Date: Fri, 29 Dec 2000 23:15:59 -0000
From: "Matthew Hanson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Off topic: BIOS boot problems
David,
Your're just as amazing as ever!
>Check battery on Motherboard. Dying battery will cause these symptoms.
I've been leaning to power at some point being the problem, and was
suspecting the battery. But then I wasn't sure if the system really needs
the battery after it's fully booted. As I HAVE reached the Windows desktop,
and have been able to run Windows for a couple of minutes, I began to think
the problem was NOT the battery. Could a bad battery affect the system
after a full successful boot to Windows?
>Check RAM. www.simmtester.com for their DocMemory DOS memory tester.
Great... I'll check this out... and maybe swap some memory from another
system.
> Check HD.
Huh :-P The HDD that was originally in the system with the natas.mp virus
on it died when I switched the jumpers to make it a slave drive. BIOS (or
something that gave me a message while testing) reports that it can't see a
boot sector on the drive anymore. BIOS see's the drive and can set it up,
but can't see the MBR.
I had to execute "FDISK /MBR" to clear the virus, but I think the MBR was
never right after that, and switching the drive to slave pounded the last
nail in its coffin.
>Scandisk thorough to make sure nothing's wrong with the MB.
Well, I've run ScanDisk enough times! However I haven't looked at any
report. I wasn't aware it checked problems with the MB. I'll set it up to
make a report if it's not already configured.
>Open case and check for dust bunnies and non-operational CPU fan.
This all seems okay... the fan and CPU seem to be fine, and there seems to
be no overheated components as far as I can sense. The CPU, memory, cards,
and MB components don't seem to be overheating at all. I don't know about
inside the power supply. I knocked a couple of those little bunnies inside
when I was cleaning it all theother day.
However a guy over at the PC Hardware Forum at Compuserve pointed out
(without my having mentioned the dead HDD) that the virus may have destroyed
some other hardware in the system, from memory, to CPU to any boards in the
system. I thought I'd remove all cards, and put in another video card and
see what happens.
> Update BIOS to latest version. Older BIOS versions may have problems
>with Windows 98SE.
Yeah... I was wondering about W98-SE conflicts... but with the system only
working for 30-240 seconds without freezing, I'm real reluctant to flash the
BIOS. Though I might pull an old HDD with W95 set up, and try that in the
system.
Thanks for the feedback David. Hope the weather is as good over there off
the 405 as it is here by the 710!
Ciao,
Matt
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