When I came home today the blower was on in the house, but the air wasn't cool. I turned off the unit on the thermostat and waited an hour or more (ate dinner, actually). I flipped the thermostat back to call for cooling, then I walked outside to check the "load control" indicator, which said the appliance was enabled (ok). While I was standing there (the fan had been "on" the whole time), the fan stopped for about one second, then it started again. The blades never spun down to a stop, but the hum quit, and it was obvious it was "off" momentarily. The load control indicator remained unchanged, so I don't think it has anything to do with that. It seemed to me like some kind of internal reset. But it was ineffective: no cool air in the house, and no warm air expelled from the condenser unit. I tried powering the condenser unit off for 5 minutes and then on, but it didn't help, same symptoms (no heat expelled, pauses every minutes or so).
This is a 14 year old unit, by the way, and as far as I know the only repair or maintenance was that a capacitor was replaced. That was a couple of years ago, or could have been last summer, I guess.
What does this sound like? A bad compressor?
--Dale--