My computer restarts by itself. (reboot, overheating, reinstall, Windows)

[Tony22]

After I downloaded the McAfee software, my computer restarts by itself alot when the start up page comes on. The only way that I can go on the internet is through safemode. Do you think I have a virus? How can I fix it? Thanks.

[skel1977]

so did you uninstall mcafee then?

[thecoalman]

99.9% of the time when a computer abruptly stops and restarts it's caused by overheating, in safe mode you're using basic windows features which reduces CPU power and heat.

Have you cleaned it recently?

[EscapeCalifornia]

Originally Posted by thecoalman

99.9% of the time when a computer abruptly stops and restarts it's caused by overheating, in safe mode you're using basic windows features which reduces CPU power and heat.

Have you cleaned it recently?

That or a faulty driver, *cough* McAfee.

Hell, I once uninstalled the re-loaded but expired McCrappy trial from a Dell and had it give a BSoD on boot in either normal mode or safe mode with networking. The only solution was to uninstall the network adapters, including removing the driver software, and reinstall them. McCrappy is truly awful software.

[Peregrine]

99.9%?
No way.
99.9% of the time it is a driver issue.
When a PC overheats it will shut down. Period. Not restart.

[thecoalman]

I'm basing that on my experience, only ever saw that happen once because of a driver issue.

Originally Posted by Peregrine

.
When a PC overheats it will shut down. Period. Not restart.

Yes they will restart when overheating.

[Asheville Native]

Originally Posted by thecoalman

I'm basing that on my experience, only ever saw that happen once because of a driver issue.



Yes they will restart when overheating.

Every overheat I have seen killed the power. (shutdown indicated an orderly exit), just OFF. Failed fans, dust clogging heatsinks, and even a heatsink clip that broke. Get too hot -----> OFF.

Now lets throw some common sense troubleshooting at the OP problem:

• What is the last thing that was changed
• Installed McAfee
• Let's uninstall McAfee and see what happens

[NY Annie]

open it up and watch the chip fan - especially with the heat we've had lately. Eh, I was due for a new computer so bought a new computer and a chip fan at the same time. Step-son loves HIS "new" computer - upgraded him to my old dual-core and I got the quad.

[dkf747]

Originally Posted by Asheville Native

Every overheat I have seen killed the power. (shutdown indicated an orderly exit), just OFF. Failed fans, dust clogging heatsinks, and even a heatsink clip that broke. Get too hot -----> OFF.

Now lets throw some common sense troubleshooting at the OP problem:

• What is the last thing that was changed
• Installed McAfee
• Let's uninstall McAfee and see what happens

I will confirm the other poster's point. We had a PC doing the restarting itself over and over thing, and the cure was simply to clean the dust out of the case. That's all it took. Seems to confirm that overheating can cause this restart thing. However, in this case, the OP probably should uninstall McCrapee, er I mean, McAfee and install Microsoft Security Essentials instead.

[Asheville Native]

Originally Posted by dkf747

I will confirm the other poster's point. We had a PC doing the restarting itself over and over thing, and the cure was simply to clean the dust out of the case. That's all it took. Seems to confirm that overheating can cause this restart thing. However, in this case, the OP probably should uninstall McCrapee, er I mean, McAfee and install Microsoft Security Essentials instead.

OK, I learned something, never seen it an overtemp reboot. If my computer overheats I would want it to power off, instead of driving the CPU through another boot process, and another, and another ........ and so on. An unattended system could do that how many times before the thermal cycling causes the CPU to fail?

The red flag I see here is everyone jumped on heat problems when the OP clearly states that they just installed something, and now it is broken.

#1 rule of troubleshooting, if you do something, change something, install something, and it breaks it, then there is a high probability that the "something" that was just done is the cause, and the appropriate corrective action is to remove/undo that "something".