Computer shuts down during instant play

[Jeanne Haber]

Is anyone else having this problem? After 20 minutes or so, sometimes sooner, my computer completely shuts down during an instant play movie. I was told by Netflix that this could be due to my video card. This is a recent problem. When I first joined Netflix, I was able to watch many movies on instant all the way to the end, But now I the shut down occurs every time I try to watch one.

[Knaldskalle]

Is it a sudden shutdown (everything just goes dead and your machine is shut off) or does the machine go into its "shutting down" routine first?

If it's sudden it might be overheating... If your computer overheats it'll shut down to protect itself. Does the fan go full tilt before your machine shuts down? You can have your machine "cleaned" or do it yourself. Dust is an effective insulator, so you may want to take a look inside your machine, if that's the problem. Be careful about static electricity, if you choose to do it yourself!

Do you have the same problem with other streaming services (e.g. hulu or longer youtube videos)?

[Jeanne Haber]

Thanks for responding. It's sudden. I'm not sure about the fan, but the laptop does get hot. Yes, the same thing happened at hulu.

I'm using a laptop connected to a second monitor. When I play it on just the laptop and reduce the color on my laptop from 32 to 16 bit, I manage to make it through a movie. But the picture quality
suffers. This suggests to me it has something to do with the video card, but I don't know that much
about it.

I've cleaned dust out of a desktop computer before but not a laptop.

[Knaldskalle]

Sounds like it might be your GPU (graphics card) overheating... I'd either take it in to have it cleaned out or do it myself. You should know that opening the computer on your own usually voids any warranty it may have, so only do it if you have nothing to lose.

I had a laptop overheating and the metal parts of the ports (for external monitor and printer) became burning hot to touch, definitely not something you'd want in your lap. Cleaning it out solved the problem.

It may also be that the fan has somehow come loose, so it no longer is as close to the processor as it needs to be. In that case you'll need to re-glue it and that requires a special "cooling gel" you can get at computer stores.

[BurnZ]

One simple thing to try, Sometimes computer can get a lot of dust in them causing poor circulation over the heat sinks, I would suggest getting a can of compressed air, and blowing out the computer. this way you don't have to open it. Just blow the air into each opening you can see (normally there's a fan blowing so you can feel around to find them all) Do this with the computer turned off and the battery out.

[Bill]

I think the new instant viewer doesn't prevent the computer from going into sleep mode or shutting down the monitor due to "inactivity". So most likely your computer is set to suspend after 20 minutes.

Video viewers aren't supposed to let the computers read as inactive otherwise you'd never be able to watch a DVD.

In my case my power settings just shut off the monitor after 20 minutes so I have to be sure to move the mouse once in a while or the screen goes dark while I'm watching the Instant View.

[Knaldskalle]

The OP describes how reducing the color depth "solves" the problem - and that eliminates your idea as a possible explanation.

[GnomeyNewt]

I know this is really old... but I am having this exact issue right now and wanted to share my observation. As soon as this started to happen, I cleaned the dust out of my computer. I just got this computer in May of 2010 and the issue started in Dec 2010. I have a GeForce GTX 260 video card and Thermaltake TR2 RX 750w power supply, so it should be able to watch Instant View pretty smoothly I'd think.

 

When I first started having this issue, we suspected it was the power supply or even my BIL that works at Microsoft said my cat was touching the power button on the back of my computer -- yeah right -- guess who gets blamed for all Microsoft issues around here! My computer literally just shuts off, no warning. I can turn it back on and it acts like nothing happened, just starts right up. All tests and BurnInTest runs smooth and no problems are reported.

 

I had recently started watching tv shows on the Instant Viewer, so I watched a crazy amount of hours on Instant View. I thought it could be a software issue (since I really don't want to deal with replacing my power supply) since it just started happening randomly and that was the only new thing I was doing on my computer. I stopped using Netflix Instant View for a few months for tv shows only. I still watched movies without issue. My computer did indeed stop turning off randomly.

 

Last week I just started watching TV again, forgetting my issue a few months ago because it disappeared. And again, guess what started to happen? My computer turned itself off randomly! It did it for 2-3 days in a row! After the 3rd day, instead of hitting refresh when I bring it out of sleep mode, I hit the back button and rehit the play button from the view movie page. The issue went away completely. Have not had the computer shut off once.

 

My conclusion was, since I watched only movies before, I never really put my computer to sleep with the Instant Viewer saved in my browser. But when I started to watch tv shows, I almost always put it to sleep in the browser because I would come back and keep watching the next episode. After 5-10 minutes after hitting refresh in the Instant Viewer, my computer would restart. To prevent it, you have to exit the Instant Viewer and come back.

Coincidence? I have no idea, but that is my experience.