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trueman · 11-06-2003, 07:01 AM

Hello,

I have just been given an old P233 from a friend that I want to fix up and send to my dad as he wants to learn computers. I had to buy a new hdd (3gb) a floppy drive cause the original was full of dust, and added a stick of ram. I pulled the power supply apart and blew out all the dust and also gave the case, m/b etc a good blow out also. I installed the new hdd and floopy drive and added a second stick of 32mb pc100 ram.
After switching the unit on it beeped numerous times and the screen stayed black. I took out the new stick of ram as I am not sure if the original ram is pc100 anyway. I rebooted again and the computer displayed the startup screen with American Megatrends etc and "Pentium 233" on one line.
After about 10 seconds the screen turns black and nothing else happens. I tried again and this time hit the del key to try and get into the BIOS setup but it still just went to a black screen.
Question 1. Even if I didnt try to get into the BIOS setup shouldn't I at least end up at a black screen with a flashing cursor or does the hdd need to be setup in the BIOS first? I end up at a blank screen where the monitor will go into stand by as there is nothing to display.
Question 2.
Why cant I get into the BIOS setup by hitting the del key anyway?
Question 3.
I have noticed that the floppy drive light and the hdd light stays on the whole time. Could this be the problem and if so how do I fix it?
Question 4. Does it matter If I use the first connector for the drive on the IDE cable or the end connector. (1 drive on IDE 1 with jumper set as master and cd-rom on IDE 2.
Question 6. If the new pc133 ram didn,t work can I assume that my original ram must be PC66 and i therefore need to buy another stick of PC66?

Thanks for the help,

Trueman.

11-06-2003, 07:01 AM	#1 (permalink)
trueman Registered User Join Date: Nov 2003 Posts: 141	See today's most popular deals at » problem with re-built computer Hello, I have just been given an old P233 from a friend that I want to fix up and send to my dad as he wants to learn computers. I had to buy a new hdd (3gb) a floppy drive cause the original was full of dust, and added a stick of ram. I pulled the power supply apart and blew out all the dust and also gave the case, m/b etc a good blow out also. I installed the new hdd and floopy drive and added a second stick of 32mb pc100 ram. After switching the unit on it beeped numerous times and the screen stayed black. I took out the new stick of ram as I am not sure if the original ram is pc100 anyway. I rebooted again and the computer displayed the startup screen with American Megatrends etc and "Pentium 233" on one line. After about 10 seconds the screen turns black and nothing else happens. I tried again and this time hit the del key to try and get into the BIOS setup but it still just went to a black screen. Question 1. Even if I didnt try to get into the BIOS setup shouldn't I at least end up at a black screen with a flashing cursor or does the hdd need to be setup in the BIOS first? I end up at a blank screen where the monitor will go into stand by as there is nothing to display. Question 2. Why cant I get into the BIOS setup by hitting the del key anyway? Question 3. I have noticed that the floppy drive light and the hdd light stays on the whole time. Could this be the problem and if so how do I fix it? Question 4. Does it matter If I use the first connector for the drive on the IDE cable or the end connector. (1 drive on IDE 1 with jumper set as master and cd-rom on IDE 2. Question 6. If the new pc133 ram didn,t work can I assume that my original ram must be PC66 and i therefore need to buy another stick of PC66? Thanks for the help, Trueman.