Well, just on a hunch, I dragged out my old Celeron computer dating to 1997 from my storage unit. It’d been in storage for the better part of 2 1/2 years, completely taped up inside it’s cold cardboard crypt.
Well, I plugged everything together, and hit the “Power” button.
Some of the lights light up, but it seems to be caught in the boot sequence. The hard drive light is on, the three keyboard lights are on, and the monitor is blank. And it just sits there. . .
. . . and sits there . . .
. . . and sits there . . .
. . . and sits there until I have to flip the little power switch in the back to turn it off. I’ve tried the same thing using a boot disk in the “A:” floppy drive, but to no avail.
Is my old computer kaput for good, or is there some way I can boot it up, even if it’s just to get some of the old information off the hard drive before I condemn it to the firing squad? I was hoping to network it to my old machine, but this is leaving me with a cold, sinking feeling in my stomach.
Help, please.
Tripler
I have 300 rounds of 5.56mm ready to put it out of its misery if need be.
Sounds like the motherboard is not functioning at all. You might try taking the CPU out and the memory out then putting them back in, making sure that they make good contact. Your best bet might be to put the drive in another machine to get stuff off of it.
I would open the case and make sure that all the cards are seated well and IDE connectors are tight. Computers always look for the video card first and will not proceed if there is an error. You will see the boot sequence even without a hard drive so I would think that the problem is occuring before the the OS system begins to boot. Did it give any beeps?
This seems to imply that it’s been stored in someplace like an unheated garage or storage area? So then it’s actually probably been cold for 2 winters, and hot for 2 summers.
This kind of thermal change (plus packing and now unpacking it) is fairly likely to lead to unseating of components. So open up the case, take out each board and each removable chip, and carefully reinsert them into the slots.
It also depends on exactly where it was stored. If there was anything nearby that emitted an electromagnetic field, like a motor or something, that would definately make it hate life.
Many of the pentium machines had trouble with the memory becoming unseated, but you would certainly see something on starting it up.
Going on just the information you’ve provided, I would conclude that the hard drive is bad or miscabled. But that’s really not enough information to diagnose the problem.
Can we get more info about the hard drive light? Is it flickering, or is solid? Do you hear the characteristic “ticking” sounds made by a hard drive as the OS is being booted from the hard drive?
Also, do you at any point see anything at all on the monitor? Flickering, diagnostic data, anything at all?
Well, I just pulled out the video card, dusted it off, cleaned it’s contacts and put it back in. I haven’t tried it for the rest of the cards/chips yet, but I think I might. . .
I can heartily verify that it hasn’t been cannabalized for parts (as I’m the original and only owner), and there are no little bugs in the guts (although I did see a little facehugger xenomorph running my apartment buildings hallway this morning. Weird, eh?)
The hard drive light lights up, but it’s a constant light. At first, I can hear the hard drive twitching as it starts, but then nothing. And I see absolutely nothing on the screen on bootup.
If it’s my hard drive, I have three questions:
Can I go down to the local office supply place, buy a new HDD, and slap it in there just to get the thing up and running again?
Is there any way I can retrieve the data on my old HDD? I’ve heard it can be done, but IIRC, it’s kind of expensive.
Does anyone want parts for a really cool Borg costume for next Halloween?
This is a bummer though. I was really hoping I could use this machine this weekend. Please tell me it can be salvaged. . .
Tripler
Instead of Alien vs. Predator (which was dumb), I suggest an Alien vs. Borg movie.
It really looks to me like your motherboard is dead, and because of this there is no way of determining whether or not your hard drive is still functioning. The only way your hard drive will fix this problem is that if you remove the hard drive (you don’t have to physically remove it, just disconnect its IDE cable), the computer boots normally and complains about not being able to find an operating system. If that happens, then there is a decent shot that a new hard drive would fix it. If you remove the drive and the screen is still blank, a new hard drive isn’t going to help.
You haven’t posted enough info yet for me to conclude that your hard drive is definately dead. It may be, it may not. If not, you can just stick it in another computer and see if you can access it. If it is dead, you can send it away to a data recovery place. They will remove the platters, connect them to a working drive controller, and will read the data. All of this has to be done with specialized equipment in a specialized room, so the service tends to cost a few thousand dollars.
The fact that you hear the hard drive “twitching” is a good sign. It means the drive bearings aren’t frozen and the head mechanism still works. I’d say you have a much better than 50/50 shot that the drive is still functional.
I don’t know if it is ready for assimilation just yet. You really need to concentrate on the CPU and memory. If reseating these and maybe cleaning their contacts doesn’t get something to appear on the screen, then you can call your local borg office.
There is no evidence at all that your cpu is doing anything. The lights on your keyboard and hard drive will all do what they are doing if all you have is power and get a reset signal. If it was actually getting part way through the boot sequence you’d at least end up with beep codes.
And since you’ve already been advised of my first choice (reseating the video card)…
I have two other things to try.
I’m assuming this is a Celeron 266. That’s a fairly resilient overclocking CPU, by the way. Worth keeping. It will run Quake.
Take out the AGP video card and install a (known-working) PCI card instead.
For the second possibility, it is not a huge stretch to say that the BIOS has gone south.
If the chip itself is bad, it may be modular and easily replaceable. You just won’t have the PC for this weekend.
You may want to look on your motherboard for a jumper labeled BIOS CLEAR. I’m assuming you know how to use it, but in case you don’t, look in your system manual for instructions.
Also, depending on the depth of your boot sequence, you may notice the floppy drive (presuming it’s still working) power on. If this is the case, you may be able to rescue a bunk BIOS by inserting a floppy with a good BIOS on it. Many BIOSes come with fail-safes that can be accessed by depressing a key combination at power-on and through pre-boot.
