Computer Shuts Down When Using CD-ROM Drive

[The Tech Professor]

Hello everyone,

Another interesting fix:

The other day a client called me and told me that his computer was shutting down every time that he tried to play his Hoyle Card Games CD-ROM disc.

I went over to his house and sure enough, every time that the CD-ROM drive started to spin up the computer would shut down and then reboot. When not using the CD-ROM drive the computer was apparently functioning OK.

I did some research and found that a spinning CD-ROM draws an extra 6-7 Watts of power from the Power Supply. In other words, there is a significant power drain when any disc is actually spinning up.

I concluded that the clients old PSU was no longer able to handle the increased power drain from the spinning CD-ROM. I replaced the defective PSU with another one, and all was well once again!

My client and his wife were now able to play their Hoyle Card games. Very happy!!

When repairing computers, never underestimate the importance of a good Power Supply!

Best wishes,
The Tech Professor

 

[FoolishTech]

First time you've seen that eh? You had to do research? Hmm...

 

[NYJimbo]

First time you've seen that eh? You had to do research? Hmm...

This guy is a treasure trove of information, isn't he ?

 

[Slaters Kustum Machines]

I had a friend saying when he tried to use his DVD drive the computer would shutdown. I was like hmm, PSU? He didn't think so, well ok. I also asked if the internals were rather dirty thinking maybe it was overheating under the stress of trying to burn a DVD, nope I looked it's pretty clean. Needless to say I grabbed a can of air and drove the half hour to his house to open the case and find the CPU fan and heatsink so dirty you couldn't even see the fins. I gave him quite a hard time over this as he should no better. All in all had a good time and he gave me $50 for the trouble, lol.

 

[Xander]

Actually, I'd not seen it before. Common sense, to me, would be to swap out a known-good CD drive (which would require opening the case and checking for dust clogs) and, if that doesn't do it, then it'd be the P/S.

That's without a tutorial, mind you.

 

[Mr.Mike]

Actually, I'd not seen it before. Common sense, to me, would be to swap out a known-good CD drive (which would require opening the case and checking for dust clogs) and, if that doesn't do it, then it'd be the P/S.

That's without a tutorial, mind you.

Apparently you've been doing it the wrong way for all these years!

 

[AlaDes]

I've got a real good one. I had a computer that would restart on it's own every time you would try to shut it down. The only way to actually shut it off was to pull the plug or hold the power switch as the bios posted. I finally decided to do an N&P on it thinking it could be a virus or rootkit causing it. After the N&P, everything worked just fine until I installed the SATA drivers, and then it started the whole rebooting problem again.

Another N&P assured me that it had something to do with the SATA drivers, or at least I thought so anyways. After a few months of racking my brains and flashing the bios several times, I finally decided to try switching out the power supply with a different one, even though it didn't seem bad. Sure enough, it fixed the problem.

I later put the power supply I had the reboot issue with in another system to see if it caused any problems but it didn't and it's been running fine for over a year now. SATA drivers and a power supply, now that's weird lol

 

[16k_zx81]

Just wondering, do you take the white coat and the blackboard to your onsite jobs? Podium too?

 

[buzzcut]

but don't we all wear white coats

 

[altrenda]

While this may seem obvious to a lot of us, based on what is posted here daily, I would bet that there are a lot of people reading this that found this enlightening.
There are varying levels of experience and knowledge on this site.

 

[RedFoxComp]

PSU or motherboard. When the drive spins up it draws enough power to cause a dip.

 

[FoolishTech]

While this may seem obvious to a lot of us, based on what is posted here daily, I would bet that there are a lot of people reading this that found this enlightening.
There are varying levels of experience and knowledge on this site.

While you're right, it's just funny to see this coming from the self proclaimed "tech professor" - had it been anyone else I wouldn't have said a word.

 

[altrenda]

While you're right, it's just funny to see this coming from the self proclaimed "tech professor" - had it been anyone else I wouldn't have said a word.

I agree. Most of his postings are of the computer 101 variety, but this one was a " who would have thought a bad psu would cause something like this?" when it seemed obvious.

I was more commenting on what seems like an increasing amount of basic questions that could be answered by 30 seconds of googling.

 

[Mr.Mike]

I agree. Most of his postings are of the computer 101 variety, but this one was a " who would have thought a bad psu would cause something like this?" when it seemed obvious.

I was more commenting on what seems like an increasing amount of basic questions that could be answered by 30 seconds of googling.

Good point. Maybe the good professor should enlighten us on how to google!