[Gllug] Hardware help needed

[Matthew Thompson]

On Saturday, November 23, 2002, at 11:31 PM, Alain Williams wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I have just put a new box together, I thought that I would get all the 
> bits
> & see what I could manage... well it doesn't work. Because it is a 
> system that
> has never worked before I can't be sure if it is something that I have 
> done
> wrong or a bad bit of hardware.
>
> Any advice from a hardware guru would be gratefully received, I live 
> in Watford
> & would be happy to bring it round one evening.
>
> System:
> AMD Athlon 2100XP, 512Mb DDR Ram, Epox 8KHA+ mother board, Nvidia 
> TI4200 Ultra650 video card.
> + the usual CD, disk, floppies, etc.
>
> When I power up the POST code is FF (which the manual says = Boot 
> attempt (INT(10h)), it
> gets there immediately, no other code shows, the disk/floppy don't 
> spin up or seek,
> the monitor says 'No signal'. I can't get to BIOS setup.

What do you get if you remove everything from the motherboard other 
than Processor, Memory and Video?

Also is this FF code something displayed on an LED cluster built into 
the motherboard?

> 	1. BIOS chip replace inverse		make sure bios chip replace appropriate

Check to see if there is an indicator for pin 1 on the BIOS chip and 
that it is inserted the right way round.

> 	2. Update wrong BIOS

If you can't boot into the system at all this is a bit of a nasty error 
as well.

> 	3. Mainboard problem			make sure all hardware device insert 
> appropriate

Thoroughly reseat all components. Please ensure that you are using a 
properly rated heatsink and fan for the Athlon 2100+ - they're hot 
buggers and you could easily fry you chip if you run it for even the 
shortest amount of time without any cooling.

> 	4. ADD-ON card insert inapropriate	Swap mainboard

Gotta love these manuals, translated from the original Taiwanese into 
english by a German schoolgirl. By this I'm assuming that they mean the 
motherboard is incompatible with one of the third pary cards in it.

M at t :o)


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