M6809 on battery sometimes just shuts down - Page 2

I almost never turn off my notebook, choosing Hibernation instead. It will usually happen after coming out of hibernation - usually I get about 30 seconds of action and then it turns off. It takes about three complete reboots before it stops crashing. But, this is only occasionally. Not every time I use it on battery power.

I called Emachines about the problem, They had never heard of it and suggested I change my battery. I said thanks and hung up.

My money is still on this being a heat sink seal problem, which for some is most prevalent when the thermal paste is cold (and contracted). It's telling that for most people once the unit warms up they have no problem. I know my limitations (and I have a BB extended warranty I don't want to void) so I'm not opening up my unit, but I wish/hope someone who is competent will check and repaste the heat sink to see if it solves the problem.

Highly unlkely it has to do with a contracting heat sink pad. That doesn't even sound reasonable considering the heat pipe/sink is mounted on the cpu with spring screws which constantly keep pressure on the cpu whether its cold or hot.

Just to let everyone know here, I have a bad battery and when ever i put it in the machine will not boot correctly inot Windows. It may take 2 or 3 tries to do it successfully. When i use my other battery it isi fine. Boots up into Windows without crashing. Try running it without the battery.

MH, obviously I haven't taken it apart to check so I don't know, but I'm basing my admittedly uneducated guess based on this thread about the M53xx series, where apparently instead of a pad Emachines used some type of paste:
If the M68xx uses a pad instead of paste I stand corrected.

I can reproduce the power-off (with fan on full) fairly easily...
Just put the laptop in the refrigerator.. I try to power it up after cooling it down and it will turn off in < 10 secs.

This is before the OS is loaded. I'm guessing the problem is either a flakey sensor or a bios issue. It really really doesn't look like a heat issue.

Note: You probably do not want to try this in a humid environment.

I discovered this "situation" while trying to use my laptop while camping in 40 degree weather. It took me about 5 power up attempts until the laptop booted to the desktop. After it is warmed up, I have no further problems.

Mark

A temperature sensitive bios?

Please reconcile this.

BTW, I had a shutdown again Saturday after the machine had been running for over two hours...

I was guessing that it's a potential bios issue because it might not be initializing a sensor port properly or clearing bad data coming out of hibernate mode etc... However, I have no knowledge on how this thermal protection is implemented. It might be pure a HW circuit that controls the thermal shutdown.

Is the fan software controllable?

Because I can get it to occur before the OS is loaded, I know it isn't a OS/software problem.

I only see this shutdown at initial power-up. I never had it happen after the laptop is up and running.

The fact that you see the problem occur after being up and running for several hours is an interesting wrinkle...

Mark

Bad/leaking capacitor on the motherboard maybe? Only way to know is take out the motherboard and inspect. I don't know if you want to do this though.

FWIW, I accidently put my laptop in its bag thinking I had hibernated it. 90 mins later I pulled it out and it was super hot, fan was running etc.

But it had not shut down due to heat and was working fine.

I'm not a hardware wizard but I'm thinking it can't be a heat issue.

Ok, don't know whether this relates to our problem but... there's a long thread here about a guy with a Medion RAM2010 with AMD Athlon 64 3000+ experiencing shutdowns very much like we are experiencing. Long story short (omitting all the fruitless software/OS reinstalls/tweaks), if you skip down to the message at "Date: 01/13/2005 11:16AM PST" (sorry no direct links to posts) you find this:
Followed a few post later by this at Date: 01/14/2005 12:24AM PST:
And this reply at Date: 01/14/2005 12:37AM PST:
I'm skeptical, but thought I'd pass it along here fwiw...

[Edit: I fixed the link. ]
And got a temp ban for ignoring all warnings!

Happens to me either way and I don't see any discernable difference in frequency between AC and battery. My crash frequency has picked up and it's now more likely to occur within the first few minutes after boot. It also occurs with some frequency during the resume out of hibernation or standby. Haven't had any associated wireless connectivity issues.

I'm having the exact same problem.

I keep the laptop running 24/7 on AC power, and for the first 8 months ran OC'd continuously, both FSB and GPU. Didn't have any problems. Eventually updated the BIOS and installed SP2, no noticeable problems after doing so.

Several months ago I experienced a couple of the random shutdown events. I don't remember whether the fans kicked on first or not. I assumed I was running it too hard, and set everything back to stock speeds. That took care of the problem... for the time being. Then I also got an AirDesk, which means it's sitting on a flat surface at all times instead of on my lap when being used, so that should have provided additional help with keeping cool.

Last night it shut down on me while surfing the web. I noticed the fan kick on full speed, and then down it went. No restart, just off. I fired it back up, then went off to other things, so it was just sitting there idling. About an hour later I heard the fan fire up then stop, so I went over and checked it, and it was off again.

I plan to open up the case and try to clean out any dust. But I'm not sure if that's really the problem. I would think the fans would run for awhile, and if it couldn't maintain temp, THEN it would shut down. Also, there's no way it should be overheating when idle, and somebody here said it never shut down when playing games, which I would think would be the worst case for heat. With the fan kicking on for a couple seconds then shutting down, I wonder if the temp sensor / fan controller is at fault, in which case, cleaning it out may not do any good.

FYI, my power settings are 'always on', hibernation is disabled, and I rarely put it to sleep. It just stays on.

<double sigh> How do these buffoons explain shutdowns occurring before the OS even loads...?

It has been happening to me a lot in the past few days including on AC power which bothers me a lot.

Any updates from the guys that are talking to eMachines?

Bingo...me too. Last night my wireless connection was screwy and I had to basically remove WEP encryption to get it going again. Only when I removed and reinstalled the drivers was I able to start again with WEP and get a connection.

Up until now, my wireless connection around my home has been rock solid. I think I have rebooted my router twice in a year.

Maybe that has something to do with it. Today it did the fan>shutdown thing while XP was beginning it's boot so it is not the OS.