One minute everything is fine, and the next? All shut down. The problem persists, but I have nailed it down to the case top/front panel headers, the panel itself.

Coolermaster added a ‘ground’ cable to the later panel headers, but the fix doesn’t work, at least for me it doesn’t. I know this because they kindly sent me a complete new top + panel for it.

I have since had a discussion online with a Coolermaster techie guy and he suggested that there is a bad ground somewhere, maybe in the surge protector or power supply. I might have taken these suggestion on board but for the fact that everything is fine if I use the header panel from another computer. Worryingly, even with the case’s native USB and audio ports disconnected, I only had to go near one of the ports at times and the computer would shut down.

Anyway, I have arranged to send the case back to Coolermaster for either repair or replacement, whatever Coolermaster see fit, and am presently anticipating the arrival of a returns label.

I have no doubt that Coolermaster are doing all that they can to resolve my problem, BUT I have serious misgivings about using it if they send it back ‘repaired’, and even have misgivings about using a replacement now.

A few days ago, I didn’t feel the same way and was looking forward to getting a new case, but the constant shutdowns have slowly taken their toll. A few days ago, I ran a System Health report and saw that three services had stopped abnormally and wouldn’t restart. Every attempt to use documented fixes failed, and yesterday, my Windows 8 installation started to collapse BIG time.

I lost all protection, including Windows Defender, the firewall, Volume Shadow copies, System Restore, anything and everything associated with recovery from issues. With what was left of Windows 8 that would run (the Modern UI gave out months ago), I cleared the first partition on my data drive, and have now re-installed Windows 8 on it. This morning, I set up everything that I use and the computer is again usable.

Whatever Coolermaster do, it had better work because I am about to cross the company off my Christmas card list. Not only do they not get a card, they lose any sale of a Coolermaster branded product to me in the future. I need and want reliability, and any company that does not give me this loses out. I don’t go back to anybody who has let me down. It is just the way I am..

HP are already on the list and I have NEVER knowingly bought an HP product, but the experiences of others and the exasperation that I have experienced while dealing with HP on behalf of some of my clients has been enough.

I will post an updated report as soon as I get something back from Coolermaster.