Advice on a PeeCee

[Holley]

How often do you see a bios chip without a motherboard attached?!  If it won't boot at all you can't re-flash easily (it's more than likely surface mounted - look for an 'Award' hologram on PBs).

If you had an A4000T that wasn't booting you'd bother with that kind of attention, it'd be like having a vintage Ferrari with a blown engine - if you had a rusty Fiat Uno with a blown engine would you do a ground up restoration?

[JaXanim]

Blimey, my freebee PeeCee is not what he thought it was!

I've just managed to get the unpowered hovercraft engine off the cpu and it turns out to be an AMD-K6-2 stuck in a Socket 7 socket. What speed would that little beauty be?

[EDIT: It's 300MHz]

How do I get it out of the Socket 7 socket?

The RAM card says it's PC100 DRAM 32Mb, which sounds familiar. Alongside, there's a second DRAM slot, which presumably will take another 32Mb stick?

[EDIT: I've got two 128Mb sticks of 168-pin 50ns EDO DIMM,
will they be any use? They are physically the same size as the old stick and fit in the socket]

The whole mobo is very thin and flimsy. I have to wedge a pencil under it to push the RAM back it. Scared of busting it, but that's academic now, I guess.

Sooo, I need another Socket 7 PC100 mobo, is that right?

Should I swap the AMD for something else? If so what? I'm unwilling to spend more than thirty quid on this box'a'tricks. Can I get a Socket 7 mobo and an old Socket 7 Pentium whatever for thirty quid?

And what about a graphics card? There seem to be plenty of spare slots of one type or another. Are these things tricky to set up? Is it beginning to sound like a fifty quid project? Is it worth it?

I do need at least a basic PeeCee for some important docs I've got to print.

As before, advice very welcome!

JaX

[adz]

More than likely the machine needs a propriatory psu, if thats the case, forget about getting the existing mobo up and running, you may even have trouble with the power switch on a new mobo. Getting the CPU out should be pretty simple, remove the heatsink and lift the little level next to the socket, if that doesn't work, the CPU itself may be glued in (a little trick big manufacturers used to use to discourage upgrades). As for the RAM, unless the board supports EDO, you can't use it, even though the RAM may look the same its not. Your best bet would be to abandon this little bundle of headaches and look for another freebie.

[spirantho]

If all you need is a mobo/RAM/CPU...



.. pay postage and you can have one of these spare ones.. they're not being used.

Be warned, though, Packaged Hell use non-standard cases, so you might need one of them.

[mikeymike]

The floppy light never comes on, even with the Win95 boot floppy in it (have that thankfully).

That could just be because floppy boot and seek are disabled.

So when you switch the machine on, exactly what happens?  Display?  Keyboard light flash?  Any beeps?

[drwho]

Sounds like most PC's to me, "works as designed" ;-)

Sorry, I couldn't resist ..

- Mike

[JaXanim]

@mikeymike

Other than the power-on LED, there are no lights at any time. Not from the keyboard or floppy drive. The floppy drive was working before I got the machine. And there are no beeps either. There is no display output on the monitor which came with it.

Other than the HD spinning, the thing seems dead. Remember I fitted a new ATX box to replace the original, which had blown out at least two capacitors. That event probably killed the mobo, eh?

Cheers,

JaX

[JaXanim]

@spirantho

Blimey m8, that's a very generous offer!

I'll PM you on this.

Cheers,

JaX

[Holley]

Do get a new case, though you'll then have a spare PSU ;-)

A K6-2 300 is worth about £2.50, provided it's not glued in.  Like I said, strip the drives & new PSU and bin the rest.  £50 is worthwile for a working PC, because then you can use UAE and AROS :-) on a Pentium 200 UAE can go A500 speed.

[JaXanim]

@Holley

Two pounds-fifty eh? Then it looks like it'll all end up on our local Dumpit site's 'retail counter'!

I may go for a new case, especially with the help offered by spirantho. Depends if I can fit one of his mobos into the Dreaded Packard Bell box. I'll try that first.

Cheer,

JaX

[mikeymike]

JaXanim wrote:
@mikeymike
Other than the power-on LED, there are no lights at any time. Not from the keyboard or floppy drive. The floppy drive was working before I got the machine. And there are no beeps either. There is no display output on the monitor which came with it.
Other than the HD spinning, the thing seems dead. Remember I fitted a new ATX box to replace the original, which had blown out at least two capacitors. That event probably killed the mobo, eh?
Cheers,
JaX

No CPU fan either?

Try removing everything (CPU, RAM, graphics etc) except the case connection for the switch and obviously the PSU connection.  The system should beep (I can't remember what sequence of beeps) at you.  Then progressively put the rest in on each success.

Old ATX motherboards are temperamental.  Sometimes for "no apparent reason", they stop booting, and just removing and reinserting fixes the problem.

[JaXanim]

@Mikeymike

Yes there's a fan, but it's never been connected to any power.

OK, I'll try your suggestion. Maybe if it works, I can use the mobo as a doorbell?

Cheers,

JaX

[odin]

JaXanim wrote:
OK, I'll try your suggestion. Maybe if it works, I can use the mobo as a doorbell?

:lol: Better turn it into a bell ;-) (as in church/ship-type of bell...).

[JaXanim]

@Mikeymike

OK, I stripped it down to the completely bare mobo and switched on. Zilch! No beeps, only the sound of the power pack fan.

Once on, the on/off switch on the front of the case wouldn't turn off the power. The power fan kept running. The switch didn't switch off when held for thirty seconds (someone said it should)..?

When I turned off the power on the ATX box itself there was a weak kinda noise from the speaker. It wasn't a beep, more like a faint screech/death-throw..!

What's up Doc? It's dead isn't it..?

Cheers,

JaX

[JaXanim]

@odin

Now that's just silly. I think a doorbell would be much more useful!

Cheers,

JaX

[BouncingAyatollah]

Don't forget you need the speaker connected to hear any beeps (did it beep before, from the speaker?). Don't wanna sound patronising btw - just in case!

Also, I had a mb inexplicably die on me once, and clearing the CMOS sorted it out. There may be a "clear CMOS" set of jumpers on the mb somewhere, you would probably have to move the jumper connector across from where it is to the next set of pins, leave it for a few seconds, then move the connector back to where it was. If you don't have a manual see if you can find any reference or model numbers/names on the mb to Google for to see if you can get a manual online, which will show you where this jumper is if it has one.