What could cause a computer to do this?
 

What could cause a computer to lose power without being unplugged or shutdown? Im wondering cus i sold someone offline an hp tower loaded with xp professional and I think hes trying to scam for his money back. I have about 15 towers all used for tax prep last year in busy offices. All the towers were wiped with the recovery disk, making them like right out of the box. They wee all they put away in storage. I was planning on using them for tax prep this year but my biz failed so i had no use for them. So i let a guy know i was thinking about selling the towers to make a little cash.He jumped all over it and we arranged to meet the next day for the exchange. The night before i plugged in the tower cut it on, let it run about 5 -10 minutes, then cut it off. Im morning we made the exchange, but before hand i cut the tower on to make sure the tray was empty in front of him.

He claims he sent it overnight. So couple days later calls me to tell me there is a problem. He says that the computer wont stay on even though its plugged in the wall. He said hes taking the tower to a repair shop to have it looked at. To anyones knowledge what could cause a computer to not stay powered on once it was cut on? I think this guy is trying to scam me.

I think you should be asking Captain Ice Cream!
http://www.voudini.com/files/captainicecream.jpg

Take your pick...

Bad power supply
Windows
Fucked up bios
Fucked up CPU
Fucked up RAM
Scam artistry
Stupidity
Bad house wiring
Insufficient circuit breaker
Incompatible mods you don't know about
Bad power switch
Act of God
etc..... etc.....

:2 cents:

A bad flux capacitor.

A fried PSU is one option.

Does the puter power up then shuts down or does it not power up at all?

It's good to know he made sure the computer was plugged into the wall. :1orglaugh

If it's starting up, then shutting down after a few minutes, maybe the CPU heatsink became loose during transit.

Could be a bunch of things, he could just be lying. Post up what he says the computer repair shop says.

I certainly hope you got it insured when shipping it. Meaning he should simply be able to take up his grievances with the USPS. If something happened to it during shipping, and you had it insured, it's not your problem anymore.

My guess, he's scamming you, Bad PSU, bad PSU connection to motherboard, CPU over heating. If he's taking it to get checked, demand to see the diagnosis from teh repair place before offering anything back to him.

It booted when he came and picked it up. That's all you need to worry about. He could have done a number of things to it in the meantime.

When I sell shit like this, I always include a receipt stating that the item was sold in as is condition. In fact, I put that on all my eBay auctions too.

Cover Your Ass.

LOL this guy calls me yesterday to tell that now the computer is freezing (no mention of the previous issue) and he said he still gonna pay to have it sent to a shop, i said ok then he says that maybe i could send a new harddrive (lol) or new tower then he will send the other back so i can have it inspected...at this point im just letting him have as much rope as he wants but he will never get a dime back from me, i smell scammer all on him one thing about being a webmaster you come across alot of bullshitters so now im kid of sensitive to it.

You said he sent it overnight? So he shipped it to himself somewhere else? Ask him if he insured the package because more than likely it was damaged in shipping as he saw it worked fine before he bought it.

Maybe it's a heat issue .....

http://i768.photobucket.com/albums/x...n_computer.jpg


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maybe overheating, is it dirty inside?

I guess you RAM is damaged or sit out possition.

Bingo bango :2 cents:


If the heatsink/fan is not on properly (or filled with crap/dust) the temperature can stroll all the way up to 80c then the bios will tell the computer to auto shutdown to prevent damage to your system.

It also might be a PSU issue

it's all a "temporary" problem

I think the owner suffers from something called stupidity.