486 Won't Boot Up

[Enjay1]

I have a 486DX2-33 with 20 MB ram running Win95 B. For some reason, When I go to boot up, the top of the first screen repeats itself twice and that's as far as it goes. I re-boot and go into CMOS, and reset everything, then when it boots again I get the "AMI- American Megatrends" twice and it hangs again. Help Please!

[eyesee]

has any new hardware been added to the system?

[dial]

Do you feel like some work?
Remove all the cards (except the video card) & disconnect the HD & floppy cables. Try to boot, if OK - start adding drives and cards. If 'no go' - remove all but one memory SIMM - still 'no go' - swap the video card. Still no luck - check for motherboard grounding, loose BIOS chip, full moon etc. Some may disagree with this - but I figure 'back to basics'.
Good luck

[Professur]

486DX2-33??? Better recheck that. There's no such animal

[Enjay1]

Oops - my mistake - I was working on 2 at the same time - this one is a 486SX33 the other was the 486DX2-66. The one I'm having this problem with is the 33.

Sorry about that....

[Enjay1]

No new hardware added.

Tried your suggestions and still nothing.

Crossed the jumpers and cleared the CMOS 3 times, reset it, and the same garbage.
Maybe I could use some of Murph's C4?

[Professur]

May as well go for the C4. It looks like the MB or the CPU. Can you swap parts with the 66? Also, try removing the video card and ALL the simms. you should get some beep codes. Report them here and we'll go from there

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No good deed ever went unpunished

[Enjay1]

Will do. It smells like the mobo may be the cause. I can't even access CMOS. A few more tries, and I think I'll perhaps store the thing..... in a dumpster.

[jtmurphy]

HEY! 486 GUY HERE

Glad I'm not the only one lol,lol

Reboot that sucker one last time and hold the INS key down, this may clear the CMOS.

If you can get in use BIOS defaults either F3/F4 key.

Your master boot record is screwed up, boot with a good boot disk, at the A:\> type

FDISK/MBR to fix it, if it won't boot to the A:\>, time for the C4.......

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Murphy's Law- It will go wrong, but we can fix it!!
But if it ain't broke - "Leave it Alone"
http://www.sybercom.net/jtmurphy/index.htm

[Enjay1]

Thanks Murph - but even with the INS key held down - I got nowhere. I yanked the board out, put the I/O card, sound blaster, video card and cpu into another board and lo and behold - it worked. That confirms my suspicions that the motherboard was likely faulty - or perhaps it could be narrowed down to the BIOS chip itself.

Thanks for the tips all!

[leeo]

Hi Enjay1,
Are your MB jumpers set right?
Did you try differnt SIMMS?
Check the power supply voltages?
Hello dumpster..

[This message has been edited by leeo (edited 02-21-2000).]

[Professur]

No beep codes?

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No good deed ever went unpunished

[Enjay1]

The jumper settings are correct. I tried the simms in the second board and worked fine.

One beep. Thats what makes me think bios chip. It seems to be seated properly and not loose. Oh well.... Hello dumpster!

[Professur]

What do you get when you mix 1 motherboard, 3 ounces C4, and a 9 volt battery.....
something even I can't fix

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No good deed ever went unpunished