[SOLVED] PC shuts down with no warning

[ollyfitz]

Hi All

I have a custom refurbed gaming PC that has a fault.

System:

NVIDIA GTX 1050Ti 4GB GDDRS
Core i5-2400
16GB DDR3 SD RAM

I had a problem with the hard drive originally so installed a new one myself and also installed a better quality psu in about spring time last year.

PSU I installed was a Corsair TX550M.

A few months later I started occasionally getting an error message on start up saying: Memory size reduction.

A few weeks after that my computer started shutting down without warning as if experiencing a power cut. This started occasionally but now occurs after about an hour of being powered up, whether I’m using it or not.

Also, going into bios I’ve noticed only 8gb of the 16GB ram is installed in two slots,the other two slots showing empty although the modules are still there.

After a bit of my own research I’m tempted to buy new ddr modules and install them to see if that fixes the issue but I’m also wondering if I’ve made a mistake in installing the psu or something that might have caused it and therefore would be wasting my money on new ddr. Would faulty ddr cause my pc to shut down like this?

So should I go ahead and install new ddr modules or is there anything else I should be considering first?

Many Thanks for reading.

ps

I did check to see if anything was overheating and all seemed ok and pc shuts down whether I’m using it or not.

 

[DRagor]

wondering if I’ve made a mistake in installing the psu

If you installed if properly then no. Considering system works well overall I'm assuming you did install it correctly.

Would faulty ddr cause my pc to shut down like this?

Not likely. However you don't know yet if that's a bad RAM or something else, like motherboard fault.

So should I go ahead and install new ddr modules or is there anything else I should be considering first?

First you should check if indeed your RAM is bad. You need to use one stick at a time to find out those that are faulty (if any are). If all four sticks work alone then it would point out to a motherboard problem.

 

[punkncat]

I think @DRagor is on the right track, particularly in his advice to check each stick. Do the RAM sticks show in BIOS?

Probably would be a good idea to check all connections and reseat all of the components.

Check Event Viewer and to a lesser degree Reliability History and see what comes up there.

The i5 2400 is getting some age on it now. You issue could be a sign of that starting to fail.

My thoughts on this would be not to spend a whole lot of time chasing and in particular ANY money trying to fix this. A modern i3 and new mobo/ram would FAR outperform the current system and could be had for less than $300, perhaps even $250 or so with judicious shopping.