I have a 233mhz Cyrix processor system (6×86/MX300) on a Tekram VIA P3 motherboard, (96mb RAM). When I recently upgraded from Windows 95 to 98 it started to intermittently reboot itself randomly there is no pattern to particular software running at the time it happens. I went back to a clean, fresh install of Windows 95 and the problem disappeared for about 6 weeks but has begun to reoccur intermittently. The system will reboot without me doing anything - I have seen it do it while I’ve watched and nothing is running apart from windows. Do you think this is hardware or software related and what action would you suggest? Before upgrading to Windows 98 I had used this machine for about 4 months without problems.

This problem is probably just a coincidence and is not related to your upgrade. It is very hard to diagnose and fix a problem like yours because there are so many causes that it is hard to narrow it down to one. Here are some ideas that may assist with diagnosing your problem: (i) Scan your system for viruses (ii) Is the problem only occurring when you are using a specific device? (eg. modem, printer, etc’¦). If it is then investigate that device to make sure that it is correctly functioning and make sure that there are no conflicts that that particular device is having with others. (iii) Maybe a component on the motherboard is running too hot? If the problem only occurs after the system is warmed up (eg. after 30min or so) a component on the motherboard (eg. CPU) may be running too hot. If this is the case I suggest you buy some fans for inside your computer (they can be obtained from electronic stores). You can find fans for CPU’s, Hard drives, and heat extractor fans for the actual air space inside the computer. (iv) Try running some DOS applications. If it runs fine there may be a problem with your installation (Windows is more sensitive than DOS is). (v) Use scandisk and Disk Defragmenter to scan the hard disks for errors and to defragment them. If none of the suggested solutions help I suggest you take your computer into an expert because it is more than likely a hardware problem.