3/60 reboots itself

[Steve Elias]

naturally, we have service calls in about this...  but even with the
backlog on sun-spots, you folks out there might have some timely
information for me...

problem:  3/60 with color monitor, 4M add-on clearpoint memory, box hill
327M scsi disk...  it reboots itself randomly during mundane tasks like
editing using gnuemacs.  the reboot does not give any of the symptoms of a
software error -- no panic or dump (we think).  is it possible that all
indication of a software error would be lost if we didn't have proper
setups for a dump area?

the reboot causes the screen to blank -- as if someone did a "k 2" from
the monitor prompt.  

another random question:  is there anything that a scsi disk could do
which would cause such behavior?  

by the way -- this is occurring with the 4.0 generic kernel.  i am
reconfiguring a 4.0.1 kernel for the machine to see if it gets happier...

guesses and/or advice welcome...  thanks in advance, folks...

steve elias
(eli at spdcc.com)