Adventures in Computing

Post by **Dalton** » 2004-01-02 09:35am

Or, another hour of "FUCK!"

So my CPUFAN connection is failing to return the RPMs on my heatsink fan, which it's supposed to do. Won't do it in MBM, won't do it in the BIOS. So after mucking about with MBM settings, I decide to flip a switch in the BIOS.

The CPU overheat protect.

Problem is, the thing'll shut down the computer if the CPUFAN is under 500 RPM...

And since the CPUFAN connection wasn't returning any speed reading at all, i.e. 0 RPM...

Yeah. So I went in and cleared the CMOS jumper. Shorted the jumper, put it back, turned it on.

Dr Voice: "Your memory may have a problem."

FUCK!

Flash-forward to now. After various and equally useless attempts to fix the problem by other means, including clearing the CMOS again...I decide "to hell with it" and remove the 512MB RAM chip in DIMM 1.

Computer boots.

Cost of my efforts: Fan speed still reading 0 RPM, RAM down 512 MB to 384.

And I still can't figure out what happened to the RAM.

Post by **The Yosemite Bear** » 2004-01-02 10:10am

I don't know hard ware that well I just understand the way they think

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2004-01-02 04:16pm

Run memtest86 and see if something's wrong with your RAM. There are downloadable ISOs.

Daltonator · Post by **Daltonator** » 2004-01-02 05:33pm

phongn wrote:Run memtest86 and see if something's wrong with your RAM. There are downloadable ISOs.

I don't think I can run something if the computer refuses to boot after it detects a RAM problem.

lukexcom · Post by **lukexcom** » 2004-01-02 09:34pm

Pull the RAM out, put it back in, in different orders, sometimes one stick, sometimes two, in all possible combinations, each time testing the effect?

GrandMasterTerwynn · Post by **GrandMasterTerwynn** » 2004-01-02 10:42pm

Daltonator wrote:
phongn wrote:Run memtest86 and see if something's wrong with your RAM. There are downloadable ISOs.
I don't think I can run something if the computer refuses to boot after it detects a RAM problem.

Try pulling out the 384 MB of RAM and putting in the 512 MB stick by itself. See if it boots with that, and then run memtest on it. Or, better yet, first test the 384 MB you have in there now.

Post by **Dalton** » 2004-01-02 11:59pm

Well, I just put the 512 back in and it works fine now. Moot point

A final tip: don't be a dumbass