Stumped

[suzyq67]

I have a friend that has a Celeron 333 slot 1, with a chaintech motherboard. Lately it has been freezing at the virus checker and will not start even after a shutdown. She brings it to my house and it boots fine...she left it here for 3 days and didn't freeze once. She took the computer home and works great for a month and then freezes again. I have checked the memory, chip and board and all seems okay...no overheating or such. The problem is strange cause it doesn't happen here on there...and after about a month. She made no changes to the system...and has been running fine up until now.
We would appreciate some suggestions cause i am kinda stumped

[kazuza]

The problem most certainly are the environmental conditions in her location.
Advise her to move the computer to a more ventilated area and AWAY from moisture, as that can ruin a good machine!

[suzyq67]

the computer has been in the same spot for almost 2 years and has only now developed those symptoms....do you think that is still enviromental...the cd rom quit just as the problems started i was wondering about power fluctuations....damaging something....but you would think that would show up all the time not intermittenly....do you think bad motherboard??

[BipolarBill]

I would suspect a worn out video card. I find that the TNT2 M64 works well on those Celeron geezers. ;)

[smily_03]

i'd guess power problems. if the psu doesn't get the correct sine wave input (sorry geek talk), from noise, etc. or if the voltage is too low or tends to bottom out (the lights would dim, etc.), then strange problems can happen. try getting a noise suppressor for the power going into the comp. also, you can try moving it to a different location away from things such as refrigerators, air conditioners, or anything with a big electrical load that starts and stops.

[DocEvi1]

could it be something like mobiles / telephone mast? I would tend to follow Bipolar's advice tho.

Stefan

[smily_03]

well, my cell phone would make my tv speaker pop when i had it on nearby. i'm just doing the improper power thing from experience at work...we had a mac tower that wouldn't power on in the old science building with its equipment running, but in the tech office it would work perfectly for weeks on end. then we'd take it back to the professor's office and no power on again (yes, the outlet worked).