The Midnight QuestionCopyright 2008 by Morris Rosenthal |
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Troubleshooting your Laptop or PC
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See the new Troubleshooting your laptop or PC (May 2008)7/1/99(Q) The CPU on my Toshiba laptop is a solder mount. Portable Enhancments will upgrade this chip from a 486 to a 586 but it is rather expensive. I'd like to do this myself. I know my way around a laptop quite well but I never tried soldering chips. Is it feasible? Tom (A) I wouldn't dream of trying, you need industrial quality soldering equipment. Whats more, I doubt the upgrade woul give you a real performance boost, the benchmarks they show for such things are entirely unrealistic. If you have money you wantto sink into an old notebook, put it in RAM. I just started (March, 2005) working on a new site about laptop upgrades and repairs. First page up is how to replace a laptop hard drive. Morris (Q) This is a tough problem...beware..I am an ISP and run into a lot of problem and able to fix all of them wth enough determination. I have a user that connects fine at every location tested except their own residence. There have been 4 independent tests at other locations. As their modem tries to connect, the modem picks up but does not produce the DTMF (dialing tones) required to place the call. Even though you can hear the modem pick up for a dialing tone, the modem times out with "no dialtone". We have connected the medem directly to the telco box on the side of the house and experience the same problem. We have opened and close 6 service tickets with our local phone company and they claim that there is no problems. One check however reveiled a problem that the phone company refered to as "open out". Still no resolution. The bottom line is that this resident should get the same sevice that we checked it against. What could the problem be. Bruce It sure sounds like they are only paying for pulse service at their house, and they're dialing with tone, something most people pay the extra 60 cents a month for. Not a problem, but they need to select "pulse" in the mosem setup. Even if this isn't your proble, I'm posting it because it's the most common reason for modems to "not dial". Morris (Q) I have a problem with random freezups. They seem to happen with equal frequency on and off the web. I cannot run Half-life or viavoice at all and some games and simulators start and then freezup. My system uses an Abit TX5 board, AMD 233 chip, 96 meg of memory, and an ATI Expert at work video card. I have no drive with less than a gig of available space. I get no blue screen when it freezes. Does this mean that the problem is with software? I would appreciate any help. Gary (A) No, it pretty much sounds like hardware. Top guess is usually RAM, so with the quantity you have, I would remove one bank at a time, running the PC for a few days in betweeen, and seeing if the behavior improves. Also, make sure the fan on the CPU has good thermal contact and is running. If Windows isn't automatically running SCANDISK when you boot after these freezes, do it manually, or you will have a software problem. Morris (Q) After a lightening storm, I discovered my pc wasn't recognizing my hard drives and believe the controller for them may be bad... my question is how do I test to see if in fact it is the controller and not unluckily both hd's at the same time failing on me? Douglas (A) Never heard of two hard drives failing at once in the same building, much less the same computer. Strange that the PC doesn't report a bad controller though, have you checked in CMOS Setup to see if the hard drives are even shown as installed? Don't bet the ligtening had anything to do with it unless you were using the PC and it flashed out with a strike. Morris The following is a question from 8/19/98 with a new answer by Steve. Don't remember what my answer was, but it's there in the backlog for anybody who wants to check (Q) I have a Matsonic MS-5010 (Running the 82437VX Chipset) it has 4 72pin slots, and 2 DIMM slots. I am guessing that the 32MB DIMM I have in the system now is not SDRAM. The documentation for the board tells me that it does support SDRAM, and there is an entry on the BIOS report at boot that says: SDRAM Rows: None. Recently, Best Buy put their 64MB SDRAM modules on sale for $70 so I picked some up, however when I installed it in my system, it only counted to 49MB. I then removed my 32MB DIMM from the first slot, and tried to install the memory there, still counted as a 16MB module. Well the tech at Best Buy tried 64MB SDRAM DIMMs, 32MB SDRAM DIMMs, and he tried multiples of both PNY and their "Bulk" memory. None of it counted past 16MB, except the module I started with. I called the vendor, and they told me that the board does not support EPROM Memory, all I can think of is that this is some type of newfangled memory thing, or the tech support guy was full of hot air. He also said that .... And I quote, "EPROM stands for error correction something or other." Last time I checked it was an Erasable PROM. I would really like to increase my memory to at least 64MB and 96 would be great! Eric (A) On all of the VX chipsets that I have encountered, the boards on support up to 16MB per side. 16MB max single sided SIMM/DRAM and 32MB max double sided SIMM/DRAM. This is why he is only getting a count of 16MB. He can use up to 32MB SIMMs if it is 16MBx2 double sided. Steve 6/1/99(Q) I am chickenheartedly going to attempt building my first PC. I have purchased your book, however there is little in there about building a SCSI machine. Unless you have a book on same, or can recommend one for "first timers", I'm hoping you will answer a couple of questions for me? I have a CD ROM and aCDR for this project; is this overkill? I hope to be able to copy music CD's from the CD ROM to the CDR. Is this possible? Bruce (A) I largely ignored SCSI in the new book because it is essentially a "home-owner" book, and SCSI's higher cost is rarely justifiable. Both CDRs and CDs are available cheaper in IDE (and with higher performance) than in SCSI. As to copying music CDs, there is some dependance on the software that comes with the recorder, so check before buying. Morris (Q) You have brought another question to mind; if IDE is cheaper and faster, why SCSI at all? I had the understanding that the Plextor 8/20 SCSI was the fastest and the best CDR on the market!...? I have all of the Adaptec software that came with the 8/20, but my question was; will I be able to copy music selections from a CD ROM drive to the 8/20? Both installed in the same machine? Bruce (A) The Plextor may be the best at the moment, 8X record is impressive, and it could be they aren't producing it in an IDE version (yet). However, what it comes down to is this. The drive mechanics, seek/write speeds, etc, are identical for SCSI and IDE drives, only the interface to the PC bus is different. The SCSI interface on the drive end adds cost to the drive, and the SCSI controller, of course costs money. The SCSI interface is capable of higher theoretical throughputs than the IDE interface, but these data transfer rates are not encountered with single real-world drives (neither are the fastest IDE transfer rates). SCSI is superior for multi drive configurations (up to 15 drives with wide SCSI implementations). It's a good question you are asking, and I'll post it in the FAQ. It seems to me that I did a write-up on SCSI somehwere on the site, maybe the transition guide at http://www.daileyint.com/build/build.htm Morris (Q) I'm in the process of buying components to build my own system, and I notice that many dealers put the annotation OEM after the product they are offering. I know the acronym stands for original equipment manufacturer, but I'm not sure what that means. Could you clarify this for me. Saundra (A) It means the warranty and service are through the distributor and not the manufacturer. Makes it a couple bucks cheaper in most cases. May also lack printed documentation and packaging. Morris (Q) I'm French and bought five years ago a Texas Instruments Travelmate 4000M 486/DX4 100Mhz. For a few days I have been getting the message "no timer tick interrupt" at startup and if the laptop is not connected to the docking station, everything malfunctions (mouse, very slow loading of everything, stalling...) TI has been bought by Acer and no one has been able (either in France or in the US) to help me. The "best" advice I received was that it was the small battery which failed and that I had to change the motherboard ($ 1000) because this battery was welded to the motherboard. Olivier (A) Well, you could replace the notebook with a much better one for less than $1000. The timer tick is the 1/18 second timer that many system components require. The failure is hardware, either the interrupt controller or the real time clock. In either case, on a portable motherboard, there's nothing you can do unless you have an old fashioned tech shop around that actually does component level troubleshooting, and even then, the board may not be repairable. I'd start shopping for a new (or used) notebook. Morris 5/21/99(Q) I checked out your new book, 'Build Your Own PC', from our local library. It told me most of what I need to know about building my own PC, with one small exception. I did not see any mention of doing a system 'burn-in' referred to at most custom-built PC sites. For the home builder, what do you advise as a burn-in procedure? Or is this even necessary? Stephan (A) No, you don't need to do anything to "burn-in" a PC you have built, using it is the best "burn-in" of all. The "burn-in" promised (and rarely performed) by PC vendors is intended to catch obvious problem before the PCs leave the shop, saving on service calls. By continually hitting the hard drive, motherboard functions and memory, the "burn-in" software attempts to provide some accelerated aging to catch iffy parts on the frontside of the bath-tub curve. Thank your library for me. Morris (Q) I have a Toshiba Infina 7130 with an Intel Pentium 133Mhz (3.3v) w/VRT in a Socket 7 which I wanted to upgrade to a Pentium 233MX. I opened the case and took off the Heatsink retaining clip. When I went to pull up the ZIF lever, I noticed that the heatsink extends past the chip and over the ZIF lever. I gently pulled on the heatsink, hoping it would detach with no luck. I am stuck now as I do not feel comfortable using the "bigger hammer" approach to try to remove the heat sink and I can't get at the ZIF lever. Am I missing something here? Al (A) The heat sink should pull off once the clips are removed. Sounds like it's stuck on with conductive grease, try twisting and sliding it off. (Al reports success) Morris
(Q) I purchased a I233 MMX cpu today from a local reseller for $55, pretty good for the local Dallas market. I didn't really think much about the lack of a faceplate until I started looking at heat sink/cooling sites. This CPU lacks the flat plastic faceplate of retail CPUs. There is a central square component raised about .5mm above the rest of the chip, which may present difficulties in establishing a good thermal seal between CPU and heat sink. Jason (A) I doubt there's a market for overclocked (i.e. mis-labeled) MMX CPUs, why would they bother? Far superior K6-2 and Celerons are available under $100. The raised chip was common in some eariler Socket 7's, never occured to me to check if ther was a difference between OEM and Retail. There are Socket 7 heatsinks with a depression for raised CPUs in the middle, but don't ask me where you'd find them these days. Morris 4/25/99(Q) I just installed a new hard drive in my system. I am getting the following message when my system is booting up: conflict I/O ports 2F8. The systems stops booting up until I hit the F1 key. Any ideas? Steve (A) 2F8 is your COM2 port. Could be an internal modem conflicting. You can go into CMOS Setup and dissable or move the conflicting port. Morris (Q) This week I built two systems using SOYO Tek motherboards model 5EMA+ with AMD K6-2/450 CPUs and 128MB PC100 SDRAM in one and 64MB in the other. These boards use the ATX form factor. I installed Windows 98 OEM versions on both systems and the motherboard drivers as well as all drivers for video, sound, intellimouse, and modem. My problem is that when shuting down by the normal method everything is OK if I restart instead of shutdown but if I choose shutdown then ScanDisk runs when I restart. I have used the motherboards before when building 400MHz systems with the same specs and OS and never experienced the problem. Is it because of the extra 50MHz or what and is there something I can do to stop it? Also could the polarity on one of the case cables for power or reset, etc., cause this type of problem? I'm sure I am just missing something here but....I am building another system with the same specs next week and would like to get the bug corrected. Paul (A) The answer: Go to Start then select Run Then type: MSCONFIG Then hit OK Then click on Advanced at the bottom right of the box that opens. Then put a check in the third box up from the bottom that states: Disable Fast Shutdown. Then hit OK After this you exit out of the next box and restart your computer then try it out by shutting down. This has worked on the first two systems that I built with 450MHz and on the third that I just finished. Thank you for your consideration in this matter. Paul (Q) At my father-in-law's house. He has a new computer and the store partitioned the drive to C and D. C being 5.89 Gb and D being 1.98 Gb. I feel he would be better off with 4 X 2.0 Gb drives. Is there a simple method for him to repartition? Or should he? Also winfile shows only a total of 4 Gb. Drive space shows full 8.4 Gb. On startup C: shows up on bottom quick launch toolbar. Do not know why. Dan (A) He is much better off with a single 6 GB partion than three 2 GB partions, even better yet with a single 8 GB. Win95, depending on the version, often miss-reports hard drive size, cutting it off at 4GB, but it doesn't effect anything. Morris (Q) Is there anything one can do to get into cmos when the keyboard is not recognized? I can delete the device (and the ps/2 mouse), refinds fine, but won't work. I thought there may be some setting in cmos, but cannot get in there either! Help! This is a Canon tower - MT9160, p100, 16mb RAM. Schwartz (A) Interesting, sounds like the ATX Core ports went out together. Unless your motherboard physically supprts an AT style keyboard, dissabling the PS/2 connector keyboard wouldn't be an option. At most, CMSO will let you not check for KB on boot, but the PC will always recognize it if there. It sounds like a physical failure of a solder connection on the core or something, since the controllers for the two are unrelated. I would take the whole system apart and rebuild it on the desk, just to make sure a screw didn't role under there or something. Otherwise, motherboard is likely. Morris 4/18/99(Q) I have more than one SCSI CD-ROM drive that are in external cases. I would like to play CD audio from them and use the multiple drive function that most software CD player's have. Since the sound card usually has just one audio cable hookup and mine are external anyway, I figured that I could just play the audio through the SCSI bus, right? If you can I don't know how. If you could provide a solution or even a reference to a CD player that does, I'd be very greatful. Jared (A) No way I know to play CD audio over the bus, it's a seperate function entirely. There's a two dollar chip on the drive that does the actual D/A conversion and kicks out a real stereo audio signal on the 3 or 4 pin connector. Morris (Q) I am a teacher in a schol for autistic children. We have an IBM PS/1 - 386SX, 2Mb RAM, 40 Mb HDD, donated when it was new. We now have P166 machines in each of our 4 classrooms (26 childrne in all) and their needsreally require these more powerful (to us!) PCs. I am reluctant to dispose of it when it could still be useful, and the best use I can think of would be as a word processor for staff use. Is there a DOS WYSYG word processor available? Mark (A) Yes, several. Unfortunately, even the later DOS versions Wordperfect, Word, and AmiPro, required more than a 386sx with 2MB. You'd need to find a version from around 1993, or, you could look through the shareware at tucows (www.tucows.com) Morris (Q) I have two hard drives ( c:<master> and d:<slave>). The computer detects the slave HD (master HD is OK) when running CMOS. After rebooting the computer it checks that master and slave HD are present. But the problem is when I change the drive to d: then "Invalid drive specification" error message comes up. What's wrong? Hyung (A) That means the PC isn't finding a boot sector on D: when it's starting. Two possible reasons, beyond hardware, poorly inserted cable, etc.. 1) The drive has never been FDISKed or has become corrupted. 2) The drive parameters that CMOS is currently using aren't the parameter sthe drive was originally being used with, though often the drive will be recognized and even boot in the latter case. Morris (Q) Can you explain the difference between 16, 32, and 64 bit machines. Also what is the difference between 30 and 32 bit scanners? Jerry (A) Well, I give you a quick overview, though it's a kind of basic question that indicates you have some reading to do. At any rate, bits, in this context, represent both binary numbers and actual electrical paths the CPU has for moving data around. In the case of current computers, 16 bit (IBM-AT, Intel 286 and Motorola 6800 CPUs) are long obsolete, except in low performance requirement embedded controls. 32 bit systems (Intel 386 and 486 PCs, Motorola 68000, a few other CPUS) are also long since obsolete everywhere dedicated systems, though I'm still working on a 486 PC myself. Starting with the Pentium series CPUs, which came out in '92 or '93, all production computers are 64 bit. These CPUs aren't yet used very much in embedded systems, the performance is overkill, and the hardware is significantly more complicated. In the case of scanners, the bit number, usually 24, 30 or 36, refers to the number of bits used to store information for every dot the scanner scans. For color scanning, an RGB (Red,Green,Blue) scheme for example, that number is divided three ways and divided amongst the color. For a 24bit scanner (now obsolete), each color gets 8 bits of depth, or 256 levels of differentiation. For a 30bit scanner, thats 1024 levels per color, for a 36 bit scanner, thats 4096 levels per color. All of these are overkill, unless you are doing magazine quality work. All of the artwork you see on the web, for examble, uses far less color levels and is highly compressed. Morris 4/11/99(Q) I am helping someone out with a computer. On power up it goes fine then gives the error "No ROM BASIC - SYSTEM HALTED". I saw a low battery warning earlier, but I see no battery on the board. Do you think the BIOS chip is bad and is it item that can still be purchased, and/or can a better chip be found. Mike (A) The problem is that it has lost the hard drive parameters and is not finding the boot sector, thus producing a "No ROM BASIC" You probably lost the settings when the battery failed, but as a 486 it probably has an "Autodetect" option in CMOS. There is a battery, all PCs have them. Morris (Q) I took out my old hard drive to stick in a new one, but that didn't work so iItried to put back in my old one. Everything is the same, jumpers, bios, cables, EVERYthing! I didn't damage the hard drive, and checked it for viruses beforehand, but it gives me the "invalid system disk..." error. the bios is set to boot from hd. I just don't understand. Could the fact it's fat32 have anything to do with it? a girl in distress (A) An "invalid system disk" error can come from two places. First, you might have left a non-bootable floppy in the drive (I only point this out because I do it all the time). Second, the hard drive is recognized, but the BIOS can't find the boot sector. Assuming the hard drive is hooked up right and not damaged, the only reason for this would be if the parameters in CMOS are wrong. You can try manually autodetecting, and if that doesn't help, you can try entering the actual numbers on the drive label. Morris 4/4/99(Q) I have sent several of my desktop files to my winzip program leaving the icons on my desktop. Am I freeing up space this way or would I need to move the icons to my recycle bin and empty it before space is free. I have tried to compress my files on my hard drive but I get an unable response because it is a fat drive. Fred (A) Once the files are zipped, you can delete their unzipped versions. You're better off using the "Detail" view in Explorer so you can see the actual file sizes and duplication process. However, I've always found zipping/unzipping so inconvienient, that it may be a good time to pick up a removeable drive or a CD recorder (great things), so you can permanently archive these files, yet still have them available for immediate access. Morris (Q) I work for a non-profit and was recently given an old laptop and external modem for mobile e-mail and word processing. The boot up shows it as a 486, but a pre-loaded copy of Check-It shows it as a 386. I seem to remember from way back when that some programs wouldn't recognize the crippled (i.e. co-processor free) 486SX/SL/SLC as a true 486. Is that the case do you think? Jeff (A) Probably a Cyrix or TI CPU, the Intel 486SX still shows as a 486. They put that weird TI chip in lots of notebooks, and it could be used with an adapter as an upgrade CPU for 386 systems, though I don't know how much oompf it really provided. Morris (Q) I have a question about my computer. A few days ago I upgraded my processor from a Pentuim 166 to an AMD K6-2 366 w/ 3Dnow. It now seems that whenever my cpu is heavily processing data (like when I open a program or make a zip file) my computer makes this really high pitched whistling sound. It happens when the computer is booting up, but once Windows 95 loads, the high pitched sound stops unless I am making the cpu process alot of data. Have you ever heard of such a thing? I have never heard of anything like this and I was wondering if you could help me out. Could the chip be sucking too much power from my system? I have a 200W power supply. Should I consider upgrading that. Donald (A) There are two possibilites. One, it could be a whistling capacitor on either the motherboard or in the power supply. If you upgraded the CPU on an old motherboard that wasn't really intended to run such a fast chip, a capaitor on the motherboard might be a reasonable bet. Also, a capcitor in the power supply may have failed, but the 200Watt rating is plenty. You should be able to isolate the noise with the cover off by tiliting your head about, it's highly directional. However, even more common is the coupling of RF noise to an internal modem adapter, if you have one. You can troubleshoot that by temporarily removing the modem, or moving it to a slot farther from the CPU. Morris (Q) I am looking for the trick or perhaps a tool that facilitates spreading the wires in unshielded twisted pair (CAT5) cable for insertion into RJ45 connectors. I seem to break one of the conductors as I try to get each pair aligned. I suspect there is a technique to do this quickly and correctly but I have not been able to discover it. John (A) Can't say I ever had trouble with wires breaking, though you may have some poor quality cable. The main trick is to remember that you only need two pairs, wires 1&2 and wires 3&6. Since you don't need the other two pairs, I only leave them in to help heep the other wires in place while inserting the end. Morris (Q) I have a Mustek Scanner Model MFS-8000SP, well it came with an ISA SCSI card, I ran out of ISA slots in my system and decided to get a PCI SCSI card which is a SIIG SCSI Pro PCI.. Model SC2454... well...needless to say they are not communicating very well. The ID for the card is #7 and the ID for the Scanner is #6 both are factory settings and should work. when I changed the setting on the scanner to 7, it would not stop scanning.. and then when I reset it to 6, it went back to what is was doing before I changed it.. It will do the test scan fine when you are loading the drivers for the scanner, then when you try a prescan on a picture it will get half way through a scan and stop... and the light will blink steadily. I have the ASPI manager installed, and when I put the card in Windows 98 automatically installs the card as Advansys SCSI PCI Controller card. when I try to install the SIIG drivers it tells me the best drivers for the card are installed. Kathrine (A) Well, 7 is definitely no good for the scanner, as you found. You might retry one of the low addresses, like 2 or 3, but as long as the card can find the scanner, the SCSI ID probably isn't the problem. It sounds like a timeout of sorts, but unfortunately, I have no experience with the SIIG. Your best bet would be using the ISA card which came with the scanner, and swapping one of your other ISA cards for a PCI. Morris 3/17/99(Q) Would like to get listed on your used parts page Allen (A) Outside of wanting a lazy post (nothing but unanswerable Windows NT questions lately), I went and looked at this site, and it's a well orgainized collection of reasonably priced used stuff. I've never bought anything from these guys, so I can't vouch for buiness side, but it's worth a look. Morris 3/15/99"Should my hard drives power down on Windows shut down?". I'm running Windows 98 with an AMD K6-2 300 on a generic TX AGP main board, with two hard drives. I have a CD writer as a primary slave, and a regular CD drive as the secondary slave. Recently I noticed that the drives (or at least one of them) continue to spin after Windows says "It's safe to shutdown your PC", and the hard drive indicator light on my tower stays on, then when I physically hit the power switch I here a "cluck" noise from one or both of the drives. I believe this situation to be software related, maybe by Norton Anti Virus, but I disabled the auto protect and no change. I also have tried every software/bios related setting I could think of and it still happens. Tom (A) Sounds like your system is going into standby rather than OFF. This depends on how the motherboard logic triggers the power supply, and can generally be diddled in CMOS Setup. (This is a good example of me not really understanding the question the way it's intended.) Morris (C) Fact is, on standby the hard drives do power down, and I've tried going on standby then shutting down, but when I do the hard drive(s) power up just before the shut down process is complete. Tom (A) Pretty neat, well, not in a good way. The hard drives themselves probably incorporate some slick power saver logic, but they still can't trump the motherboard on shutting down the power supply. It sounds like the shut-down signal from your motherboard is either not-happening, or the power supply isn't monitoring it. I haven't put enough time in on these things to give you any good ideas, but I'd sure appreciate to hear from you if you work it out, and post it for others. (Here I still am missing the point.) Morris (A) I've come up with the solution to this problem, so I wanted to let you in on it. The problem stemmed from Norton Antivirus 5.0, which seems to have several shut down issues related to it's operation under Windows 98. Norton has fixes for shut down problems related to this software at it's web site, http://www.symantec.com/us.index.html , but the fix which solved my problem was the removal of the "NAVEX" entry in the following key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\control\Shutdown\Exclusion List Everything works fine after removing this entry. Tom 3/11/99(Q) I have bought 2 different sets of 4 SIMMs 8meg each neither have worked. First set was 2X32 60ns EDO ram, installed all 4 of the new 8meg SIMMs, system will not boot, no beep, no nothing. Finally got some documentation for the system, claims can use anything up to a 32meg SIMM, 70ns, page mode type. So get second set of SIMMS supposed to be page mode, again put al of the new mem in and system will just give long beep, pause, long beep, continuously. Is there a way to tell if memory is FPM or EDO? First set is marked EDO, second set is not. Victor (A) Well, 8MB SIMMs were always the most problematic, especially the single sided ones, but longtime readers of this page already know that. The main reason for this post is BIG NEWS (at least to me). IC Master now has their whole database online, with free registration to get in and use it immediately. This means you can now identify just about every chip and module you come across, and as those of us who've done any reverse engineering know, this book is the ultimate resource. www.icmaster.com Find out if that RAM is really FPM, EDO, SDRAM, etc... Morris 3/9/99(Q) I am building my own pc i followed the instrucions and everything seemed to be going fine the initial boot up was fine it went thru the BIOS then I powered down to add more cards--then rebooted and the monitor has no video the litle yellow light comes on but it dosen't follow up with the green light and a picture. I switched monitors nothing, I switched cords nothing, took out all the cards except the graphics card nothing, tried a different PCI slot nothing. What went wrong? I really hope I don't have replace the motherboard, it's brand new. I even tried a different graphics card nothing happened, so I tried the graphic card I was using in a another computer to see if it was the problem it worked fine. Nichole (A) It does sound like the motherboard. With some ATX motherboard and power supplies, you should really unplug them from the wall before adding adapters, because there is always 700mA or so available on the I/O bus for adapters to do Wake On LAN or Wake on Ring (with modems). That applies even when the computer is switched off. It's a somewhat unpublicized fact, but I've seen some detailed photographs actually showing motherboard failure from this cause, intermittent shorts burning motherboard traces and discrete components up during insertion. Morris 3/8/99(Q) Re last posting: I looked up the cache information on the AMD site, and now I'm more confused. I didn't even see a spec for the L3 cache size or the speed at which it would run. I'm not sure I even understand the L1 and L2 anymore. I eagerly await your response. Michael (A) AMD is inventing some new terms. What it amounts to is they call internal cache L1 cache, which on their K6-3 is a combined 64KB Instruction and Data cache. L2 cache used to be the new name for external cache, or the bound module cache in the case of Pentium II and III processors. AMD is now calling L2 cache the 256KB of cache located on the CPU die on a dedicated backside bus, running at the full CPU MHz. L3 cache is their new name for the old external, on motherboard cache, which they now access via the 100MHz frontside bus on the Super 7 motherboards, in amounts from 512KB to 2MB. You have to keep in mind that the bus MHz aren't the only factor in memory transfer rates, the PC-100 rated SDRAM is still DRAM, with all the overhead of refreshing and access times dependant on what and when the last read was. Cache is always Static RAM, more expensive, a full flip-flop approach using four transistors per bit, but faster and always ready to go. Morris 3/5/99(A) An answer without a question - call it a pre-emptive strike. A quick summary of the new Pentium III, K6-3, Super 7 and Socket 370 (Yes, papa Intel's got a brand new bag). Morris 3/4/99(Q) Where can I buy Notebook parts, have data recovered from my hard drive, find some of these second hand parts and deals you write about? Composite (A) I've put together a short list of vendors of used, reconditioned, hard to find parts and services. I've never spoken to or dealt directly with any of these people (except Electrified), I just visited their web sites to gather this info. Caveat Emptor. Morris 3/2/99(Q) In relation to copying whole drives you wrote: The XCOPY method doesn't work with Windows 95, you need to use third part software to do the copy. Another person suggested to me just today the site: http://www.vdsarg.com for the software "COPY ALL." XCOPY works fine with DOS/Windows systems, but you have to set the boot pation active on the new Master, which means you need a boot floppy with FDISK on it. The newer versions of Windows NT come with several levels of software RAID that allow you to mirror the drives, and switch as nescessary. Morris (an old posting from somewhere) (A) Briefly, I disagree. XCOPY works perfectly, if you do it right, and I use it all the time to setup systems. You have to run it from a DOS prompt inside of Win 95/98. If you type XCOPY /? you will see the list of switches that will let you copy the hidden files, overwrite read onlyfiles, etc. Also, from running it inside 95/98, you do get the proper long file names on the target drive. Usually, something like: D:\>XCOPY C:\*.* /K /E /H /R /C will grab the whole drive properly. At least, it has for me, repeatedly. David 3/1/99(Q) I was wondering if you could give me an approximation of how much it costs in electricity to operate a computer. This is a strange question, but my roommate and I are arguing, and I say it costs virtually nothing in kilowatt hours which is part of the convenience of computers, while he says that if my computer is on approx. four hours a day that it costs 20% of our electric bill which is a full bill of $800. I think this is impossible--just so you know, it's a personal computer-300MMX I think, just a plain average computer I bought in 1998. Could you please give me some kind of guess as to the cost of operation, even if you can say it's a few dollars or cents. I'm Canadian too by the way, but I can do the conversion. Michelle (A) Holy %$^&, what do you guys pay per KWH, or is that like a bill for a year? I thought with all the hydro, Canadian electricity was practically free. At any rate, a 14" monitor probably averages around 150W (120Vx1.2A or 220V x .6A) and the system box uses a fairly efficient switching power supply which probably draws less than it's full power rating, normally 200W. So, all in all, a working PC is equivalent to three or four 100 Watt bulbs. Refrigerators are big draws, microwaves draw over a kilowatt when they're running, and of course, nothing comes close to electric heat for a waste of energy. Easiest way to check is to turn the thing on and watch your meter for an hour, turn it off and watch for an hour. If we call it 350Watts for four hours at $.10 per KWH, thats about $.15 (15 cents) a day. Morris 2/25/99(Q) I had a great system - K6 233 running perfectly... or as perfect as you can get with windows, but anyway, there were no problems with the system, at least nothing apparent and no signs of any potential issues. So, I wanted to get the most out of my system, I decided I would over lock this system, as I have done with others with no previous problems. My BIOS only supported 233 (which was the MHz of my chip - the AMD K6-233)... So I turned up the BIOS to 75 and set the multiplier to 3.5 and voltage to 3.3 IO and 3.2 or 3.3 Core, I think it was 3.2.... this was all basically correct according to factory, just the fact that I changed the bus from 66 to 75... I also MAY have had the multiplier on 2.5 o 3.0 at one point... I am not positive at this point...Ok, so I made the changes and hit save BIOS settings and then had it reboot... well it didn't. In fact it wouldn't even post... couldn't get to BIOS. I reset the settings back to my original, no overclock or anything.. and this is when the problems started....I would sometimes not be able to boot up... when the OS did boot up (to Win98) I got MANY errors, mostly VXD and protection fault errors.. blue screens. The first though I had was like file corruption... I tried a few things to work around it, but I could not even use windows without crashes and forcing my to reboot. Also, when I rebooted, the rest button no longer worked... and the system would not post unless I turned power off for 2 or 3 seconds and back on.. and then it sometimes didn't post... I then used the default settings supplied.. 166 MHz... and auto everything (as I had auto voltage set before)... To my surprise, it posted right away with no problems, it booted up, and NO errors. Just slower than 233, obviously.... The system will not function at all in 233, but FINE in 200 MHz.. at 200 I can do everything with no errors...I just am baffled why the system will not work when I try to put it back to the original settings it worked with before... I am almost positive there is permanent hardware damage and I have to replace something... Shawn (A) I would also bet on CPU, it's the main reason I don't overclock these days. Damage is usually more or less instantaneous and irreversable. I've heard your exact story from several people lately, where the shaving about 10% off the original clock allows the thing to run again. I'm becoming suspicious that manufacturers are putting in a fusable link to punish overclockers. If you can get a trade-in, go ahead, but I wouldn't try overclocking it again. Morris 2/22/99(Q) I decided to upgrade my machine (or better, buy a second one) and yesterday I did so: a PentiumII 400Mhz with 64M, All in wonder and DVDBut on Saturday I brought home my brand new monitor, a nice 19"Samsung monitor... I'm hearing some strange sounds in the back of it. I mean, it's a cracking sound like the one the static produces in a TV screen after turned off (and as you pass your hand in front of it, you know the sound? Sounds like little firecracks in the back of it were being blasted, or like those bubble gum that explodes in your mouth...) Today, Monday, I started to work as normal and the sounds started again after half an hour of being turned on the screen... I'm very worried... is it normal? Can I do something? Should I tell the store and change the monitor? Pablo (A) Definitely tell the store, and see what they advise. I've actually seen some brand new monitors that smell like burning electronics for the first few days, then are fine after that. It's strange, since monitors, unlike PCs, are always "burned in" to an extent, because they can't make the final adjustments without powering them on. All the same, noise is never a good thing. Morris 2/21/99(Q) It really started to take hold after I installed Win 98.... I would get invalid page faluts, blue screen of death thingys ect. because the case of the machine was for a P60...I figured that my full decked out system was asking too much power from the 145 watt power supply, I upgraded to a new case and power supply. After the new power supply the errors I get come much less frequently, but when I run games, and during cerain parts of windows, I either lock up, or get illigal operation things. I've noticed that it only really happens when I run games and things that require large amounts of system resources. Furthermore, I just got the game half life, and should be able to play it (with my system) at at least 640x800, but it's somtimes is too choppy. Also randomly durring the game the entire system locks up. Nat (A) Try running with just 1 32MB DIMM, and then just the other. Win98 stresses the system RAM more than any previous version, just like 95 had a way of picking on overheating CPUs. Really sounds like an unhappy RAM problem. (Nat reports RAM is it). Morris 2/18/99(Q) I have recently purchased a new computer, which I am using for financial programs, and my wife if using as a wordprocessor. Can you summarize the different options I have for e-mail, and whether or not I want to get a regular Internet service like AOL or somebody local? Irving (A) You have three main choices for e-mail. First, the free, no Internet service route, using Juno or a similar provider. The give you a local number to call and a custom e-mail program, which gives you full e-mail usage at the cost of looking at some advertisements. My sister has been using Juno for 2 years with no complaints. The other two choice require you to have a monthly Internet service, whether local or national. Your ISP (Internet Service Provider) will always give you an e-mail account with your service, and you can choose which program (i.e., Eudora, Netscape Messenger, etc..) to use for actually sending e-mails. If you travel, howver, getting your e-mail can be a bit of a hassle. The other option, once you have an Internet connection, is to use the free online mail from Excite, Yahoo, etc.., which you access by going to their home page from any computer. The main advantages are you keep the same e-mail address even if you change your ISP, and you can getand send mail from any live Internet connection in the world. As to who to pick for Internet service, I don't have any strong likes or dislikes, just don't sign any long term contracts, particularly your first time out. A month at a time is the way to go for most folks, unless you have a business. Morris 2/16/99(Q) I am currently under task from my employer to network the internet. I have to admit that I am at a loss as to where to begin. Our current network is Windows NT 4.0 server with Windows 95 workstations. I have two modems available for use, one is 56.6 and the other is 28.8. I am just looking for a starting point, 1) how to share a modem over the network, 2) what kind of software will I need to provide shared internet access and e-mail capabilities for my workstations. I have plenty of networking and computer experience, but haven't worked much with modems yet. Once I know where to begin I can usually figure out the more technical details. Jeni (A) You can install Proxy Server on the NT box (or a 95 for that matter) and the networked computers can then share the modem. Don't ask me for details, I've never had a reason to do it, but there is probably some more info on Proxy Server based on what people wrote me in the Midnight Question backlogs. If anyone has any good info to send me on the subject, I'll be happy to post it. Morris 2/15/99(Q) My system started locking up during boot at "Verifying DMI Pool Data," so I had to boot from floppy. I tried reformatting my C drive but at the end it says "Unable to write to BOOT, format terminated." I can get a C> and D> (2 physical drives, D still has data on it) but when I try a DIR on either, I get an "Invalid Media Type reading drive C:" Tony (A) First, go into CMOS and redetect your hard-drive types. If they are OK, and you still can't access the drives, your BIOS may have slipped a bit, or you may have bagged a virus. For the latter, FDISK and FORMAT from a clean floppy should do it. For the former, about the only suggestions are restoring BIOS defaults, and if that doesn't work, re-Flashing the BIOS. Morris 2/12/99Back from Israel, will try resuming service. Sorry if my answers are getting shorter, but I'd been getting over 20 questions a day and I have to take some time out for new writing projects and making a living. Morris DisclaimerI reserve the right to re-use old questions out of my backfile on days that the incoming questions aren't illustrative of anything interesting, and to edit the questions and answers for this page. Please include a valid e-mail address with all questions. I reply to all submitted questions, and each weekday I'll post a question/answer on this page after midnight. Who knows? Maybe I'll get another book out of it some day. I also reserve the right to be wrong, so I assume no responsibility if my answers cause you to lose your life, your wife, or even your joint life savings. Nor do I guarantee the safety of your data, or that your computer or telephone won't explode, wiping out your home town.
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