Vince please don't feel bad on long vids, it is great to watch and the time you put in is great. Well done mate for gambling the problem and finding it.
I bet you were all "it's the RAM"" at the start. Bet you never guessed dodgy bios chip! I didn't to begin with. He got there though. I'm well proud of Vince for this one.
Most repair shops would have just swapped the board, good to see you going the extra mile fault finding on to component level is worth the reward. It is clear that a surge or static electricity killed the BIOS in this instance.
Your videos are always enjoyable! Long, short, no fix, easy fix, complex fix, old time toys, brand new unopened tech, cars, vacuums, etc. Your work is GREAT
Wow I've never repaired a bad bios. Your deduction skills are excellent! If you didn't disconnect the backup battery, perhaps second bios died as legs were shorted when un soldering... Good to see a win!
Repairing PCs used to be my bread and butter. I much prefer hardware to software but both can be frustrating, especially not having spare parts to swap around. I don't envy you this task 😅 .
Wow as a guy that has watched every one of your videos and who is an IT engineer I loved it. I assume the low CMOS battery corrupted the bios chip. Some motherboards allow you to reflash a bios chip without a screen by copying the image to a usb stick and then putting the stick in a specific port and turning the computer on to re-flash. P.s. please use usb mouse and keyboard when you fix computers at the bios level and not Bluetooth. Keep up the great work I'm learning with every vid thanks to you
The CMOS battery will affect CMOS memory, which stores settings. The BIOS won't be affected by that. Logitech Unifying keyboards and mice will behave like USB wired counterparts of these devices. The receiver needs to be paired, though.
The bios chips can be programmed with a cheap usb programmer from ebay. It should be possible to do it directly with the bin files if they are available from the hp website, but haven’t tried that. The bios guy is either dumping bios images from all kinds of pcs, or getting them from the manufacturer site. It’s a good service, as it would take some effort to buy the tools and set up the software yourself
In general: The dvi ports on the motherboard will only work, if the installed cpu has graphics-support. If not, they won't. Normally with removed separate graphics-card (and installed speaker) and cpu without graphics, it will only beep several times.
The power on, power off and power on cycle is usually ram training/testing. Nice fix! No idea if the original bios chips could have been flashed blindly, ie usb stick with the bios file on and plugged into a particular usb port when switching on. With it being a HP prebuilt, and particularly the age of it, probably not.Nice to see companies available that will flash bios chips for a very reasonable cost.
interesting, the dell optiplex in my bedroom does that after its been unpluged for a while the ram testing thing I sell referbished computers and wondered about that bc I need to let the custumer know it works fine but will do that.
Let me first say Vince, if you are ok making long videos, I am very happy watching them. I have not watched the whole video yet. But for someone familiar with bent pins on an Intel board, this worries me a little. I am sure though this was not the problem. I really wish I had your exceptional skills in all areas of fixing. I am afraid I have only a small amount of skills compared to you. I have the equipment, just not the know-how. I just love your videos and the way you do not let your personal troubles stop you from making them..I really do love your channel, Vince, and the way you go about repairing stuff in a logical manner, its a sight to behold. Thank you for sharing your repair videos with us, Vince.
Great finding of the fault Vince. Nice to see you trying new things to fix. An advice - Get a BIOS programmer like the CH341A kit and you will be able to flash most if not all BIOS chips. Just make sure to do the 3.3V correction for the CH341A and you will be good to go. Cheers.
Yes, this generation of HP motherboards are notorious for a failed bios after a ram swap. Flashing the latest version of bios using ch341a usually fixes it.
Fascinating and entertaining to watch your personal approach on things you barely ever worked on. I would've started off completely differently to rule out "an obvious" component issue and probably ended up just replacing that entire mainboard. :) But it's incredible to see you go above and beyond to pinpoint the exact fault and still manage to get it fixed in the end. Mad kudos, Vince! ^^
Great job... You have a very interesting way of repairing this. I have several motherboard test cards and boxes. These will diagnose 80 percent of all issues. You can also get a cheap chip reader with pin clamps. This will allow you to read the data and check for corruption as well as try to write the chip.
Had one of these just before Covid, and the power supply died during. Came as a shock to find out both it and the motherboard were proprietary. They didn't even keep it in stock to sell, supposedly due to Covid. Tried for ages to get a replacement but never did. That experience has definitely put me off buying prebuilt systems again.
You can of course by one of those ATX to whatever proprietary connector. Then you can use normal ATX PSU...yay. But yeah, I dont buy any non ATX devices.
Always fascinating to watch your level of perseverance Vince and I'm glad you stuck with it! Fascinating to see your level of diagnostic skill has risen over time! I wish you the very best!
Great fix - This is the reason a lot of hobbyist/enthusiast motherboards have a bios flash back function. You drop a bios file onto a usb stick, push a special button on the motherboard or back panel, and it flashes the bios, and can be done even without a cpu or ram!
Assuming the bios chips were still good you could have reflashed them with and EPROM programmer. I've used my TL866 to repair a few dead bios chips. It isn't as easy on modern PCs though as the bios update files nowadays contain updates for more than just the bios. The will also have firmware images for things like the Intel Management Engine (a microcontroller in the chipset), network controllers, RGB lighting controllers, and other things. You would need to separate out the files from the update package before flashing it to the bios. It can also require you customizing the firmware image with things like the network MAC address, and other data specific to the machine (or at least generic info).
Well done, Vince. Good deduction on BIOSes. One thing to be aware of, if you tackle another desktop is that symptom of the PC turning on, then off, then on again. When turning on for the first time, this is normal. The PC is doing checks, training memory, settings, then once it finds settings it can use, resets and boots.
fair play for sticking with I also lose interest when it doesn't go right first or second go and then it ends up on my desk for "later" lol, maybe needing to finish the video is good motivation or shows better your dedication to your channel. Well done
Can't be certain, I did so much work on this that sometimes the battery may have been left in 😬😬😬 Didn't think about 3v going into a leg it shouldn't have gone into
At least you didn`t give up! it is frustrating but sometime you take a bit of down time, comeback a little later, even the most apparent fault will show up, but computers are a difficult beast, and are challenging even to the most seasonal technician/ hobbiest, when you actually fix something self achievement can be overwhelming. Pat on the back👏👏👏
Shorting out pins of the bios chip with the 3V from the battery still around can only do harm. Oups... We can't see if you were using the soldering iron with battery on, but for sure you were probing with the battery on.
A chip flashing tool might be a good investment for future fixes like this where you need to program or reprogram a chip that became corrupted. Would also allow you to buy cheaper blank chips and flash them yourself instead of paying someone else for a preflashed chip. Either way, great fix, Vince!
Vince, most motherboards (if not all) have a jumper that we can use to reset the bios. I’m not aware that bios chips are so sensitive to heat, technicians de-solder, re-flash and re-solder them normally. What some chips are very sensitive to is electrostatic electricity. When testing a computer, give preference (if possible) to use the DVI port. HDMI is set as secondary port in some video cards and are only activated after you install the driver. One of my cards is like that. Anyway, you got it.
You have the patience of a saint, I would have thrown both in the bin half way through this and I am a PC guy Well done for working it out, greeat videos, love them! Keep up the great work
I'm 14 years old and I fix computers too. If an HP pc beeps 5 times, it's a memory problem. If it's not displaying but it's on and not beeping, it's possibly the ram or the gpu. I have been fixing computers since 2019 and still fixing them to this day.
Thanks for the video. I had this exact issue occur to me. A long while ago I had a dead laptop (with a 5th gen. i5 and some Radeon GPU) which was given away to me by a customer (I was a PC tech back then). Then, one guy on Facebook asked if anyone had dead laptops to sell, he wanted to try fixing. I said sure, I can sell mine. Sold him for the price of a charger and a promise that in case he succeeds, he would tell me what was wrong. And it turned out all that was wrong was the corrupt BIOS chip. The lucky guy got himself a half decent laptop for almost nothing.
hey Vince, find your videos very interesting, wish I knew more about the how the different components work and the job they do, be great if you did a mini series on a tutorial .....
I'm surprised hot air wiped or killed the BIOS chips, generally I use hot air to pull chips off boards then solder them on to a chip programmer without any loss of data. Maybe both of them were marginal? But yes you can buy cheap re-programmers for these chips including ones that don't need de-soldering at all, they just clip on to the legs of the SOIC chip. It's nice to think that newer motherboards have USB flashing and dual BIOSes to try and avoid situations like this. It was super nice for the seller to flash them for you. Would I fix one of these in real life? It's hard to say, we've kind of peaked with computer processing speeds and we're at the point of e-wasting computers just because we have too many of them. I'd probably fix it. Thanks for another great video Vince, I really admire your dedication and effort in to making videos over a long time span instead of just dumping it up in parts on TH-cam for series that shouldn't be parts. That said, no objections to another 100 part car series!
Well done for getting as far as you did (even with the mistakes!) :) For future PC-fixing reference, here's a few tips: * If comparing stuff, always use the same input/output method(s) (preferably wired, not wireless). Try to compare like with like rather than introducing further potential differences (complexities, not voltages) between the devices * HDMI can use a lot more GFX processing power than VGA/DVI, as its GFX output is processed by the GPU to save CPU cycles, so the startup current spike is critical. Use the 'lowest common denominator' method (both DVI in this case) to eliminate that potential difference/fault * Check 'no display' faults with all available inputs before moving on to another area: this one could have been as simple as a minor PSU component falling below its 'trigger level' for required startup current (more common with higher-end GFX processors than this 'office' machine, but still..). This would prolly require a 'scope trace (& correct interpretation) of the PSU while powering up, ofc * The onboard cell is there simply to provide activation current to the UEFI ('BIOS') chip so it can retain its settings during power-off conditions. A lower voltage is perfectly good (& expected in such an old machine); the only time to be concerned would be if the cct or cell shows signs of corrosion or dmg: the (uncorrupted) BIOS will still work when powered up, but won't retain (eg) time/date or settings manually altered from its defaults (so should still display the same error screen). This cell cct should have no connection to any other power if the m/c is on mains, as it's not rechargeable* * The original board was for an I5; the comparator was for an I3. There may have been subtle (sometimes undocumented) board revisions between the two which could have resulted in a similar failure mode if the CPUs were swapped, as the comparator may have needed some BIOS tweaks to help it recognise the newer, more powerful I5 - you lucked out there! :) *I'd look around that 0-ohm resistor to see if there was any chance of the local tracks/components leading to the 'battery backup' cell being shorted: an unexpected voltage surge could have spiked thru that area via induction, leading to BIOS corruption/wipe & potentially damaging the cell: high frequencies (MHz/GHz), even in low voltage areas, can have surprising reach if spiked outside their nominal operating range - hence the careful track designs in such crowded areas as a computer mobo. See RF 'magic' for more details :) Once again, 'grats on getting as far as you did! :)
Great fix. If you happen to come across a corrupted BIOS in future it is often possible to flash the bios with a usb stick on many new-ish PCs - even if the PC won't boot - I guess the flashing function is built into some other chip on the board. I have successfully done it on an old MSI motherboard even without a CPU installed. I did look on the HP website and this one seems slightly too old to support it or at least it isn't documented, but they do seem to support it on later models. I would never have found that open resistor!
Only newer boards that are mostly non oem or in a specific pc but for all purposes have it. It actually uses a second microocntroller chip on the motherboard which often has "BIOS" or "BIOS FLASHBACK" labled on it
Some motherboards have the ability to flash bios without the CPU but it's not as common as the ones without a q flash function, although alot of the newer ones do
I really enjoyed this video, reminded me when I was trying to get an old PCI-E card running on my old PC I bought of ebay.. found it the power supply was too low and I needed to put extra power directly into the card. "Wasn't like that in my day HA!" in fact back in the day I couldn't afford the card to that was why I was trying to relive the 2009 magic I never had 🤣🤣
while hes at the big tv with the bioses swapped, omg never heard someone so enthusiastic about the end result being it broken! Then, buzkill once they are both busted including the og one. Hey I would love to see you try to fix a faulty ebay hair removal laser-IPL machine or a VCR. Heres a challenge for you: try and uncrack a lcd? I doubt you'd have any success unfortunately but hey maybe you'd come up with a fix somehow who knows! You never fail to amaze me man I appreciate your channel and what you do right now Im eating mcdonalds watching this and it is awesome to sit back and enjoy.
Hi Vince take out the graphics card. Then connect a monitor to the graphics card that is built into the motherboard. If that don't work my next move would be to try it with each stick of ram separately. Love your content. Keep it up
That PC is outdated as can be. It could hardly handle windows 10. I'd not spend the time, or money fixing it. But the video was well worth the watch. Great job.
I had the exact same symptom with exactly the same model. Mine also had a graphics card in it. I also had no display. Simply unplugging the card does not necessarily solve it if the bios still expects the card and has turned off the internal graphics. Also removing the battery does not necessarily reset the bios. There is a bios reset jumper on the board. I used that and it worked again. No electrical tech work required ;)
Could you hear me yelling at the screen. LOL We all start at the start, You can not know everything. I have been working on computers a long time. You reminded me of how I started. Because of the I have lots of computer parts to test with. and you getting one to test with is pure genius on your part. I was rooting for you all the way. and Yelling try this and that. LOL Like you could hear me. You can only fail if you quit. Take a break is okay. Sometime you run into a fix away from what you are fixing. The Aha moment always feels good.
Well done Vince, my money was on the power unit as I've recently had a similar problem with an HP do strange things on boot, no booting or rebooting continually. You could do what I'm doing with mine - Turn it into a media server.
why it worked twice randomly.. I would say that temperature had very much to do with it. the temperature may have hit in a zone that brought some components to life, but drop when the temp is not perfect. Great video! :)
Some useful knowledge I found out in my 9-10 years of experience with pcs (it's not painful to me, you remind me of me when I was fixing my first pcs at 13 years old) 2:58 depends on the motherboard, hp mobos (like almost all the others on the market) do not allow both igpu (integrated cpu graphics) and gpu to work at the same time. that said, if you have igpu output with a gpu in, i would check the graphics card. 10:58 at that point, I would have started to swap the gpu, just to see if something changes. If you think that that is not going to be the last (desktop, obviously) computer that you're going to work on, i'd suggest to buy a cheap (5-10£) pci-e gpu, just to have one around to help troubleshooting. 16:08 it's actually pretty easy to find a bios chip, look for a square 8-pin 25 or 24 series ic Yup, the square chip near the resistors at the edge of the board looks like a bios chip. 36:51 There's a good reason why it's not working, f-ing Intel's ME region on the chip. I still don't know what it does, but it's an essential peace of code that you have to either copy or leave blank when reprogramming the bios ics. You can try to reprogram the bios chip (following some annoying procedures). But you'd need both a bios dump (you can find it online or get it from the working ebay board) and a bios chip programmer (I have a CH341A, very basic, but inexpensive) 38:31 I don't know why it failed, but i doubt it's because of the hot air, the first ic failed due to bit-rot, it is becoming more and more common nowadays. 39:48 I was wondering about the compatibility of those ebay chips, thanks for tying them... I actually have a dual socket motherboard that needs a bios chip replacement. Overall, the repair shop that your friend went to, gets an F, he should have at least tried to reprogram the bios chip on a pc this old with these symptoms. I would have. P.S.: I'm in a bit of a hurry, I have not re-read the comment to check for errors (english is not my first language), hopefully there are none.
4:00 Most of PCs do work without coin cell battery. The coin cell battery sumplys voltage to a chip that keeps CMOS settings date and time. You actually can leave battery off during diags or if the PC is always plugged to power. Putting a new battery will not make PC work. In fact, batteries with like 2v will work fine to keep date and time when PC is powered off from the wall, no cord plugged. If PC is plugged and not running, one ATX feature will keep motherboard supplied with voltage.
I have seen multiple videos from other repair guys, Electronic Repair School and Adamant IT I guess, where a simple BIOS reprogramming without even changing it had resolved the problem. Seems an ongoing theme that BIOSes can loose some info. Maybe even cosmic radiation. Only one bit flipping would be enough to corrupt the program. The blown zero ohm resistor could then have been the result of faulty BIOS signal output. But a power surge is also a possible scenario. I had a board once after a power surge caused by a flash. The board didn't want to start if you pressed the on switch. It span up the fans for half a second and shut down.
Thank you for your video, i have a similar desktop one at home that i left for dead and i think it's also bios related. I'm gonna check if i can find a replacement chip, nice !
Great fix and when the system starts and then turns off and then shows it is doing basic system checks and memory training it is a completely normal thing for a PC to do. The better of the 2 PCs is probably not worth much more than the one you got from ebay as it is a 3rd gen chip that came out in 2012.
Very nice fix, interesting to see a desktop PC being fixed for a change. Talking about HP desktop PC's, recently tested my 2001 HP Brio PC with my FullHD flat screen display the first time ever. So far I've always used it with it's original CRT monitor. It worked and the HP's Windows 98SE wanted to install new plug & play device driver for the Asus FullHD display. This HP started and gave display signal normally even when the cmos battery died, it just complained about BIOS checksum error at the start, and time and date were wrong (Jan-1-2000). Original cmos battery lasted about 20 years which is pretty amazing.
Wow (spoiler warning) .. ... .. , I would've never found that broken 0 Ohm resistor. For me it feels like you are the luckiest guy ever or you just got a really good intuition for finding broken components. I mean there are hundreds of parts on the board. And well the bios chip by itself is not doing much. It needs most of the other parts including cpu under ram and all the voltage stuff to show something. So from my point of view it could have been everything, so I was quite sure if it is not one of the main components that it quite impossible to fix even more so for someone with very little pc knowledge.
It was purely diode test that found it, it did take around 15 mins of probing before I found a different reading from the working board. If it wasn't for the other working one I would never have found it, no chance. Probably a bit of luck as well though😂👍👍👍
Hi Vince, the 0 ohm resistor (nice find) is often used either as a link or also as a fuse. It could have been blown when they tried to fix the computer. As for the corrupted BIOS/Flash, this is a relatively common thing. It could be as simple as a failed Bios update. Just be aware that there are 2 types of chips with different voltages. 1.8V and 3.3V You can get a programmer for few pounds. Look up CH41A. It is relatively simple to use. The chips them self don't necessarily have to be bad. Certainly NT by using hotair. Many boards do have a BIOS recovery option and I believe that this board does have it too, where you can recover the BIOS directly from a flash drive. Other than that.. you've essentially got and bough e-waste. But you can use it as a Linux Mint Office PC.
Cheers Marcel. Looks like changing the zero ohm resistor and reprogramming the BIOS would have probably fixed it without buying another chip. Realistically I wouldn't have found the zero ohm resistor without the 2nd eBay system so even if I had my time again I think I would have still needed the working system. Cheers buddy
@@Mymatevince Even a blind chicken will find the corn ;-) and I think, knowing you and your methods, you would find it sooner or later even without the second system. You like to check for continuity. Cheers!
Good Job, I make a fair bit of side income from building and repairing computers (often ones that don't really deserve it, but my clients are on too tight a budget or the machine has sentimental value/etc) A couple of notes, eprom programers are actually very cheap these days (plug in via USB, clips to hold the chips temporarily...) (Many but not all) More recent/modern computers have a feature called 'Flash Back' (many different names) for updating or repairing a corrupted bios with only a USB thumb drive. Zero ohm resisters are often used as a fuse, its the FIRST thing you check on many game consoles/handhelds.. I'm not even going to 'cringe' over some of the NO.. Don't Do it THAT way' moments.. I applaud anyone with the basic electronics skills and diagnostic patience to dig into something more involved like a computer. Good choice (always) to heat check for dead shorts. That said, MANY computer parts get very very warm in normal operation. Looking for the items OUTSIDE the curve is still always a good option for finding a short. The duplicate machine, no shame.. I have tons of spare parts to swap in/out (though, I HATE with a passion proprietary equipment.. Dell/HP, etc..etc.) Part swapping is a valid process of elimination tool. As another I'm sure already commented. System Integrators willl block off motherboard video ports for multiple reasons. First the processor involved doesn't include video abilities, or Second to avoid customer service calls for people plugging into the motherboard and complaining why their video card (quite frequently a very sizable proportion of the computers cost) isn't working as advertised. Anyways, Love your methods and your persistence..
Great fix Vinc! I did think you might have damaged/corrupted the flash chip of the working one by extensive heat. Memory chips like the common 25xxxx series from winbond or macronix (MX) are pretty common but i managed to damage the firmware of my router when i took the chip off and on again. Memory chips and some other more Sensitive chips dont like heat and it can cause the data stored in them (the bios/UEFI FIRMWARE in your case or firmware in the case of an embedded device like my router) to start corrupting due to how the data is stored in it by storing electrical charges and randomly changing those charged states. Newer motherboards have a external microcontroller chip on them that allows reflashing the bios using just a usb stick, pretty handy and a quality of life feature but tis obvious that these older systems lack that. I hope you have learned a bit about these chips cause these are generic 25 series SPI flash chips that are used in a lot of devices to store firmware or bootcode and i bet you will meet them again in the future so i would actually advise getting a cheap ch341 of amazon which allows reading and writing those chips and also allows copying data from a working chip to a chip that has corrupted data on it or to a new blank chip from aliexpress or some site. Also these can have a handy soic8 clip that allows you to keep the chip on the board and to read it while its in circuit, but this does not always work and you have the risk of sending power into other components or powering up some chip that tries to read from it while you are reading the chip, but they come with a 1.8volt adapter that would hopefully prevent that. Also that the pc turns off and on again sometimes actually is normal! Its just the bios performing something called "dram training" where it decides what the max speed of the ram is and sort of configures it, kind of like the handshake old modems make to negotiate speeds and to configure!
Thanks Simon, it was cut from the video, but one of the little white clips was snapped off (just hanging there) but the RAM was seated down. I noticed it a little later when I went to take them out. I'm pretty sure even at the beginning the RAM was seated down. I just placed the snapped white clip back in, but it wasn't actually clamping anything down later in the vid. Sorry for the confusion, lots of footage was cut from this video 😎
Hey Vince, I got a spare working Seiko H601 missing a pusher and a needing cell change, sans bracelet be more than happy to send to yourself to add to your collection prob could do with a service but it was working lovely up til the cell gave up and its a bit involved changing it, I rebuilt another I bought initially for spares for the other but the second one turned out in a almost pristine condition so the offer is there for me to send to your PO box oh and the GPO multimeter is surplus to requirements since I got my grail multimeter a Soviet 4341. I have a 15v cell for it now but never went any further with it so quite happy to send that along to your PO box (it was the one I emailed you a few weeks back about) :D
Thanks Ian, my watch collection is already too big. I'm planning on reducing it just like everything else i don't use. Cheers for the offer on both of them though👍👍 Appreciate it a lot!
a great way my mate showed me to check if the bios chip is dead is to plug in a keyboard and press num lock or caps lock and see if the corresponding light turns on. if it does it might be something else. but 9/10 times it has worked for me
[SPOILER WARNING AT THE END] i work at an MSP, effectively a tech support person for businessed. we have some of these computers, and i hate them with a passion. the small card in a white socket is a wifi card (also possibly ethernet thought ive never seen this done), its entirely inconsequential to the computer powering on what you did with the RAM is the first step in diagnosis, because it tells you is the CPU is initialising to the point where it can detect ram, nearly all computers will beep aggressively when booting without ram. the battery you removed just keeps time when the PC is unplugged, if its kept plugged in it doesnt matter in the slightest. even when turned off, there is some power flowing though a board to allow it to boot, and tell the PSU to power on, it also keeps the time and BIOS settings personally, this read to me as a faulty dGPU. a computer like this has an iGPU (the graphics card baked into the cpu) and a dGPU (the dedicated graphics card, its sole job is to do the display, think like an rtx4070), but this doesnt explain why it doesnt boot without the DPU (in this case, the red card with a black heatsink), i've never seen the bios of a system fail this way admittedly, so i would have never even thought to check the BIOS. well done vince, you fixed something i would have long given up on, and just chalked it up to a CPU issue also, these computers are entirely useless now. they do not support windows 11, and windows 10 looses support in 2025. following this, the options are either linux, chrome os or insecure windows. for anyone wondering if their computer supports windows 11, if it was made after 2017 it more than likely is.
Dell did this to add a DVI port with a daughter board that would go into the PCI slot. It gave the onboard video an extra output or two. You could tell also, because the printboard was pretty much vacant of any chips and components. Just some traces to a DVI port.
Zero ohm resistor os frequently used to jump traces. A wire need to be manually placed, but zero ohm resistors are automatically placed by same machines as all the other resistors.
Very fun to watch a non pc guy troubleshoot the issue like an electrical tech.
Vince please don't feel bad on long vids, it is great to watch and the time you put in is great. Well done mate for gambling the problem and finding it.
Finally Vince is fixing something I have knowledge of. Now I get to shout at my screen during the video. :)
To resist commenting on things we aren't familiar with demonstrates a higher than normal IQ. Good on you!
I bet you were all "it's the RAM"" at the start. Bet you never guessed dodgy bios chip! I didn't to begin with. He got there though. I'm well proud of Vince for this one.
did you notice that one of the white ram slot clips is out of line at the start of the video??
Same!!!
@@tyronenelson9124 yes
Most repair shops would have just swapped the board, good to see you going the extra mile fault finding on to component level is worth the reward.
It is clear that a surge or static electricity killed the BIOS in this instance.
Your videos are always enjoyable! Long, short, no fix, easy fix, complex fix, old time toys, brand new unopened tech, cars, vacuums, etc. Your work is GREAT
Agreed, I'm happy with any Vince video.
Wow I've never repaired a bad bios. Your deduction skills are excellent!
If you didn't disconnect the backup battery, perhaps second bios died as legs were shorted when un soldering... Good to see a win!
'Have another ridiculously long video that nobody is ever gonna watch' - No, Vince, that's what we love!
You're a good friend to have, lifetime of tech support.
Repairing PCs used to be my bread and butter.
I much prefer hardware to software but both can be frustrating, especially not having spare parts to swap around.
I don't envy you this task 😅
.
Wow as a guy that has watched every one of your videos and who is an IT engineer I loved it. I assume the low CMOS battery corrupted the bios chip. Some motherboards allow you to reflash a bios chip without a screen by copying the image to a usb stick and then putting the stick in a specific port and turning the computer on to re-flash. P.s. please use usb mouse and keyboard when you fix computers at the bios level and not Bluetooth. Keep up the great work I'm learning with every vid thanks to you
The right side Ram wasnt seated properly. And the robbing around on Capet in Woolsocks makes even my Hair stand up. I bet he blew up the Northbridge.
@@dervwfahrer
There is no northbridge anymore, since over 10 years. lol
The CPU is doing that stuff nowadays itself.
@@AttilaTheHun333333i know that
The CMOS battery will affect CMOS memory, which stores settings. The BIOS won't be affected by that. Logitech Unifying keyboards and mice will behave like USB wired counterparts of these devices. The receiver needs to be paired, though.
The bios chips can be programmed with a cheap usb programmer from ebay. It should be possible to do it directly with the bin files if they are available from the hp website, but haven’t tried that. The bios guy is either dumping bios images from all kinds of pcs, or getting them from the manufacturer site. It’s a good service, as it would take some effort to buy the tools and set up the software yourself
Man, do I love these super long and irrational efforts to fix things. Well done!
Thank you for not giving up on the repair, even though it must have been quite frustrating. This video taught me not to give up.
I swear, It feels like I watched the entire TH-cam and was so bored. Then I saw the My Mate Vince notification 😃
Great video man! you should get a live linux flash disk in case you test a computer without a hard-drive again, you can just boot the live OS via USB
I'm liking this before I even watch it because I know personally how hard that can be. Thank you Vince for always uploading quality content.
In general: The dvi ports on the motherboard will only work, if the installed cpu has graphics-support. If not, they won't.
Normally with removed separate graphics-card (and installed speaker) and cpu without graphics, it will only beep several times.
The power on, power off and power on cycle is usually ram training/testing. Nice fix! No idea if the original bios chips could have been flashed blindly, ie usb stick with the bios file on and plugged into a particular usb port when switching on. With it being a HP prebuilt, and particularly the age of it, probably not.Nice to see companies available that will flash bios chips for a very reasonable cost.
interesting, the dell optiplex in my bedroom does that after its been unpluged for a while the ram testing thing
I sell referbished computers and wondered about that bc I need to let the custumer know it works fine but will do that.
Very interesting. Vince, you have the methodical approach of a scientist and the patience of a saint! Inspirational as always. Well done!
Let me first say Vince, if you are ok making long videos, I am very happy watching them. I have not watched the whole video yet. But for someone familiar with bent pins on an Intel board, this worries me a little. I am sure though this was not the problem. I really wish I had your exceptional skills in all areas of fixing. I am afraid I have only a small amount of skills compared to you. I have the equipment, just not the know-how. I just love your videos and the way you do not let your personal troubles stop you from making them..I really do love your channel, Vince, and the way you go about repairing stuff in a logical manner, its a sight to behold. Thank you for sharing your repair videos with us, Vince.
Hands up who shouted don't turn it off at the beginning you just know it's not coming back on lol,great video vince well done
you forgot to romouve the bios battery before desoldring the bios ship and you short the legs
The bios battery doesn’t have power to the rom chip
Are you English because you can not spell
Great finding of the fault Vince. Nice to see you trying new things to fix.
An advice - Get a BIOS programmer like the CH341A kit and you will be able to flash most if not all BIOS chips. Just make sure to do the 3.3V correction for the CH341A and you will be good to go. Cheers.
Yes, this generation of HP motherboards are notorious for a failed bios after a ram swap. Flashing the latest version of bios using ch341a usually fixes it.
Fascinating and entertaining to watch your personal approach on things you barely ever worked on. I would've started off completely differently to rule out "an obvious" component issue and probably ended up just replacing that entire mainboard. :) But it's incredible to see you go above and beyond to pinpoint the exact fault and still manage to get it fixed in the end. Mad kudos, Vince! ^^
Vince you got almost 1 million subs. Were gonna watch anything you make man. We love your channel and your goofy segues to pcb way lol.
Love all of your videos. Watching you inspires me to try and fix my own things. Best wishes from the USA!
Great job... You have a very interesting way of repairing this. I have several motherboard test cards and boxes. These will diagnose 80 percent of all issues. You can also get a cheap chip reader with pin clamps. This will allow you to read the data and check for corruption as well as try to write the chip.
Had one of these just before Covid, and the power supply died during. Came as a shock to find out both it and the motherboard were proprietary. They didn't even keep it in stock to sell, supposedly due to Covid. Tried for ages to get a replacement but never did. That experience has definitely put me off buying prebuilt systems again.
You can of course by one of those ATX to whatever proprietary connector. Then you can use normal ATX PSU...yay. But yeah, I dont buy any non ATX devices.
Always fascinating to watch your level of perseverance Vince and I'm glad you stuck with it! Fascinating to see your level of diagnostic skill has risen over time! I wish you the very best!
Yes! That is why I love watching Vince--it is his perseverance. He gives it his all on all fixes.
Great fix - This is the reason a lot of hobbyist/enthusiast motherboards have a bios flash back function. You drop a bios file onto a usb stick, push a special button on the motherboard or back panel, and it flashes the bios, and can be done even without a cpu or ram!
HP Desktop Vince? For a moment I thought I was watching the Antiques Roadshow!
😂😂
I always enjoy your videos, fix, no-fix or Rolls!
Assuming the bios chips were still good you could have reflashed them with and EPROM programmer. I've used my TL866 to repair a few dead bios chips. It isn't as easy on modern PCs though as the bios update files nowadays contain updates for more than just the bios. The will also have firmware images for things like the Intel Management Engine (a microcontroller in the chipset), network controllers, RGB lighting controllers, and other things. You would need to separate out the files from the update package before flashing it to the bios. It can also require you customizing the firmware image with things like the network MAC address, and other data specific to the machine (or at least generic info).
Nice one Vince, love the long videos, keep them coming. Really enjoyed this.
Welcome to the IT world Vince😂😂
Well done, Vince. Good deduction on BIOSes. One thing to be aware of, if you tackle another desktop is that symptom of the PC turning on, then off, then on again. When turning on for the first time, this is normal. The PC is doing checks, training memory, settings, then once it finds settings it can use, resets and boots.
fair play for sticking with I also lose interest when it doesn't go right first or second go and then it ends up on my desk for "later" lol, maybe needing to finish the video is good motivation or shows better your dedication to your channel. Well done
Always a joy to see you work. Another great video! Best wishes from the USA.
Did you removed the bios batteries before playing with bios chips?
Can't be certain, I did so much work on this that sometimes the battery may have been left in 😬😬😬 Didn't think about 3v going into a leg it shouldn't have gone into
That BIOS guy is great used him years ago I would have stumped too ,well done mate
At least you didn`t give up! it is frustrating but sometime you take a bit of down time, comeback a little later, even the most apparent fault will show up, but computers are a difficult beast, and are challenging even to the most seasonal technician/ hobbiest, when you actually fix something self achievement can be overwhelming. Pat on the back👏👏👏
One of best Videos Vince !! never give up , never surrender ! now gift yourself a proper work space and bench ..
Shorting out pins of the bios chip with the 3V from the battery still around can only do harm. Oups...
We can't see if you were using the soldering iron with battery on, but for sure you were probing with the battery on.
Hi, Vince. You fixed something at last. And I liked the video. It was well done and interesting. 👍🏻
A chip flashing tool might be a good investment for future fixes like this where you need to program or reprogram a chip that became corrupted. Would also allow you to buy cheaper blank chips and flash them yourself instead of paying someone else for a preflashed chip. Either way, great fix, Vince!
Vince, most motherboards (if not all) have a jumper that we can use to reset the bios.
I’m not aware that bios chips are so sensitive to heat, technicians de-solder, re-flash and re-solder them normally. What some chips are very sensitive to is electrostatic electricity.
When testing a computer, give preference (if possible) to use the DVI port. HDMI is set as secondary port in some video cards and are only activated after you install the driver. One of my cards is like that.
Anyway, you got it.
I like the long videos, i watch them with pleasure. 🇳🇱
You have the patience of a saint, I would have thrown both in the bin half way through this and I am a PC guy
Well done for working it out, greeat videos, love them!
Keep up the great work
Bravissimo Vince!!!! i love your repairs 😍😍😍
Love all your videos. Keep up the amazing work. 🇨🇦🇨🇦
I'm 14 years old and I fix computers too. If an HP pc beeps 5 times, it's a memory problem. If it's not displaying but it's on and not beeping, it's possibly the ram or the gpu. I have been fixing computers since 2019 and still fixing them to this day.
@PCBWay need to pay Vince more sponsorship money! 😮
Thanks for the video. I had this exact issue occur to me.
A long while ago I had a dead laptop (with a 5th gen. i5 and some Radeon GPU) which was given away to me by a customer (I was a PC tech back then). Then, one guy on Facebook asked if anyone had dead laptops to sell, he wanted to try fixing. I said sure, I can sell mine. Sold him for the price of a charger and a promise that in case he succeeds, he would tell me what was wrong. And it turned out all that was wrong was the corrupt BIOS chip. The lucky guy got himself a half decent laptop for almost nothing.
hey Vince, find your videos very interesting, wish I knew more about the how the different components work and the job they do, be great if you did a mini series on a tutorial .....
Tip for you Vince during the boot sequence if you press F1 or del it will jump you into bios.
I'm surprised hot air wiped or killed the BIOS chips, generally I use hot air to pull chips off boards then solder them on to a chip programmer without any loss of data. Maybe both of them were marginal? But yes you can buy cheap re-programmers for these chips including ones that don't need de-soldering at all, they just clip on to the legs of the SOIC chip. It's nice to think that newer motherboards have USB flashing and dual BIOSes to try and avoid situations like this. It was super nice for the seller to flash them for you.
Would I fix one of these in real life? It's hard to say, we've kind of peaked with computer processing speeds and we're at the point of e-wasting computers just because we have too many of them. I'd probably fix it.
Thanks for another great video Vince, I really admire your dedication and effort in to making videos over a long time span instead of just dumping it up in parts on TH-cam for series that shouldn't be parts. That said, no objections to another 100 part car series!
Thanks for the info and the nice comments Jookia 👍👍
Well done for getting as far as you did (even with the mistakes!) :)
For future PC-fixing reference, here's a few tips:
* If comparing stuff, always use the same input/output method(s) (preferably wired, not wireless). Try to compare like with like rather than introducing further potential differences (complexities, not voltages) between the devices
* HDMI can use a lot more GFX processing power than VGA/DVI, as its GFX output is processed by the GPU to save CPU cycles, so the startup current spike is critical. Use the 'lowest common denominator' method (both DVI in this case) to eliminate that potential difference/fault
* Check 'no display' faults with all available inputs before moving on to another area: this one could have been as simple as a minor PSU component falling below its 'trigger level' for required startup current (more common with higher-end GFX processors than this 'office' machine, but still..). This would prolly require a 'scope trace (& correct interpretation) of the PSU while powering up, ofc
* The onboard cell is there simply to provide activation current to the UEFI ('BIOS') chip so it can retain its settings during power-off conditions. A lower voltage is perfectly good (& expected in such an old machine); the only time to be concerned would be if the cct or cell shows signs of corrosion or dmg: the (uncorrupted) BIOS will still work when powered up, but won't retain (eg) time/date or settings manually altered from its defaults (so should still display the same error screen). This cell cct should have no connection to any other power if the m/c is on mains, as it's not rechargeable*
* The original board was for an I5; the comparator was for an I3. There may have been subtle (sometimes undocumented) board revisions between the two which could have resulted in a similar failure mode if the CPUs were swapped, as the comparator may have needed some BIOS tweaks to help it recognise the newer, more powerful I5 - you lucked out there! :)
*I'd look around that 0-ohm resistor to see if there was any chance of the local tracks/components leading to the 'battery backup' cell being shorted: an unexpected voltage surge could have spiked thru that area via induction, leading to BIOS corruption/wipe & potentially damaging the cell: high frequencies (MHz/GHz), even in low voltage areas, can have surprising reach if spiked outside their nominal operating range - hence the careful track designs in such crowded areas as a computer mobo. See RF 'magic' for more details :)
Once again, 'grats on getting as far as you did! :)
Where do you get your low melt solder from?
I was so excited when you were waiting at the end and both worked.
Great fix. If you happen to come across a corrupted BIOS in future it is often possible to flash the bios with a usb stick on many new-ish PCs - even if the PC won't boot - I guess the flashing function is built into some other chip on the board. I have successfully done it on an old MSI motherboard even without a CPU installed. I did look on the HP website and this one seems slightly too old to support it or at least it isn't documented, but they do seem to support it on later models. I would never have found that open resistor!
Thanks for the tips ekens 😎
Only newer boards that are mostly non oem or in a specific pc but for all purposes have it. It actually uses a second microocntroller chip on the motherboard which often has "BIOS" or "BIOS FLASHBACK" labled on it
Some motherboards have the ability to flash bios without the CPU but it's not as common as the ones without a q flash function, although alot of the newer ones do
Vince love the way you went around finding the fault.
Vince who is the singer at the end.
Cheers
kevin
I really enjoyed this video, reminded me when I was trying to get an old PCI-E card running on my old PC I bought of ebay.. found it the power supply was too low and I needed to put extra power directly into the card. "Wasn't like that in my day HA!" in fact back in the day I couldn't afford the card to that was why I was trying to relive the 2009 magic I never had 🤣🤣
while hes at the big tv with the bioses swapped, omg never heard someone so enthusiastic about the end result being it broken! Then, buzkill once they are both busted including the og one.
Hey I would love to see you try to fix a faulty ebay hair removal laser-IPL machine or a VCR. Heres a challenge for you: try and uncrack a lcd? I doubt you'd have any success unfortunately but hey maybe you'd come up with a fix somehow who knows! You never fail to amaze me man I appreciate your channel and what you do right now Im eating mcdonalds watching this and it is awesome to sit back and enjoy.
Hi Vince take out the graphics card. Then connect a monitor to the graphics card that is built into the motherboard. If that don't work my next move would be to try it with each stick of ram separately. Love your content. Keep it up
He did that and it didn't work.
This doesn't always work as some cpu's don't have onboard graphics
That PC is outdated as can be. It could hardly handle windows 10. I'd not spend the time, or money fixing it. But the video was well worth the watch. Great job.
Great video I love your persistence keep up the good work
I had the exact same symptom with exactly the same model. Mine also had a graphics card in it. I also had no display.
Simply unplugging the card does not necessarily solve it if the bios still expects the card and has turned off the internal graphics.
Also removing the battery does not necessarily reset the bios. There is a bios reset jumper on the board. I used that and it worked again. No electrical tech work required ;)
Could you hear me yelling at the screen. LOL We all start at the start, You can not know everything. I have been working on computers a long time. You reminded me of how I started. Because of the I have lots of computer parts to test with. and you getting one to test with is pure genius on your part. I was rooting for you all the way. and Yelling try this and that. LOL Like you could hear me. You can only fail if you quit. Take a break is okay. Sometime you run into a fix away from what you are fixing. The Aha moment always feels good.
My mate VINCE brilliant I've watched all your videos great knowledge keep it going
Well done Vince, my money was on the power unit as I've recently had a similar problem with an HP do strange things on boot, no booting or rebooting continually. You could do what I'm doing with mine - Turn it into a media server.
why it worked twice randomly.. I would say that temperature had very much to do with it. the temperature may have hit in a zone that brought some components to life, but drop when the temp is not perfect. Great video! :)
Hi Vince! Have you link to buy low melt solder? Thx
Wonderful job. Keep up the great work.
Some useful knowledge I found out in my 9-10 years of experience with pcs (it's not painful to me, you remind me of me when I was fixing my first pcs at 13 years old)
2:58 depends on the motherboard, hp mobos (like almost all the others on the market) do not allow both igpu (integrated cpu graphics) and gpu to work at the same time. that said, if you have igpu output with a gpu in, i would check the graphics card.
10:58 at that point, I would have started to swap the gpu, just to see if something changes. If you think that that is not going to be the last (desktop, obviously) computer that you're going to work on, i'd suggest to buy a cheap (5-10£) pci-e gpu, just to have one around to help troubleshooting.
16:08 it's actually pretty easy to find a bios chip, look for a square 8-pin 25 or 24 series ic
Yup, the square chip near the resistors at the edge of the board looks like a bios chip.
36:51 There's a good reason why it's not working, f-ing Intel's ME region on the chip. I still don't know what it does, but it's an essential peace of code that you have to either copy or leave blank when reprogramming the bios ics. You can try to reprogram the bios chip (following some annoying procedures). But you'd need both a bios dump (you can find it online or get it from the working ebay board) and a bios chip programmer (I have a CH341A, very basic, but inexpensive)
38:31 I don't know why it failed, but i doubt it's because of the hot air, the first ic failed due to bit-rot, it is becoming more and more common nowadays.
39:48 I was wondering about the compatibility of those ebay chips, thanks for tying them... I actually have a dual socket motherboard that needs a bios chip replacement.
Overall, the repair shop that your friend went to, gets an F, he should have at least tried to reprogram the bios chip on a pc this old with these symptoms. I would have.
P.S.: I'm in a bit of a hurry, I have not re-read the comment to check for errors (english is not my first language), hopefully there are none.
Good job, mate! You didn't like the video but I enjoyed it as always. Switch/PC killer no more!
4:00 Most of PCs do work without coin cell battery. The coin cell battery sumplys voltage to a chip that keeps CMOS settings date and time. You actually can leave battery off during diags or if the PC is always plugged to power. Putting a new battery will not make PC work. In fact, batteries with like 2v will work fine to keep date and time when PC is powered off from the wall, no cord plugged. If PC is plugged and not running, one ATX feature will keep motherboard supplied with voltage.
Got to love a Vince video
I have seen multiple videos from other repair guys, Electronic Repair School and Adamant IT I guess, where a simple BIOS reprogramming without even changing it had resolved the problem. Seems an ongoing theme that BIOSes can loose some info. Maybe even cosmic radiation. Only one bit flipping would be enough to corrupt the program. The blown zero ohm resistor could then have been the result of faulty BIOS signal output.
But a power surge is also a possible scenario. I had a board once after a power surge caused by a flash. The board didn't want to start if you pressed the on switch. It span up the fans for half a second and shut down.
Nice work Vince
We need a Vince & @Adamant_IT collab
Thank you for your video, i have a similar desktop one at home that i left for dead and i think it's also bios related. I'm gonna check if i can find a replacement chip, nice !
Vince pal. You're so determined to Fix. Well done indeed. Hope your pal is giving you the cost of the fix? Including the £450 labour charges😂😂😂
😂😂😂 Pint of Guiness more like!!
Great fix and when the system starts and then turns off and then shows it is doing basic system checks and memory training it is a completely normal thing for a PC to do. The better of the 2 PCs is probably not worth much more than the one you got from ebay as it is a 3rd gen chip that came out in 2012.
Very nice fix, interesting to see a desktop PC being fixed for a change.
Talking about HP desktop PC's, recently tested my 2001 HP Brio PC with my FullHD flat screen display the first time ever. So far I've always used it with it's original CRT monitor. It worked and the HP's Windows 98SE wanted to install new plug & play device driver for the Asus FullHD display. This HP started and gave display signal normally even when the cmos battery died, it just complained about BIOS checksum error at the start, and time and date were wrong (Jan-1-2000). Original cmos battery lasted about 20 years which is pretty amazing.
Wow (spoiler warning)
..
...
..
, I would've never found that broken 0 Ohm resistor. For me it feels like you are the luckiest guy ever or you just got a really good intuition for finding broken components.
I mean there are hundreds of parts on the board. And well the bios chip by itself is not doing much. It needs most of the other parts including cpu under ram and all the voltage stuff to show something. So from my point of view it could have been everything, so I was quite sure if it is not one of the main components that it quite impossible to fix even more so for someone with very little pc knowledge.
It was purely diode test that found it, it did take around 15 mins of probing before I found a different reading from the working board. If it wasn't for the other working one I would never have found it, no chance. Probably a bit of luck as well though😂👍👍👍
Hi Vince,
the 0 ohm resistor (nice find) is often used either as a link or also as a fuse. It could have been blown when they tried to fix the computer.
As for the corrupted BIOS/Flash, this is a relatively common thing. It could be as simple as a failed Bios update. Just be aware that there are 2 types of chips with different voltages. 1.8V and 3.3V
You can get a programmer for few pounds. Look up CH41A. It is relatively simple to use. The chips them self don't necessarily have to be bad. Certainly NT by using hotair.
Many boards do have a BIOS recovery option and I believe that this board does have it too, where you can recover the BIOS directly from a flash drive.
Other than that.. you've essentially got and bough e-waste. But you can use it as a Linux Mint Office PC.
Cheers Marcel. Looks like changing the zero ohm resistor and reprogramming the BIOS would have probably fixed it without buying another chip. Realistically I wouldn't have found the zero ohm resistor without the 2nd eBay system so even if I had my time again I think I would have still needed the working system. Cheers buddy
@@Mymatevince Even a blind chicken will find the corn ;-) and I think, knowing you and your methods, you would find it sooner or later even without the second system. You like to check for continuity. Cheers!
@marcellipovsky8222 Hahaha, I DO LOVE my continuity, that's for sure😂
@38:00 my guess is the bad BIOS chip is blowing the 0 Ohm resistor, I bet it blew again, and has probably blown the one on the other machine too.
great video as Always and i love computers 😁🖥💻
Good Job, I make a fair bit of side income from building and repairing computers (often ones that don't really deserve it, but my clients are on too tight a budget or the machine has sentimental value/etc)
A couple of notes, eprom programers are actually very cheap these days (plug in via USB, clips to hold the chips temporarily...)
(Many but not all) More recent/modern computers have a feature called 'Flash Back' (many different names) for updating or repairing a corrupted bios with only a USB thumb drive.
Zero ohm resisters are often used as a fuse, its the FIRST thing you check on many game consoles/handhelds..
I'm not even going to 'cringe' over some of the NO.. Don't Do it THAT way' moments..
I applaud anyone with the basic electronics skills and diagnostic patience to dig into something more involved like a computer.
Good choice (always) to heat check for dead shorts. That said, MANY computer parts get very very warm in normal operation. Looking for the items OUTSIDE the curve is still always a good option for finding a short.
The duplicate machine, no shame.. I have tons of spare parts to swap in/out (though, I HATE with a passion proprietary equipment.. Dell/HP, etc..etc.)
Part swapping is a valid process of elimination tool.
As another I'm sure already commented. System Integrators willl block off motherboard video ports for multiple reasons.
First the processor involved doesn't include video abilities, or Second to avoid customer service calls for people plugging into the motherboard and complaining why their video card (quite frequently a very sizable proportion of the computers cost) isn't working as advertised.
Anyways, Love your methods and your persistence..
I like the way your mind work.
Great fix Vinc! I did think you might have damaged/corrupted the flash chip of the working one by extensive heat. Memory chips like the common 25xxxx series from winbond or macronix (MX) are pretty common but i managed to damage the firmware of my router when i took the chip off and on again.
Memory chips and some other more Sensitive chips dont like heat and it can cause the data stored in them (the bios/UEFI FIRMWARE in your case or firmware in the case of an embedded device like my router) to start corrupting due to how the data is stored in it by storing electrical charges and randomly changing those charged states.
Newer motherboards have a external microcontroller chip on them that allows reflashing the bios using just a usb stick, pretty handy and a quality of life feature but tis obvious that these older systems lack that.
I hope you have learned a bit about these chips cause these are generic 25 series SPI flash chips that are used in a lot of devices to store firmware or bootcode and i bet you will meet them again in the future so i would actually advise getting a cheap ch341 of amazon which allows reading and writing those chips and also allows copying data from a working chip to a chip that has corrupted data on it or to a new blank chip from aliexpress or some site. Also these can have a handy soic8 clip that allows you to keep the chip on the board and to read it while its in circuit, but this does not always work and you have the risk of sending power into other components or powering up some chip that tries to read from it while you are reading the chip, but they come with a 1.8volt adapter that would hopefully prevent that.
Also that the pc turns off and on again sometimes actually is normal! Its just the bios performing something called "dram training" where it decides what the max speed of the ram is and sort of configures it, kind of like the handshake old modems make to negotiate speeds and to configure!
Thanks for all the info 309👍👍👍👍👍
Nice video... Thank u for sticking around...
Right at the start, one of the first things you should always do is to check for loose connections. One of those RAM sticks wasn't correctly seated.
Thanks Simon, it was cut from the video, but one of the little white clips was snapped off (just hanging there) but the RAM was seated down. I noticed it a little later when I went to take them out. I'm pretty sure even at the beginning the RAM was seated down. I just placed the snapped white clip back in, but it wasn't actually clamping anything down later in the vid. Sorry for the confusion, lots of footage was cut from this video 😎
Nice going next time you can use a eprom reader and try to rewrite the bios. The tool is about 18£ and you clip onto the chip no soldering needed :)
Hey Vince, I got a spare working Seiko H601 missing a pusher and a needing cell change, sans bracelet be more than happy to send to yourself to add to your collection prob could do with a service but it was working lovely up til the cell gave up and its a bit involved changing it, I rebuilt another I bought initially for spares for the other but the second one turned out in a almost pristine condition so the offer is there for me to send to your PO box oh and the GPO multimeter is surplus to requirements since I got my grail multimeter a Soviet 4341. I have a 15v cell for it now but never went any further with it so quite happy to send that along to your PO box (it was the one I emailed you a few weeks back about) :D
Thanks Ian, my watch collection is already too big. I'm planning on reducing it just like everything else i don't use. Cheers for the offer on both of them though👍👍 Appreciate it a lot!
a great way my mate showed me to check if the bios chip is dead is to plug in a keyboard and press num lock or caps lock and see if the corresponding light turns on. if it does it might be something else. but 9/10 times it has worked for me
[SPOILER WARNING AT THE END]
i work at an MSP, effectively a tech support person for businessed. we have some of these computers, and i hate them with a passion.
the small card in a white socket is a wifi card (also possibly ethernet thought ive never seen this done), its entirely inconsequential to the computer powering on
what you did with the RAM is the first step in diagnosis, because it tells you is the CPU is initialising to the point where it can detect ram, nearly all computers will beep aggressively when booting without ram.
the battery you removed just keeps time when the PC is unplugged, if its kept plugged in it doesnt matter in the slightest. even when turned off, there is some power flowing though a board to allow it to boot, and tell the PSU to power on, it also keeps the time and BIOS settings
personally, this read to me as a faulty dGPU. a computer like this has an iGPU (the graphics card baked into the cpu) and a dGPU (the dedicated graphics card, its sole job is to do the display, think like an rtx4070), but this doesnt explain why it doesnt boot without the DPU (in this case, the red card with a black heatsink), i've never seen the bios of a system fail this way admittedly, so i would have never even thought to check the BIOS. well done vince, you fixed something i would have long given up on, and just chalked it up to a CPU issue
also, these computers are entirely useless now. they do not support windows 11, and windows 10 looses support in 2025. following this, the options are either linux, chrome os or insecure windows. for anyone wondering if their computer supports windows 11, if it was made after 2017 it more than likely is.
Dell did this to add a DVI port with a daughter board that would go into the PCI slot. It gave the onboard video an extra output or two. You could tell also, because the printboard was pretty much vacant of any chips and components. Just some traces to a DVI port.
Never use a wireless keyboard when diagnosing pc issues.
Zero ohm resistor os frequently used to jump traces.
A wire need to be manually placed, but zero ohm resistors are automatically placed by same machines as all the other resistors.
Nice watch Vince, what’s the make/model, cheers