PC turns on when IT wants to

[mad1394]

UPDATE 21.05.2015 : The problem was the power supply. Fortunately it was still in warranty so they replaced it for free. I chose a Superflower 750w.
Longer story : The people working at the warranty department were not happy to see me. "We didn't have time to install it" and I was like "No need to. I got this"
So I come home I install the power supply and the ssd and..... old dusty is stuck in an infinite restart loop. No image on screen. Grrrrr. Hulk smash.
After a couple of unsuccesfull tries I remembered what you guys said about the case power/restart button causing problems. So I disconnected the case from the motherboard and IT WORKED!
Good thing I paid extra for this motherboard with power/restart buttons otherwise I wouldn't have figured it out.
Thank you very much for the help. Now that I got this fixed I am looking forward to the new graphics cards from AMD. ( Freesync )

 

[stoggs1]

This sounds like a similar issue I've seen with women. Have you tried talking to it nicely? Asking if it's lost weight or done something differently with its hair?

lmao that's some good troubleshooting advice lol.

 

[Jeff Stokes]

powercfg -report I think it is, can tell you why it powered on last, etc.

 

[Bill_Bright]

powercfg -report I think it is, can tell you why it powered on last, etc.

That's not a valid switch (at least not with W8.x). If you enter powercfg /? (or -?) you can see the list of valid switches and what they do.

So powercfg /lastwake will tell you "what woke the system from the last sleep transistion."

 

[Jeff Stokes]

Ah thanks I was thinking of BatteryReport I think. Sorry about that.

yeah powercfg /lastwake and MAYBe powercfg /requests might help.

 

[Cvrk]

It's a PSU thing. I am not calling it a problem ,i am calling it a "thing".
Tho here is were i get suspicious. I have only encountered this once. At my friends place,in the winter,when in his house because of no heating (yes no joke he was sleeping in the cold) temps were really low the pc had problems starting. Had to give it a about 3-4 tries. After that it was all good never experienced any other problems.

 

[Bill_Bright]

At my friends place,in the winter,when in his house because of no heating (yes no joke he was sleeping in the cold) temps were really low the pc had problems starting. Had to give it a about 3-4 tries. After that it was all good never experienced any other problems.

Except that does not necessarily point to the PSU. There are several points throughout the motherboard between the case's front panel power button and the PSU that come into play and any one of them, if not correct, could give the exact same symptom you describe.

This could easily be a CPU or motherboard issue too. Or even simple condensation issues when the heated computer cooled way down. Did this house have running water? Is so, then it is highly unlikely the house ever got below freezing inside or there would be the very serious risk of burst water pipes.

That said, the ATX Form Factor standard for ATX PSUs states,

Operating ambient +10 °C to +50 °C (At full load, with a maximum temperature rate of change of 5 °C/10 minutes, but no more than 10 °C/hr.)

Non-operating ambient -40 °C to +70 °C (Maximum temperature rate of change of
20 °C/hr.)

Again, those are the minimum and maximum requirements all PSUs must meet to be ATX compliant. Some PSUs are fully capable of exceeded those minimum and maximums.

So if the house and PSU did drop below 10°C (50°F), depending on the specific PSU it might not want to fire up. But again, it could be something else preventing it too.

 

[Jeff Stokes]

er how cold?Yeah also a spindle HDD should start having issues around 0 degrees C I believe. But the ATX PSU is probably more spot on imo. Good call!

 

[Bill_Bright]

According the WD Black drives data sheet, they are designed to operate in environments as low as 5°C (41°F). So yeah, if the house got colder, and the bearings lubricant hardened enough to prevent the motor from spinning up to speed, the computer would not boot either (though the computer might power up and make it through POST).