I can only guess what might be happening with your computer. It could be a faulty power supply. Is it shutting off completely or is it shutting down windows right away? I’m no tech expert, but I’d like to help if possible.

The computer shuts off completely, no warning. The screen fades to black and bam, it’s off. It might be the power supply, I’ve had a few people suggest that already. The RAM is another issure brought to my attention, but I’m not sure.

It may also be overheating, so maybe the fan isn’t doing it’s job, but as far as I can tell, it’s working, and I don’t get a “your computer was not properly shut down” message when I restart, which is odd in and of itself.

It could be overheating as well. I don’t know your setup, but if you have your computer out in the open (and if you have cats), dust and pet dander can clog the fan intakes pretty quickly. A can of compressed air can clean out the gunk and sometimes fix issues like this. It could also be the RAM going bad, but that is a bit harder to test without going out to buy some and randomly test. I would definitely check the fan spots to see if they’re clear.

Brian, thanks for the second opinion. I’ve gotten in the habit of shutting down the computer when I’m not using it and thus far it hasn’t been turning off on me, so I suspect it is the fan. Also, Ein’s fur seems to get on everything, and I’m sure there’s some in there, haha. I happen to have a can of compressed air on hand, so hopefully that will solve the issue if it jumps up again. Thanks again for your help.

Excellent. Luckily, a new fan is fairly cheap. That can of compressed air is definitely going to help out if this happens in the future. Is there a way you can move your computer into a small cabinet or otherwise enclose it? That would definitely cut down on the hair and dander.
I’m glad I could help!

Well, it’s a laptop, so unfortunately i can’t just stick the CPU in a cabinet away from dust and Ein fur. I try to keep it as far from his high traffic areas as possible, unlike in the old place when it was right next to my bed and he would jump up and hack it, haha.

Yeah, I guess it’s hard to keep a laptop away from fur when Ein is jumping up and practically throwing his fur at it!

[...] those interested, the delay was caused by a few contributing factors. First, my computer decided to consistantly shut down on me without notice. After fixing that problem, the screen stopped working, so I had to get a new monitor. Within a [...]