DELL OptiPlex GX270 - Random Black-Outs

[Bavon1]

Before the chorus of groans becomes deafening; please lend me your virtual ears a while.
After a long abstinence from PCs, the gift of 100Mb Broadband made me dig out an old P6BAT-ME PIII and get going. Then by mischance I've acquired an OptiPlex GX270 (P4 HT 2.6 gHz) which seems quite light speedish in comparison. However the OptiPlex takes about ten tries to boot up then it will black out at random moments. I happen to have another GX270 PSU but changing made no difference. I'm about to link the two 210W PSUs together in order to rule out low power. I've tried onboard video, AGP and PCI video with same results.
I know some of you will think me mad, but I quite like the GX270 when it works and I cannot afford anything tasty at the moment. SO does anyone have any suggestions for problem or are there other misfits like me out there who would like to share info?

[Mousey]

If there wasn't sufficient power the system wouldn't start. I'm thinking the random blackouts could be due to overheating, Try installing CoreTemp (http://www.alcpu.com/CoreTemp/CoreTemp.zip) and tell us what kind of termperatures you're getting

[swimtech]

I know of a specific problem with these...

Check the capacitors behind the processor socket (get the fan with the green hood off to look down on them easily if needed) and check to see if the tops look swollen. If not those, then check the capcitors next to the memory slots, they may have swollen tops too. These swollen caps sometimes leak out some orangish/brown gook. It's generally pretty obvious...

Have you seen a thermal event error message on your screen at any time? Thats also indicative of bad mainboard capacitors.

Ive seen thirty or forty of these - and the extension on the warranty for the mainboards with the bad caps ran out in January just past, so if the caps are bad, you'll need to hunt one on Ebay, a computer shop, or you could buy one from Dell (ouch...).

[H3X4D3C1M4L]

Yeah swollen capacitors would explain this problem quite easily.