Windows 8.1 Laptop Randomly Shuts Down

[McDougal66]

Hello all. I have an ASUS n56vj laptop running Win 8.1, and starting today, it has randomly shut down twice. No lockups- it's as if the power button was pressed on a hard shutdown. The first time, the system was idle, and the second time, I was using a graphics application.

Temps are at a normal 35-40c range during idle, checked with HWMonitor.

Could this be due to a faulty power supply? I would think not, because of the battery, but please correct me if I'm wrong.

Any help would be most appreciated.

Here is the last report from the event viewer. It shows the same for all 8 of the processor, like this one:

Log Name: System
Source: Microsoft-Windows-Kernel-Processor-Power
Date: 12/20/2013 6:45:47 PM
Event ID: 37
Task Category: (7)
Level: Warning
Keywords:
User: SYSTEM
Computer: Machine
Description:
The speed of processor 6 in group 0 is being limited by system firmware. The processor has been in this reduced performance state for 11 seconds since the last report.
Event Xml:
<Event xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">
<System>
<Provider Name="Microsoft-Windows-Kernel-Processor-Power" Guid="{0F67E49F-FE51-4E9F-B490-6F2948CC6027}" />
<EventID>37</EventID>
<Version>0</Version>
<Level>3</Level>
<Task>7</Task>
<Opcode>0</Opcode>
<Keywords>0x8000000000000000</Keywords>
<TimeCreated SystemTime="2013-12-20T23:45:47.041536900Z" />
<EventRecordID>15462</EventRecordID>
<Correlation />
<Execution ProcessID="4" ThreadID="544" />
<Channel>System</Channel>
<Computer>Machine</Computer>
<Security UserID="S-1-5-18" />
</System>
<EventData>
<Data Name="Group">0</Data>
<Data Name="Number">6</Data>
<Data Name="CapDurationInSeconds">11</Data>
<Data Name="PpcChanges">2</Data>
<Data Name="TpcChanges">0</Data>
<Data Name="PccChanges">0</Data>
</EventData>
</Event>

 

[SchizTech]

This could definitely be a RAM issue, if not a power issue. Is your battery charged? Will the laptop start unpluged from the power adapter?

This software is useful to test RAM:

http://www.memtest86.com/download.htm

or you can just try starting with one stick of RAM at a time to determine if the problem goes away with one stick removed (or the other stick, if one fails)

 

[McDougal66]

This could definitely be a RAM issue, if not a power issue. Is your battery charged? Will the laptop start unpluged from the power adapter?

This software is useful to test RAM:

http://www.memtest86.com/download.htm

or you can just try starting with one stick of RAM at a time to determine if the problem goes away with one stick removed (or the other stick, if one fails)

Thanks so much for the reply. It boots fine on battery. I'd rather not start deducing by pulling RAM sticks, so I downloaded the tool you linked to and put it on a USB drive. I've never had to go into the BIOS on this machine, so I'm trying to figure which keys to hit at startup! (Kind of embarrassing)

Also, the computer was not rebooting, it just shut down. It seems like an intermittent problem. I'm running the laptop off the battery to see if the problem resurfaces.

I read somewhere that the windows NVidia driver update was causing someone's to do this. For all it's worth, after reviewing yesterday's event log, it was having problems installing the new driver, but did eventually succeed.

I wish I could post the entire event log from yesterday, but of course that's impossible. Is there anything I should look for in it?

Thanks again.

 

[SchizTech]

To get into the BIOS you can press delete or F2.

How did you prepare that USB stick though, are you sure it's bootable. The file you downloaded is an image file (.iso) which has to be extracted in a certain way; you can't simply copy it to a thumb drive and boot it. If you have a blank CD you can use disk burning software with the option "burn image file to disk" or something like that depending on the particular program you have.

 

[McDougal66]

To get into the BIOS you can press delete or F2.

How did you prepare that USB stick though, are you sure it's bootable. The file you downloaded is an image file (.iso) which has to be extracted in a certain way; you can't simply copy it to a thumb drive and boot it. If you have a blank CD you can use disk burning software with the option "burn image file to disk" or something like that depending on the particular program you have.

On their site, it said to right-click and choose "extract to here." There is no option that says that, so I just extracted the zip file to desktop, then clicked the .exe as it said to. It set it up on the USB flash drive.

As for getting to the BIOS, f2 hasn't worked, not sure why. I'll try hitting delete. It seems to just load Windows regardless.

 

[SchizTech]

On their site, it said to right-click and choose "extract to here." There is no option that says that, so I just extracted the zip file to desktop, then clicked the .exe as it said to. It set it up on the USB flash drive.

Ah, alright. I'm used to things distributed as .isos and didn't notice the friendlier option on the site.

 

[McDougal66]

Ah, alright. I'm used to things distributed as .isos and didn't notice the friendlier option on the site.

Believe it or not, I can't get into the BIOS! I've tried both Del and F2! I've tried holding them down right after pressing power, mashing them, pressing them and then letting up, everything I can think of. Windows keeps loading. I have to say, I'm baffled. Nobody else with this laptop seems to have this problem. For what it's worth, just the ASUS logo shows on boot - no "press F2/delete" or any info like that.

On a side note, no random shutdowns since yesterday, but I haven't been on as much either. I did clean the connectors on the power supply, and near them I found a spot where something had freshly spilled. I don't know if that would have anything to do with it.

Thanks, I appreciate all your help.

 

[McDougal66]

Just following up here. No problems have surfaced since this. I suppose the system took care of itself. Thanks for all the help.

 

[General Devil]

If your pc also shuts down while booting, I recommend plugging the charger and removing the battery... It usually works better... Otherwise, just reboot until it works again...
Geeez, I hate Windows8...