My computer is acting weird....

[BellGoRiiing]

I don't know what I did last weekend but it started acting very strange at the beginning of this week. It starts off by....er, not starting (at the starting screen it freezes up). I called my dad to come look at it when he gets home and told him what was going on, but right when he gets home around late afternoon the computer starts running perfectly. Well now its doing it again when he's not home and it's doing it again...Now, here's the really strange part that I just start noticing today that it is turning on....BY ITSELF!!! What the heck is going on here?!?!

P.S: I'm using someone else's computer for right now, and no, no one else is here right now so yes it is turning on by itself. If you know what to do (without making it worse) please help me. I scanned the computer last night for viruses and found nothing...cleaned out my computer even, apparently that didn't work either.

Thanks guys.

 

[Skyla Doragono]

Have you opened the casing recently, and did you make sure nothing odd (like a wire) was touching the motherboard?

It doesn't sound like an actual program problem, so much as a hardware problem.  If there's nothing touching the motherboard, you might have a wire in one of the power lines shorting out.  If it's turning on by itself, best thing right now is to unplug it until you're sure.

 

[BellGoRiiing]

Well, I did add a new graphics card a while ago...Well anyway I'll tell my dad about this when he gets home. Thanks.

 

[CatKeyz]

You might have an "auto-awaken" setting turned on in either the BIOS or within the OS settings. Some PCs can be set to "wake up" in the event of an incoming/outgoing network signal. They can also be programmed to turn on at a certain time.

 

[Queue]

USB devices interfere with POST startup, specifically large USB external harddrives or iPods.

Also what model and brand graphics card did you add? Unless your computer is crashing and restarting at any moment, it wouldn't be the graphics card interferring (Lack of wattage from common power supply).

 

[BellGoRiiing]

We tried everything...nothing works at all, tried using a non-USB keyboard, putting in the old graphics card. Even resetting the BIOS didn't work, he's saying that I may have a bad motherboard or something. I don't know, we're going to look at it some more this weekend probably.

 

[Rows]

We tried everything...nothing works at all, tried using a non-USB keyboard, putting in the old graphics card. Even resetting the BIOS didn't work, he's saying that I may have a bad motherboard or something. I don't know, we're going to look at it some more this weekend probably.

Try reformatting.

 

[___]

Ugh, reformatting, the most useless, ineffective and costly troubleshooting action ever!  Reformatting won't fix a problem rooted in the hardware or BIOS.

So, your computer coming on automatically:  first, are you sure it's not just going to sleep or and waking up?  Sorry to ask, but I've found that's the answer to that problem more often than you'd imagine.  Next up, it may be an auto-start feature in your bios: usually wake-on-lan or wake-on-timer.  Your power button may be stuck or malfunctioning, that's fairly common.  Finally, your power supply may be messed up. 

This is very rare, but it's possible for a short in the power supply to cause the PC to come on seemingly randomly in response to power fluctuations.  If it's turning on after, for instance, turning on a vaccum cleaner, or when your fridge compressor clicks on, or any other high wattage instrument gets turned on or off on the same circuit, this is your power supply bugging out (and shame on you for not getting a quality surge protector!)

The motherboard is a possibility too, albeit an unlikely one based on what you've described.  Before you go replacing it, try taking your power supply in to any computer service shop; any worth its salt will have a nice little tool to test it and shouldn't charge you a dime for it - the process consists of plugging the supply in, plugging this wallet-sized doodad to the business end and switching it on, then reading what comes up on the screen (or indicator LEDs if they have a cheapo one, mine has a sexy backlit LCD screen :D).

Anyway, start with the simplest solution (sleep/hibernation) and move toward more complex ones (bios, power supply).  I wouldn't rule out a virus at this point either, there are viruses that can mess with your bios settings.  Sorry to say, your antivirus is most likely only marginally useful - many viruses will slip by them or simply not even be detected by them.  Especially if it's McAfee or Norton (I consider MacAffee a virus itself, worthless piece of junk software), and especially especially if you don't let it update itself on a daily basis.  You may be suffering a combination of things, too; an aging power supply can cause instability and strange behavior, which may or may not be related to the switching back on problem.

 

[BellGoRiiing]

Huh....I could've swore I posted that I fixed the problem a long time ago...guess not, well anyways yea, the problem was fixed a long time ago.
EDIT: Ok well, subject change then this can be closed...I'm using a different computer while visiting my grandparents. The websites you see everywhere (this one included) aren't displayed properly. Is there a setting that I can change to fix this, its kind of annoying. Thanks.

 

[___]

May be an out of date browser. Post a screenshot:/

 

[BellGoRiiing]

Well, I actually made three...anyways I hope this posts correctly.

Spoiler

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f89/bellgoriiing/smashscreen.jpg[/img]

Smash Bros. site.

Spoiler

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f89/bellgoriiing/rmxpscreen.jpg[/img]

If you don't know what site this is then you have problems. :P

Spoiler

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f89/bellgoriiing/pogoscreen.jpg[/img]

Pogo's site, the top menu doesn't even show here!

How do you update IE anyways? This is version 7 by the way, I did do a Windows update but that didn't work either.

 

[___]

Yeah that's the latest IE version, it looks like your grandparents have CSS disabled.  This is usually because they have a custom stylesheet designed for the visually impaired, or just because they feel like it.  You can fix this by going to Tools->Internet Options, clicking Accessibility, and unchecking the box "Format Documents Using my Stylesheet".  You might want to check with them first, especially if they use a screen reader, as a poorly designed stylesheet can mess with their ability to function.

If that doesn't fix it, they may have a plugin that is disabling CSS for some reason or other.  Either way you'll be looking for a setting that either disables CSS or 'stylesheets' or else is replacing/overwriting them.  Good luck!

 

[BellGoRiiing]

Odd, can't find anything that would be disabling the CSS/stylesheet...and I checked (not that check, lol) the box like you said and its already unchecked...so...

 

[___]

Hmm, maybe they have a net nanny or some kind of bullshit security suite messing with it?  That's definitely a CSS issue.  Try disabling any IE plugins they're running.

Edit: I did some toying around and it looks like you may be getting CSS data, just not the colors, fonts or background images.  I assumed the rest was done by a custom sheet but after disabling just those features I came up with exactly what you have whereas I had a hard time reproducing it with a custome sheet.  Are there any other accessibility options set?

 

[BellGoRiiing]

Nope...I'm not going to worry about it anymore. Its their computer anyway and maybe they want it to stay like this...I should've brought my USB keyboard with me to use with the Wii.

 

[neomatrixjc]

Personally, it seems like you have a trojan, or you have a root kit, if it is a root kit it is lodged in you registry somewhere
i would also suggest using firefox over IE considering firefox is a safer browser to surf with

3 tips

Perform system restore
buy you some more ram if you dont have enough. more the merrier (only if you have a lot of stuff on your computer buy more ram and if your under a gig (u know get a gig)

how much space you have on your hardrive, try to keep a good bit of that their

defragment your hardrive if you havent done so

download ccleaner and use it to clean your computer

dont click on any fishy looking ads or download certain freeware

Decent advice but this post is almost 2 months old, don't necropost, grrr locked ~Nphyx