Pi shuts down soon after powering up at random points

I've tried mine connected to my old tv and after it stopped when i restarted it then screen flickered and the raspberry pi logo was in grey and my X session was in grey shades also. Maybe mine has a problem with video.

Is this connected via the Composite connector? If so that is normal behaviour if your TV cannot handle NTSC TV signals which is the default the Pi uses for the Composite connector.

To get PAL (colour) signals you need to add a line to the config.txt file in the /boot folder that reads:
sdtv_mode=3

I did as you said itimpi i've added the line but still have the same problem. I've created the file config.txt because i didn't had it.

Subsequent power cycles of the PSU result in shorter and shorter times between power on and the screen going black.

This looks like an overheated polyfuse. The polyfuse needs several hours to reset properly.

Thanks for the info. I've powered up the Pi, and checked the three fuses visible on the PCB with a infra-red laser thermometer. It can target a 5mm sq area, so is quite useful for checking PCB level component temperature. They (the fuses F1,2,3) all seem steady at about 29deg C after 10 mins power up.
A general scan of the board showed that the CPU's were hottest at about 30deg C.
I also checked for any volt drop across each fuse using a volt meter, each having 0.047v drop, indicating that the fuses are all closed circuit.
I agree that the symptoms would suggest a poly-fuse trip, but the tests i've just made done don't seem to tally with that.

Has anyone got anymore ideas? A very frustrating problem!
P.S the serial number on the underside sticker on my Pi is E2112RSV1.0B1.1

I've just contacted element14 and gotten the RMA and shipping labels emailed to me for the very same issues. I gave up...it's been too frustrating! Every time I thought the problem solved, it would just do it again randomly. I even had it on Google.com for a moment one time, thinking that the problem was over with...nope.
Exchange time.

I seem to be having the same issue with mine. I've tried multiple power adapters and SD cards and always the same results it crashes randomly after 30seconds to 5 minutes. Even if I just turn it on and don't do anything at all it will crash within 5 minutes. I can get into debian I can even run X and play around in the gui a little sometimes before it crashes, I've also tried openelec and it's the same. It works but it crashes within the first 5 mins.

I also tried booting up with just ssh enabled (only power and network) plugged in and it still crashes within about 5 minutes. So if I understand this thread properly it sounds like I have a defective board and need to RMA it? Also just in case it matters my serial number is FN1205293817.

I'm having a similar problem and also wrote a mail to farnell already...
Here's what I wrote to explain my problem and I just wanted to ask you guys if you have an idea what else I could try...I do not have a multimeter or infrared thermometer...

I finally received my Pi and of course I was very excited working with it.
But here is my problem:
The Pi regularly turns off suddenly, without the system shutting down or any premonition.

The time of the turning off varies, sometimes right after startup (for example when logging in), sometimes after having started the graphics server and installing something in the terminal etc. So it has nothing to do with what I'm doing with the Pi. It's even turning off when I do only have the Display connected (and of course a SD-card mounted) and I'm waiting a little.

I'm pretty shure it isn't the SD-card either, because I tried 2 different cards. The second one is a Mustang 8gb SDHC Class 10, which is in the Wiki-List of working SD-cards:
http://elinux.org/RPi_VerifiedPeriphera ... g_SD_Cards

To ensure it's not the HDMI-output, I also connected via the RCA-Video out.

I also tried different power solutions.
I plugged the Pi in my Motorola Smartphone charger, which should bring 850mA.
I plugged it in a powered USB-Hub, which didn't work either.
I tried the "always-on" Usb-Port of my Lenovo Thinkpad, which should bring 1000mA.
I tried powering it with a Y-Cable, combining all of the above.
Nothing worked.

I read the forum posts, but couldn't find a solution.

Can you help me? Or is my Pi broken?
I'm using the Debian Image from the Raspberry Pi Homepage. (19-04-2012).

Is it possible that my keyboard and my mouse cause the problems?

Is it possible that my keyboard and my mouse cause the problems?

I doubt it, but if you've got the same issue as me it's very easy to check. Unplug the keyboard and mouse and turn it on. I'll crash within five minutes, no need for me to actually do anything. You can also try it without the tv/monitor plugged in and just ping it from another computer to see if it crashes. If it's not crashing like that then perhaps you still have hope.

I'm using it in my tv via composite if when i turn on it's in full colors it will shutdown in a minute or two if it's in grey colors it will work a while i even have seen it work for more then 2 hours.
what causes the lack of colors?

Hi,

I have the exact same problem. I got my pi from RS one week ago.
I can boot it but after some time (from 20s to 2 min), it just shuts down. My screen goes off and only the red led stays on.

I've tried with 3 different power supplies from 700 mA to 2A, including the one suplied by RS which is a 1200mA one.
I've tried 4 different SD cards.
I've tried debian, raspbmc and openelec and all give me the same results.
I've also tried without any usb device, with just the network cable and checking the connection through ping requests and it still hangs.
Maybe I'll try with some cooling box to check if it's a temperature related problem.

I've checked how to exchange it with RS but I live in France and it seems that I have to pay the shipping cost to return it. It's around 17€, half the price of the pi.

Hi,

I have the exact same problem. I got my pi from RS one week ago.
I can boot it but after some time (from 20s to 2 min), it just shuts down. My screen goes off and only the red led stays on.

Are you using composite signal or hdmi?
If using composite after first time do you have full colors or just grey shades?

Hello everyone
I am having a similar problem with my pi shutting down not long after startup and have tried everything possible to narrow down the cause.

I seem to have got around it for now by blowing air from an 8cm case fan onto the rear of the board and I suspect the problem is with diode D17.

The pi has run stably for hours as long as there is some air moving over this area.
It will crash within 30 seconds if I remove the airflow.

I don't think it is fuse F3 because I tried with power to the micro USB and have also tried with power to the GPIO terminals.

I measure a stable 5.1V at TP1 and TP2.

Ambient temperature had little effect, but some airlow to the rear of the board has allowed me to use the pi for the last couple of days.

Could someone who is having trouble please try to direct some airflow to the rear of the board and post back with the result?

Perhaps if we can get an idea what is going on it may help to narrow it down to the power supply or a faulty board.

If anyone from RS is listening I would appreciate a reply to my emails or contact details for warranty.

Thanks
Daryl

I posted above about having this problem and since then I've sent mine back got a refund and got a new one. Took less then a day to get my new one from Newark (I'm in Canada). The new one works perfectly for me, it was definitely something wrong with the first Pi that I got because I'm using the exact same setup on this new one and it's been going for well over 6 hours now. I never got past 5 minutes with the first one.

Are you using composite signal or hdmi?
If using composite after first time do you have full colors or just grey shades?

I haven't had time to check with composite, I was using HDMI.
I sent it back to RS for exchange, I'm waiting for the new one and will tell if the problem was a faulty pi.

Just dropping in to say, that my RS Components power adapter is the cause for my Pi shutting down randomly. The MicroUSB connector is not a perfect fit and even the slightest shaking of the power wire can (or sometimes doesn't) turn off/reboot the Pi. Doesn't happen with my other power supplies, though. So my raspi seems to be fine.

But I suppose you could have a bad MicroUSB port at the Raspi end too?

I tried contacting RS Components on the issue, but not having received a reply after a few weeks, I guess I'll just cut the wire and plug em in the GPIO to ensure a stable connection.

Oh dear I do hope I am not in a "me too" situation, below is my post from elsewhere in this forum, basically the Pi needs Viagra as it cant keep it up for more than a couple of minutes

Initial feedback on Wheezy is excellent with a swanky new "raspi-config" that sets up a lot of the initial gotchas like HDMI screen size etc and the config file is now created and pre-populated with rem statements to un-rem to activate various features like overscan etc and even over-clocking (for the brave) but more than that I can't comment as all of a sudden my Pi has become unreliable, locking up, loosing USB and or network after a few minutes on either the previous reliable Squeeze build or the new Wheezy. Final testing was in headless / keyboard / mouse less just network and power ... not using it I kept a continuous ping going to it and it lasted 3 minutes sob what's up with my Pi?

viewtopic.php?f=28&t=7759&p=104094#p104094

Pi is unplugged in disgrace in the lab, will revisit in the morning just in case its poly fuses needed a good nap, otherwise ... is it back to Farnell?

Turned the Pi on this morning with my wireless KB (BTC9116URF) conected to a HDMI, wired Ethernet cable, TV and a Samsung 1000mA 5V charger off my Samsung Note. After boot up I did not touch but started a ping at 8:10 and lasted ok to 08:50 where I started X. Did not get this far yesterday at all (using a default image of Debian Wheezy) I know its the kiss of death but hopefully it was those polyfuse things. The only thing I did wrong yesterday was accidently plug into my laptop not the PSU ... to many wires about ... I guess the moral here is if it wont stay up go to bed and try again in the morning. Will play all day (work permitting) and post back later in the day about its stability.

Knew I had spoke too soon, after being up and happy since 08:10 I decided to turn the heat up, so I started the Wormy game going with its twirly graphics ... Pi fell over within 10 minutes, rebooted and fell over again within minutes, this time doing nothing not even the GUI up (was on phone) not sure if this is relevant but IC3 was getting almost to hot to touch, after 5 seconds had to remove finger.

Going to try it a couple of times again then underclock it ... think this needs to be escalated to Pi Powers that be

OK not a pretty picture this afternoon, basically left the Pi on as I worked and rebooted when I noticed it fell over.

11:50 startx
14:25 Reboot
14:27 Reboot
14:30 Reboot
14:45 Reboot
14:50 Reboot
15:45 Crashed ... left to cool down in disgrace

Gets very crash happy when I SSH to it but falls over on its own doing nothing too. Going to Under clock and repeat.

Similar story. Three different PSUs (all 1A+), several SD cards, various distros, but none would stay up reliably even with keyboards/network cables out.

I ran out of patience two nights ago and have asked for a replacement from RS, hopefully they have some spares for faulty ones.

Set the clock to 600 and started at 16:38 ran fine to 15:20 when I decided to sudo apt-get install VLC via SSH get very busy downloading until 15:12 then crash's when do I give up and declare it faulty? Anyone from the Pi foundation reading this? Where should I post for a definite answer?

Just to end my contribution to this thread, my faults were SD card related, faulty card was a Kingston 16GB Class 4, It worked fine cold but very random when warm. I have replaced it with a Lexar Profesional 32GB class 10 running Wheezy and it has been up for 24 hours now.

Have done a sudo apt-get update / upgrade and installed VLC, mounted my server in fstab and the Pi is playing videos over the LAN. OK its not watch-able as its stop start splutter but this is as much of a load test as I can do and the Pi appears fine. Hope that helps.

Im having the same problem here too. Its a real pain having waited for months for get my Pi and then getting a faulty one.
I emailed RS the other day just waiting on a reply to hopefully get a replacement one. Here's hoping I get a new one soon.

I have shipped mine back to RS.

Same issue with mine RPi.

Connected:
Power supply from RS
Network
SD card SDHC PRETEC 8GB Class 10
USB flash drive

apt-get update / apt-get upgrade working fine.

RPi started on Sunday at 20:00. Works fine.
First issue became yesterday Monday 09:30 when I try download over SFTP folder with music.
After downloading 25Mb from 40Mb device stop responding. (I can't reboot it, because RPI at home, but me on work).
Ok. Later evening I have reboot it manualy.

RPi have been manualy rebooted (by reconnecting from power supply) on Monday 23:00.

Next morning...
I have change default SSH port and try scan from my PC ALL opened ports on RPi.

PC scan ports ~1.5 minutes, and then RPi stop respond. Also it stop respond on ping.