pc resetting by its self

my pc keep resetting it's self when you turn it on it strats loading then resets, somtimes it goes all the way to windows but when you open a window it resets again it also pick up the dvd cdrw drives on start up but when you open my computer the drive's are'nt there so i cant reinstall windows because the drives won'nt work. tried system restore by it reset's half way through it, try setting all the boot drives to cd it started to reinstall windows then guess what it reset it's self it's not lossing power as far as i know because the power light is staying on when it's resseting.


windows xp pro
1024 mb ddr
200 gb hdd

any help please

 

you dont need to boot into windows to reinstall XP you just stick the cd in the drive while booting up the pc and setup loads off the disc.

have you been overclocking your system by anychance?

plz give me a bit more info about your system aswell like what make your hard drive is and what type of connection it uses, what motherboard you have etc..

 

Can u start up in safe mode? Did u install anything new recently? I could be wrong but wasn't there a virus last yr that would stick pc's in a constant reboot loop?

 

Can you see your cdrom drives in the bios ?
It more than likely is not the OS
DL this program on anothe pc and run, it will make a bootable floppy that you take to your other pc. put the floppy in the drive s. set your biod to boot from the floppy . restart the pc it will auto check your ram. The floppy prog is in linux, so if you look at the floppy in windows, windows will want to format the floppy...that is ok, do not format. Also there is a cd iso ver of the program there also for the new machines with out floppies.

http://www.memtest86.com/

 

thanks for the quick replies i haven't been overclocking it. i took the hard drive out tonight and put it in a friends pc and formated it but when we put back in my pc it was going as far as the xp loading screen then resetting again. i will check all computer details tomorow and get back to you's been at it for two days now and sick off it. ps do you think it may be a power supply problem to one or more yhe drives

 

can't start in safe mode same thing happens, drives visable in bios

 

swapping a hd from one pc to another and trying to boot from it wont work so that doesnt suprise me.

what type of connection is your hard drive using? S-ATA or IDE

 

syphertek SATA is still IDE, it is just serial IDE. The flat grey cable type is PATA or parallel IDE.

john1888 did you install xp in your friends pc onto your hd ? if you did it probably will not work unless both of your mainboards are the same. XP installs a different HAL for different hardware configs.
If you did do that you can install a new HAL by booting off your xp cd, do like you are installing for the first time. When you get to the end of the text part of the install, xp will find your previuos install and ask you what you want to do, press R for repair. DO NOT CONFUSE THIS WITH THE REPAIR CONSOLE AT THE BEGINING.

 

what the hell are you going on about with such nonsense. while the drive itself is technically the same the type of connection is completely different SATA only uses 7 wires on one thin red cable. and the other uses 40 wires onto leadind onto a giant block thats been goin for years.

im asking to find out what connection is being used. it can make all the difference to the troubleshooting if you actually no exactly what it is that your troubleshooting.

My motherboard has a broken S-ATA controller and if i try to boot from my sata hd i either get caught in a reboot cycle or just get the good old BSOD

this is why im trying to determine what kind of hard drive is being used

 

I have had a couple of pc's with this problem recently. One was cured by swapping the power supply to a more powerfull one. The other was due to a memory incompatibility with the motherboard. Assuming this PC is more than a few weeks old and has had no such problems until now, I would maybe look at swapping the power supply.

 

lol sata is the same as ide, good one.

 

IS THAT SACASTIC ? SATA IS SERIAL ATA ( IDE ) PATA ID PARALLEL ATA
ANY QUESTIONS ?

 

CORRECTION I MENT TO SAY PATA IS PARALLEL ATA ( IDE )

 

thanks again for all the reply's and sorry for the delay in getting back, back at work and not had much time. anyway still had no luck with it i formatted the hard drive on a mates pc and tried to install windows when i put it back in my pc still no luck i'am going to change the power supply tomorrow let you all know how i get on.

thanks again

 

Im having the same sort of problem, Its keeps rebooting at the moment windows screen load. Formatting/installing windows again is of no use. Have no clue whats causing it.

Im using:

MSI K8T Neo mainboard
AMD Athlon 64 3200+
Cosair Twinx 512 ddr400
Asus AX800pro
Creative Soundblaster
Hitachi 160gb sata

q-tec 400w PSU low noise

 

@ DVDBURNUP

yes sata is the same as IDE.... and heres the proof as if you pay close attention the SATA cable and the IDE cable are exactly the same... no different i swear


and if thats not enough proof lets take a look at the hard drives themselves


see theyre exactly the same one just happens to have 33 more wires than the other and uses a different connection, but theyre exactly the same i swear

 

tried the power supply yesterday still no joy. in the process of changing all the cables.

 

@ john1888

Sorry to hear the power supply replacement didnt work.
Other possibilites are
Memory incompatibility with mother board. have you changed either recently?
The CPU may be over heating and causing a restart. Have you tried overclocking anything recently. Check CPU temp in Bios or by a mother board monitor.

 

syphertek Bah ! It aint me , I was the one that got YOU on the right path, please read your preavious postings before you post again.

 

thanks for all the help!!!!!!! finaly got it going tonight took the cpu out tonight covered in dust and the fan was'nt seated properly cleaned it all up and reseated it turned it on and away it went.

bottom line overheating
-----------------------
thank again