it also said it 67/236 gb were taken.

 

Your HDD is probably ready to fail if CHKDSK can't fix the error (and that would probably only be a short-term fix anyway). Here is the Samsung drive testing utility
http://www.samsung.com/global/business/hdd/support/utilities/Support_HUTIL.html
If it reports probable failure, look at getting a replacement. A few HDD manufacturers provide a utility to clone the old HDD, but you might get errors from the bad block/s. Before you shut down to clone the drive, you could go Control Panel -> System -> Advanced tab and set the Paging file to zero (you might need to reboot to delete it). That way the Paging file would not need to be copied to the new HDD.

You could put the old HDD into an external USB enclosure and use it for temporary storage, but not for anything important like backup.

Matt
PS You didn't double post. Double posting is starting threads in more than one forum about your problem.