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8746
Dimension 5100 rebooting when hot
Hi:
A few years ago I bought (from a local store) a used Dimension 5100 which had a replacement hard drive (320 GB). It's been fine until about a week ago.
It has started rebooting. It seems to be possibly thermal as it takes a while before it happens. It might also be task-dependent. By that I mean it seems to happen more frequently when we have a database/POS app open.
BIOS A03 is installed. I find that the BIOS does not allow access to 'typical' health check things like I'm accustomed to with other PC/BIOS combinations (AMI, maybe Phoenix). I tried some utilities from CPUID and they will only read the hard drive temperature info.
I also found that the hard drive does not have the 'diagnostic software' I read about elsewhere online, possibly (I hope) in the Dimension 5100 online docs.
I am currently trying to find out what drivers and software I may be able to download based on the service tag, but the registration-scan has been running about an hour now which seems abnormal (ms ie 6 is the browser). I previously tried to download drivers manually/individually, but they kept saving as .application files, which don't mean anything to me or XP either apparently.
I removed the fan/heatsink ass'y & vacuumed the heatsink. It wasn't as bad as most PC's I've seen. The themal compund between the CPU and heatsink was grey (silver-bearing?) and seemed rather dry, so I cleaned it off with solvent & a cotton swab (MS-580 which should have nothing to do with this, but here is is in case someone asks). I only had 'traditional' white silicone thermal compound so that's what I reapplied. Maybe it's not as good, but it's got to be better than leaving dust bunnies inside the PC.
So, is there a way to measure the CPU temperature and fan characteristics? I noted it was running, and felt normal when spun manually (magnet cogging trait like a BLDC motor).
As I explore my options (motherboard? power supply?), it occurred to me that the fan, while running seems quieter than I recall. The case used to vibrate at times (years ago), so we placed a thin strip of foamcore (1/8" art board material) under one edge of the case to damp the vibration. It doesn't care how one positions it now...which leads me to think the fan is too slow or is never told to run faster for elevated temperature.
Skipping a few steps ahead, if the fan PWM control is faulty, I assume that is on the motherboard and not in the fan. I saw other referrals to a website that started with 'A' that has exact MB's for sale @ $99.95. It occurred to me that the other i945/?775 MB 's they have starting at $29.95 are probably not going to work...but I'll ask anyway, at the risk of sounding naive...do I have to buy an exact replacement Dell MB to expect connectors to align and switches to connect compatibly etc.? Sure would be nice to have temperature monitoring back again ;O)
Interestingly it hasn't rebooted yet this afternoon. I'm not running the memory-intensive app, the ambient temp is 85 F, and when I first checked the Hard Drive temp earlier today it was 40 C and has only risen to 46 C. I don't know if that's indicative of sufficient airflow in the PC case or not (85 F ~= 30 C), so HD rise above ambient = 16 C after about an hour and a half.
The Dell software scan is still running...at least 90 minutes. I'm going to abort it & consider that to be a non-option.
Thank you
Murray
stevep397
55 Posts
1
August 7th, 2011 18:00
Try HWmonitor at Cupid. http://www.cpuid.com/ It will give you all your temps and fan speeds. There is a free version and a paid version. I find that the free version is sufficient.
Philip_Yip
7 Technologist
7 Technologist
•
16K Posts
1
August 8th, 2011 15:00
Try piriform speccy it tells CPU, Motherboard and HDD temperatures in mine.
Murrayatuptown
3 Posts
0
August 8th, 2011 14:00
Thanks, Steve3:
I tried both the free and 'pro' version. Free only shows the hard drive assembly and airflow, which read the same.
The pro version, which said 30 day trial, says 'trial' under the system temp sensor...who knew it was such a secret.
Still a mystery to me why the free version can't see it at all. I initially assumed there was none, or it was 'hidden' or at a non-standard address for proprietary reasons.
I wonder if the Dell diag s/w can 'see' it. (If it's even accessible to me as a download).
M
Murrayatuptown
3 Posts
0
August 10th, 2011 16:00
OK, I tried Piriform Speccy, Speedfan, and Aida64Extreme, and learned a lot about this PC, including that there is apparently no temp sensor that's accessible (Pentium 4 521). The CPU is supposed to have thermal monitoring software controls, but I have idea how.
I ran some benchmarks and stress testing, and was surprised how well the PC runs for its age...but it still rebooted today after a couple day reprieve.
I found some event error logs that indicated there were several recent errors identifying the LCD monitor properly...I don't know if that can contribute to coming up in unhealthy frequency modes and then cause 'flake outs'. A guy at work said he got sick of ATI driver behavior and got an Nvidia card instead.
I found the Dell login for downloading drivers as a group listing to be a dead-end because it's tied to the service tag, and if no longer supported by a contract, they just boot you out at the download stage, but it DOES filter the available drives to this PC's build. So I finally figured out how to download them 1 at a time. I tried installing the Dell 32 bit diagnostic Windows Graphical Interface s/w that came up in my list, as well as the Dell Desktop Utility.
The Diagnostic S/W just opened a CMD-type box which self-closed, leaving a process active (visible in Task Manager), but I can't find any sign of anything else installed or produced. The DDU s/w went through a substantial installation process, but same result...I can't find any sign of what it accomplished.
I'm going to try reinstalling a driver for a relatively recent LCD monitor replacement and swap the locations of the the two RAM sticks...see if it acts any differently by swapping location of any potential memory cell anomalies, and accomplish some vague bit of re-establishing more positive contact between the memories and their sockets...
If anyone knows what the Dell Diagnostic and Desktop Utility's offer, and how to make them work, that would be helpful.
I am going to try and figure out next how to acknowledge this thread as 'answered'. I DO appreciate the help, but will probably be back to leave more rambling...
Thanks
Murray