Absolutely nothing

[PeteSchiffer]

Hi,

This is an old machine, PI. I was hoping to use it for a bit of practice, but can't get that far!! Used to be my sister's, she just put it away when it stopped going.

The power supply seems to work, its fan goes, and so does the fan on the processor. I've got a couple of LED lights at the front, too.

But no other activity. No beeps, no screen.

Processor or motherboard? Or could something else be preventing any forward movement?

Pete

[YODA74]

Pete, It could be that the Battery is totally shot and lost it all, seems it's been put up a while and it is old Have you checked to see what kind of battery is in it if it is a barrel type,look around the base of it to see if it has been leaking? You will notice it right off! if it has then it may have shorted out the board?

------------------
Death has come to our windows.

-- Jeremiah 9:21
(undoubtedly a Biblical reference to a Microsoft product!)

YODA74@carolina.rr.com

[PeteSchiffer]

Hi Yoda,

Thanks for the swift reply.

It's the silver kind of watch battery. I think this machine was built in 97. I thought batteries lasted a bit longer than that. I'll have a look for another.

Pete

[PeteSchiffer]

OK, I've swapped the battery and that got me through post with single beep. (not a new battery, but obviously better than the last one)

Now I have a BIOS message "CMOS checksum error - defaults loaded"

I'm hung at this screen. There are two sticks of memory in, and the memory is reported as 8192K OK. The processor is a 166MMX, well, that's better than a plain 166 anyway! That isn't much memory, I would have thought 16 was OK for the type of machine (it's some sort of clone), but 8 is a bit low, isn't it?

It's an Award BIOS.

Pete

[YODA74]

Checksum of CMOS is incorrect, so the system loads the default equipment configuration. A checksum error may indicate that CMOS has become corrupt. This error may have been caused by a weak battery. Check the battery and replace if necessary.Thats pretty much what thats telling you.now we'll have to see if you can get into the Bios?
Give you a couple of different ways and see if it works,Have you looked for a jumper to discharge the CMOS?
It usualy sits alone, and consists of three pins with a shorting jumper over two of them. The position it is in now supplies battery power to hold the settings.
With the system unpluged, Moving the jumper to the other position for several seconds will wipe the settings. Put the jumper back and try powering up. If you can then enter setup, load system defaults.
If you can get a good look at the board you may be able to read silk screening that identifies the jumper. If not you can do it to all likely candidates with no harm done.
All initial boot screens that I've seen usually tell you what to do to either skip a particular test or which key to hit to access the BIOS or Setup. Getting into the BIOS is not a "piece of cake" for those who've never done it before. There is a very small window of opporunity to hit that hot key to be able to access it. In most cases, you need to be ready as soon as the memory check has counted through and before the second screen loads. As the memory counts up, start tapping the Delete key until the second screen loads and if that doesn't take you to the BIOS screen, Ctrl + Alt + Delete back and try the F1 key instead. If this doesn't get you anywhere, you need to hit the pause/break key during the first screen and write down all the alpha numerics in the botton left corner. Then visit Wim's Bios page to find out who made you motherboard and then try to find some manufacturer support for your problem or post back with what you've found.

You might want to wait for some other confirmation on all this there may be a simpler way I'm not known to be one of the most tecknical around here. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif



------------------
Death has come to our windows.

-- Jeremiah 9:21
(undoubtedly a Biblical reference to a Microsoft product!)

YODA74@carolina.rr.com

[mjc]

Also common when the battery is replaced or the memory is changed...the hang after POST kind of sounds to me like there may be a memory problem. open it up again and see how many sticks of RAM it has, and reseat them. Then reboot and enter BIOS, don't make any changes, just save and exit.

------------------
mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.

[psabi]

One other suggestion (following on MJC) is to make sure the memory is in the first slots available. On the motherboard next to the memory slots, look for something that denotes the order (ie. DIMM 1, 2 etc.) and make sure whatever memory is in the pc is in the first slot. 8mb is not alot for a machine even as old as as that; quite possibly someone "jacked" some of the memory and took the memory that was easiest to access in the machine.

In regards to your comment that a 166mmx is better than a plain 166, the mmx isn't as important as the increase Level 1 cache; a "classic" 166mhz has only 16kb of Level 1 while a 166mmx has 32kb of Level 1.

[PeteSchiffer]

Hi everyone,

Thanks for your input and help.

This is the situation now. I replaced the battery with an old one, which did the trick and I got the memory count and BIOS screen, etc. Then it hung when the checksum error was reported. (The position I was in at my last post).

I re-booted after a while and the problem seemed to disappear. No checksum error reported and no hang. Got into the OS, Windows 3.1 (fast!). So everything seemed fine.

Unfotunately this morning, I am back to square one. Exactly the same symptoms as originally posted. Nothing except fan, lights. Flat battery again. (You remember this machine was put away as not working - when it ran so easily with just a replacement battery I wondered if that indeed was all the problem was)

So, it would seem that something is flattening the battery. What would that be?

psabi, thanks for the information about the MMX and the cache levels.

Pete

[mjc]

Look for signs of corrosion where the battery is placed, also try a fresh one. Of course you could always leave it powered on all the time....

------------------
mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.

[PeteSchiffer]

I've popped the battery out again. It's as clean as a whistle in there.

I'm pretty certain the battery was up to the job yesterday evening. OK it's not new, but don't they die slowly? Or slowishly? I never set the time so I don't know if the clock was going slowly.

I'm suspicious though that this may be the real reason why the machine was originally set aside. Something is flattening the battery.

Pete

[mjc]

Chances are good that is why, it would be a little more than an annoyance to have to reset everything everytime you turned the machine on...

If you aren't really keen on the idea of letting it run 24/7 then consider the motherboard suspect and use the rest for spare parts....

------------------
mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.