teyong Posted March 19, 2005 Posted March 19, 2005 I have always gotten good suggestions and help from here, so I have another problem to share. I am using Windows XP Home that came with a Sony Vaio. SP2 2 hard drives 120 gig each 1.5 gig ram dvd, cd 64 m video Recent upgrade is Perfect Disk 7 and System Mechanic 5 This machine runs 24/7 I had a shutdown and on reboot I got a message that It had found a hardware problem and that I should hit F1 to continue or F2 to correct the error in BIOS setup. Now I can not tell if anything has changed in the setup. The only monitoring that I have is for the mother board and speedfan which shows nothing. What is this? I have tried a search and found nothing. Where would you look or somewhere I should look? I do have someone going to the house next week but if I could shave a few $$$$. Thank you, David Quote
TCH-Tim Posted March 19, 2005 Posted March 19, 2005 What happened when you hit F1 to continue? Did you get a specific error message? Quote
curtis Posted March 19, 2005 Posted March 19, 2005 David, my friend. Haven't talked to you in a while. Have you tried rebooting to see if you get the error again? If so, make sure all cards(graphics,sound) and memory are seated properly. Also check all cables to insure they are pluged in correctly. Sometimes gremlins will cause these to work loose. Quote
teyong Posted March 19, 2005 Author Posted March 19, 2005 (edited) What happened when you hit F1 to continue? Did you get a specific error message? <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Curtis, Good to hear from you; trust all is well. None - goes right into start up fully functional. I will be opening it up Sunday, my day off, and do just that as well as give it a good cleaning. David Edited March 19, 2005 by teyong Quote
curtis Posted March 19, 2005 Posted March 19, 2005 Yep, cleaning is good. I open my case's about every month and clean. I have opened up computers that had dust-bears instead of dust-bunnies. I have even found spider webs in some. I know you know this but just as a reminder- Be sure to ground yourself to the metal in the case before touching any of the cards inside. Quote
TCH-Don Posted March 19, 2005 Posted March 19, 2005 (turtle waves at David) Hi David, good to see you here, been a while, hope all is well. If the computer is old, the contacts on the cards can become oxidized and re-seating them a few times may help intermittent problems. Quote
TweezerMan Posted March 19, 2005 Posted March 19, 2005 I'm not sure if this would apply, but I've seen this kind of error on older computers where the CMOS battery has died. When the CMOS battery is dead, the CMOS loses any custom settings when the computer is powered off and default settings are used when the computer is powered back on. The mis-match between the default CMOS settings and hardware actually detected on boot is what usually triggers the error (such as installed RAM or disk drives). If your motherboard has a replaceable CMOS battery (mine uses a flat, circular watch battery), replacing the battery would fix the problem. Quote
teyong Posted March 20, 2005 Author Posted March 20, 2005 I'm not sure if this would apply, but I've seen this kind of error on older computers where the CMOS battery has died. When the CMOS battery is dead, the CMOS loses any custom settings when the computer is powered off and default settings are used when the computer is powered back on. The mis-match between the default CMOS settings and hardware actually detected on boot is what usually triggers the error (such as installed RAM or disk drives). If your motherboard has a replaceable CMOS battery (mine uses a flat, circular watch battery), replacing the battery would fix the problem. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Well this is interesting because I remember seeing this: Power Monitor This module contains information about your computer's power handling mechanism. FreshDevices, Corp. Advanced Power Management AC Line Status Online Battery Flag No System Battery Battery Life Percent None Battery Life Time None Battery Full Life Time None --------[ EVEREST Home Edition © 2003, 2004 Lavalys, Inc. ]----------------------------------------------------------- Version EVEREST v1.51.195 Homepage http://www.lavalys.com/ Report Type Quick Report Computer DAVIDTEYONG (THE HARPER FAMILY COMPUTER) Generator DAVID Operating System Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition 5.1.2600 (WinXP Retail) Date 2005-03-19 Time 22:27 --------[ Power Management ]-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Power Management Properties: Current Power Source AC Line Battery Status No Battery Full Battery Lifetime Unknown Remaining Battery Lifetime Unknown Does this mean I don't have no stinking Battery? While I will clean up everything tomorrow I have someone coming in Wednesday. I have had small problems for two years with this and while I have been able to get a lot done we will let the DR. test it. David Quote
TweezerMan Posted March 20, 2005 Posted March 20, 2005 Well, a dead battery would probably look the same as no battery, but I don't think what you've listed here is describing the CMOS battery. Because of what it's displayed with, I believe that diagnostic is checking for something like a laptop battery or a UPS - something that could power your computer if the AC power went out. After doing a quick search on the Everest forums, I believe this set of stats may indicate the status of your CMOS battery (sample stats taken from a forum post): Voltage Values:CPU Core 1.73 V CPU Aux 3.15 V +3.3 V 3.31 V +5 V 5.05 V +12 V 1.76 V -12 V -6.27 V -5 V -7.71 V +5 V Standby 4.58 V VBAT Battery 3.14 V <<=== Voltage from CMOS battery? If your system has a typical watch battery in it, it should be registering something around 3 volts. If it's dead, I would expect it to register something near 0 volts (a lot less than 3, anyway). Quote
teyong Posted March 20, 2005 Author Posted March 20, 2005 Well, a dead battery would probably look the same as no battery, but I don't think what you've listed here is describing the CMOS battery. Because of what it's displayed with, I believe that diagnostic is checking for something like a laptop battery or a UPS - something that could power your computer if the AC power went out. After doing a quick search on the Everest forums, I believe this set of stats may indicate the status of your CMOS battery (sample stats taken from a forum post): Voltage Values:CPU Core 1.73 V CPU Aux 3.15 V +3.3 V 3.31 V +5 V 5.05 V +12 V 1.76 V -12 V -6.27 V -5 V -7.71 V +5 V Standby 4.58 V VBAT Battery 3.14 V <<=== Voltage from CMOS battery? If your system has a typical watch battery in it, it should be registering something around 3 volts. If it's dead, I would expect it to register something near 0 volts (a lot less than 3, anyway). <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Voltage Values: CPU Core 1.49 V CPU Aux 3.12 V +3.3 V 3.30 V +5 V 5.05 V -12 V -14.91 V -5 V -7.71 V VBAT Battery 0.51 V OK I got power. Knew it just didn't where to find it so fast. VBAT does not look to good. Quote
stevevan Posted March 20, 2005 Posted March 20, 2005 The other voltages are coming out of your power supply. Those all look normal. I agree with TCH-David...appears to be the CMOS battery went kaput. Quote
teyong Posted March 30, 2005 Author Posted March 30, 2005 Well the computer guy never showed up or called. I clean out the inside may have found a plug from the cable on D drive not all the way in the socket. Not sure? but it did not help me not receive the error message. However ran scan disk and now - All is Ok. I wish that there was something to tell you plug number 3 on right side of board 2 pin 42 is going bad. Thanks, David Quote
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.