[RESOLVED] RebootOmatic

[FooL]

We've just purchased a large number of new Dell 4100 machines. Running Intel 733's and Win 2k Professional. The problem we're having is this: It reboots uncommanded at completely random times. It seems, however, to occur most often during reboot or memory intensive times such as printing or graphic manipulation.

We've unchecked the "automatic reboot" optionon startup and recovery and researched the dump codes....but that's just lead us nowhere. Updated and downgraded drivers. Flashed BIOS. The list goes on and on. Nothing works.

Has anyone else seen this problem or know a fix?

[xsrvx]

I am guessing you are not getting any help from Dell.
What type of chipset is on the motherboards and is the latest Sp loaded and stuff?

need a little bit more information on the hardware and is every computer doing it or a few or one?

[ctrl_alt_del]

CPU's are your #1 suspect for such problems. Power supplies are rare.

[AlienDyne]

I wouldn't blame the CPUs about that!

Check the memory modules, and the motherboards.

Also verify the temperatures of all CPUs.

Good luck.

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"Matter is passive. In spite of its power, it can't be controlled without the human mind." Sokrates

My Hardware Info, Hardware Media and Computer History page

[TheLow1]

I work for a large company, we have a large number of Dell Latitudes. We are having the same problem, on about 1/10 of the machine they reboot randomly for no reason. I'll let you all know if we find anything out.

[ilovetheusers]

You know, ctrl_alt_del has a good idea. I once had a cpu i put into a board with a cooling fan have the thermal compound leak into the connection between the processor and the socket on the motherboard and this is exactily what happened. constant reboots for no reason at random times. this is probably not the soloution but hey, it doesn't hurt to check.

[FooL]

Thank you all for your replies. Yes, EVERYTHING has the latest drivers, BIOS flashes, SP's...etc. And yes, it's just like the post with 1 in 10 computers doing it. Sounds like the same problem. Tell you what....if we fix the problem, I will post the fix in this forum too. It seems as if I've peaked the curiosity of many.

[WinKrushR]

I've also seen RAM force reboots, esp. when its intense in the graphics/processing areas with lots of information being cached and flushed. If a lot of the Dells you JUST bought have the problem, they could have a bad batch of chips. Same goes with processors. Goodness knows heat problems can cause random dumps/crashes/reboots.

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[braybk]

That's the first thing I would check is the RAM. If your BIOS permits, you should be able to up the waitstates on the memory, and also slow down the clock speed at which the memory runs. Also try fiddling with cache settings. I've seen reboots caused quite often by bad cache memory.

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-Geek used to be a four letter word. Now its a six-figure one.

[FooL]

We've already checked the RAM on machines that are KNOWN to have issues. Ran it through sequential loops overnight. Everything checked good.