Question PC randomly shuts down and reboots random intervals

May 4, 2019
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Hey there,

A friend of mine gave me his PC after telling me that his computer randomly shuts down at random intervals. He can be playing games for 6 hours straight with no issues, then all of a sudden his PC randomly shuts off and starts rebooting on its own frequently.

At first, I thought it was an overheating issue, I changed his heat sink which was pretty old, changed his case and applied new thermal paste. After this change, his temps were between 60-70 degrees during an intense gaming session. However the problem persisted. My second guess was a faulty PSU. He had an old 450W PSU that couldn't provide enough for his specs. (Specs listed below). So I proceeded and changed his PSU for an EVGA 650W 80+ bronze. After changing his PSU, his problem seemed to be gone for a few days and there it started again. Random reboots and crashes.

Proceeded and changed his RAM sticks (He used to have a 2GB Kingston stick and a 4GB Crucial stick) to 2x4GB G.Skills Ripjaws DDR3 1333MHz along as adding him a new SSD. Problem is still present. I am completely lost as to what could be the problem.
I tried putting his GPU in my computer and the PC never crashed and his GPU was able to sustain full load stress testing for a good hour and a half without any signs of overheating, tearing or problems. So I'm pretty confident that his GPU isn't faulty.

Do you guys have any ideas on what the problem could be? I'm at a complete loss. All the cables are well plugged, the PC is not overheating, memtest passed successfully, PSU is brand new and perfectly fine when tested on my rig, GPU seems fine.

EDIT: I also did cleared CMOS.
His specs:
M/B: GA-EP41T-UD3L
CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Q8200 @ 2.33GHz
PSU: EVGA 650W 80+ Bronze
GPU: EVGA Geforce GTX 760
OS: Windows 10 Pro x64
SSD: Silicon Power 1TB-SSD 3D NAND A58
Case: Zondda DIY Orange
RAM: 2x4GB (8GB) DDR3 G.Skills Ripjaws 1333MHz

My specs (if needed):
M/B: MSI Z390 Gaming Plus
CPU: Intel Core i5-9600k @ 4.4GHz (OC)
PSU: EVGA 750W 80+ Bronze
GPU: Zotac GTX 1070
OS: Windows 10 Pro x64
SSD: Samsung Evo 860 250GB
HDD: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 5400RPM
RAM: 2x8GB (16GB) DDR4 G.Skills Ripjaws 2133MHz
 
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May 4, 2019
3
1
15
Thanks for the replies. I tried putting his motherboard in my case (where I'm sure the switches are working) without connecting the reset switch. The problem still happens.

However, I noticed something. I ran Furmark along with Heavy Load to stress the computer completely and his PC seems to crash between 3-10 minutes after the test. I tried opening his case and keep the case open and the test managed to run for an hour and a half before crashing. Could this be luck or could there be a heat issue I'm not aware of? I'll try setting up a fan in front of it see it changes anything.

Finally, is there any way to test the motherboard to see if that is failing?

Thanks again for the answers.
 
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