Do I Need to Replace the Motherboard?

[rvanover]

I'm working on a friend's Windows 7 Small Form Factor Dell GX745. The PC is usually quiet, but lately after running normally for several minutes or hours, the CPU fan starts running wildly, the video shuts down, and the PC locks up.

Thinking heat to be a possible cause, I cleaned the CPU and the Heat Sink and reapplied thermal paste. After the problem reappeared, I replaced the fan. That 'fix' also failed. The ThermalTake PSU Tester finds no problem with the power supply. Can I assume, it must be the motherboard or have I missed something?

 

[Chicano]

You may have missed the BIOS power options settings... look for something related to CPU fan speed control, Intel Active Management Technology (AMT), hardware thermal control.

Also check the Windows Control Panel / Power Options / Power Plan... see if setting the High Performance power plan helps.

 

[rvanover]

Thanks for your suggestions.

Dell's proprietary BIOS has no options for controlling the fan or monitoring heat unfortunately. The current power option is set to Balanced. I would add that the GX745 is a rather small desktop PC that is only used for email, web surfing and occasionally creating a document. It's run fine for a couple of years since she acquired the PC. Whatever is causing the problem has only recently surfaced.

 

[Chicano]

OK, so the Windows power plan settings may do what it takes to manage the way the CPU and cooler fan run. Some power settings from the BIOS change the Windows settings as well, and the Windows settings can also manage the BIOS settings. So it's a matter of setting Windows to the High Performance power plan, and see if that manages the hardware properly.

 

[rvanover]

I selected the High Performance Power Plan per your suggestion and left the PC running normally (as in usual after bootup). I returned to check on it later 3-4 hours later and the fan was racing, the display was down and PC was no longer responsive.

Thanks for the suggestion. I'd welcome any additional thoughts.

 

[Chicano]

OK, the high performance plan may not be enough, it still has power saving characteristics... the idea is to have the computer running if the power saving options were completely shutdown as these may be interfering with the issue... and the actual issue may be hiberfil.sys file corruption, this tends to happen after a while of the computer kept running and sleep mode being used instead of shutting it down... So, I would need to know how often is the computer fully sutdown, that is, powered off completely?

To leave the High Performance Power Plan intact, you can create a new power plan, and remove all the shutdown settings so the screen, hard drive, CPU, fans, are set to never so the computer doesn't shutdown. this would help diagnose the issue.

I would also suggest you shut the power options down. This could be easily done in Windows XP, and not as easy in following OSs. Shutting down can delete the Hiberfil.sys contained data which is relative to programs and files active data while the computer is in sleep or hibernation mode. Also manually deleting the hiberfil.sys file can clear corrupted data that can cause the system to go into a similar state as you are experiencing. Shutting down and powering off the computer also deletes information from the RAM modules which is there temporarily while the computer is in sleep mode.

Enable viewing hidden files and OS protected files from the Tools menu / View, next see if you have access to the Hiberfil.sys file and delete it... and restart the computer. If you cant delete the file, use the method described in the Howtogeek article.

Disable Hibernate (and Delete hiberfil.sys) in Windows 7 or Vista
http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/15140/what-is-hiberfil.sys-and-how-do-i-delete-it/

It may also help to reset the BIOS with battery off for 5 to 10 minutes... during those few minutes, remove the power cord and push the power button and hold it down for a full minute... this should clear any residual power from capacitors and components and remove any memory left in the RAM modules, as well as information stored in the hiberfil.sys (hibernation & sleep mode) and pagefile.sys (virtual memory) system files.