iPC2 Randomly Switching Off

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thouky
Posts: 2
Joined: Sun Jul 26, 2015 5:41 am

iPC2 Randomly Switching Off

Post by thouky »

I have been using an Intense PC2 i7 as a firewall (Sophos UTM) for the last four months, but am having a problem with it spontaneously switching off roughly every 3-5 weeks. When this happens the only front panel light is a red 1/0 LED, and it is necessary to manually press the reset button to restart it. The firewall's logs just stop when this happens - there is no indication of any problems prior to the iPC2 switching off or of the shutdown being software initiated, so this looks like a hardware problem.

The iPC2 is running from a UPS and none of the other devices connected to it are affected, so it is not a mains supply issue. Also, the BIOS is configured to switch itself on after power is resumed (State After G3 = State S0), and switching the external power off and on again does cause it to boot normally.

The BIOS is also configured to support Wake on LAN. If a software shutdown is performed, leaving the iPC2 with just the red 1/0 LED lit then sending the WoL "magic packet" causes the iPC2 to boot as expected. However, after it has spontaneously switched off the "magic packet" is ignored; the iPC2 remains switched off.

What is the problem likely to be? How can I fix it? Are there any workarounds?

Alex

irads

Re: iPC2 Randomly Switching Off

Post by irads »

From your description it appears IPC2 crashes, rather than shutting down. Due to the rare and intermittent occurrence it may be difficult to pinpoint the root cause.
Memtest - exhaustive in this case - is highly recommended. If memory errors are found - replace RAM, if the behavior manifests more frequently, we can proceed investigation from there.

We can also replace the unit without identifying root cause, but then if the problem is not with the hardware itself it might persist.

Sent from my GT-N7100 using Tapatalk

thouky
Posts: 2
Joined: Sun Jul 26, 2015 5:41 am

Re: iPC2 Randomly Switching Off

Post by thouky »

I left MemTest86+ v4.20 running all RAM tests for 11 hours without a single error:
Image

I had to run MemTest86+ in fail safe mode otherwise it hung on start-up before running any tests. Is there any other test that you would recommend to help diagnose the crashing?

Alex

mbirger

Re: iPC2 Randomly Switching Off

Post by mbirger »

Three options availible:
1. You can try BIOS update/override - many times some variables are being cleared by BIOS install:
http://www.fit-pc.com/wiki/index.php/IPC2_BIOS_Update
2. You can run stability test on Linux Mint 17 or Windows 7
3. We can replace your IPC2 but cannot guarantee that it will solve the problem, as we believe it is a SW issue.

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