Thread: Bios

  1. #1
    l'Anziano DavidP's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Location
    Plano, Texas, United States
    Posts
    2,743

    Question Bios

    As many of you know...I have been trying to get my Compaq Deskpro 590 back up and running for several months now.

    (If you want to review what has happened so far, search for the threads "A Word of Wisdom from DavidP" and "Networking")

    Anyways, I have been playing with the BIOS and am puzzled by something.

    When I go in to the place where I can select the drives availble, it tells me that I have a floppy drive and my hard drive, and it says my CD ROM is non existant, of course that is nothing new. It has been doing that for some time now.

    So recently I clicked on the "Advanced" button and it took me to a screen where I could specify the IRQ's for the Primary and Secondary drive controllers.

    Under the spot of Primary, it had my hard drive, but under the Secondary spot, it said "Disabled".

    So I thought that was the problem, the Secondary drive controller, where my CDROM drive was located, was disabled. So then I started trying every IRQ on the list, but none of them worked. In fact, every time I went back into BIOS to change the IRQ again, it said "Disabled" again, as if I had never changed it in the first place. But I know I did change it, and I know the setting was saved when I changed it, because it had asked me to save the settings when I exited BIOS every time.

    So why exactly is it going back to "Disabled" every time I reboot the computer? I have tried every IRQ and none will work...the BIOS just keeps switching the controller back to disabled....
    My Website

    "Circular logic is good because it is."

  2. #2
    train spotter
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Location
    near a computer
    Posts
    3,868
    Does your MB have a secondary IDE contoller? (or just the BIOS thinks you might have one)

    I have a MB that has RAID on some versions, has RAID settings in BIOS but that does not mean I can turn it on.
    "Man alone suffers so excruciatingly in the world that he was compelled to invent laughter."
    Friedrich Nietzsche

    "I spent a lot of my money on booze, birds and fast cars......the rest I squandered."
    George Best

    "If you are going through hell....keep going."
    Winston Churchill

  3. #3
    l'Anziano DavidP's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Location
    Plano, Texas, United States
    Posts
    2,743
    Yes it has a secondary IDE controller, otherwise I would never have been able to hook the CDROM to the controller that says, "Secondary" and use it before the incident 3 months ago (which you can read about in "A Word of Wisdom from DavidP")
    My Website

    "Circular logic is good because it is."

  4. #4
    5|-|1+|-|34|) ober's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Posts
    4,429
    sounds like:

    a) your bios needs to be flashed with a newer version
    b) your secondary ide controller is a piece of s**t

    send it back and get it replaced if the second is true...

    also... are you sure you're hooking the cable up the right way? I know, stupid question, but I've done it accidentally... meaning, getting the right end in the controller... I'm sure you've checked and double checked that tho..

  5. #5
    l'Anziano DavidP's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Location
    Plano, Texas, United States
    Posts
    2,743
    yeah its the right way...ive checked that...

    i also have been using the newest version of the BIOS...i downloaded it from the Compaq web site....

    one thing though...it told me to put the BIOS on a diskette and boot to the diskette...but then after I change the settings and leave the BIOS, I dont boot to that diskette anymore...

    Do you think the settings are saved on the diskette and not the computer for some reason? But why would it get the computer's settings...and then not save the settings to the computer?
    My Website

    "Circular logic is good because it is."

  6. #6
    5|-|1+|-|34|) ober's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Posts
    4,429
    did you follow the directions exactly?

    I've only flashed one BIOS in my life... and if I remember correctly, I had to boot to the floppy 2 or 3 times before it finished.

  7. #7
    train spotter
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Location
    near a computer
    Posts
    3,868
    Is the CD's jumpers set as (secondary) slave or master?

    Try swapping the HD and CD cables and see if the HD stops working and the CD starts (is onboard IDE at fault if does)

    If it is the IDE ctrl, put both on one cable, ensureing CD is slave.
    "Man alone suffers so excruciatingly in the world that he was compelled to invent laughter."
    Friedrich Nietzsche

    "I spent a lot of my money on booze, birds and fast cars......the rest I squandered."
    George Best

    "If you are going through hell....keep going."
    Winston Churchill

  8. #8
    l'Anziano DavidP's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Location
    Plano, Texas, United States
    Posts
    2,743
    Oh...that is one more problem.

    I tried swapping the CD and HD ide cables about a week ago...now it refuses to boot...even to a floppy...

    It will read the floppy...and almost boot to it...but in the end it will just sit there with the cursor blinking and do nothing...

    Oh...and this particular CDROM drive does not have a slave/master switch. But that is not the problem...because I have tried CDROMs that do have slave/master switches and they dont work either...and they were set to slave...
    My Website

    "Circular logic is good because it is."

  9. #9
    train spotter
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Location
    near a computer
    Posts
    3,868
    When you swapped the drives did you change the settings in the BIOS?

    Try two good HD's after detecting them in the BIOS. I also had a problem with Compac's not allowing user defined drives. That is if the drives size (heads, sectors ect) was not in the list in the BIOS it could not be installed.

    Does the CD work in other PC's?
    "Man alone suffers so excruciatingly in the world that he was compelled to invent laughter."
    Friedrich Nietzsche

    "I spent a lot of my money on booze, birds and fast cars......the rest I squandered."
    George Best

    "If you are going through hell....keep going."
    Winston Churchill

  10. #10
    l'Anziano DavidP's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Location
    Plano, Texas, United States
    Posts
    2,743
    yeah the cd works in other pcs, and it used to work in this one too until this computer got gay...
    My Website

    "Circular logic is good because it is."

  11. #11
    5|-|1+|-|34|) ober's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2001
    Posts
    4,429
    it sounds to me like your motherboard took a hit... you might want to start looking for a new one...

Popular pages Recent additions subscribe to a feed

Similar Threads

  1. Can you still view the bios screen with a bad CPU?
    By HyperCreep in forum Tech Board
    Replies: 4
    Last Post: 12-31-2006, 06:57 PM
  2. Lost BIOS menu options?
    By PJYelton in forum Tech Board
    Replies: 3
    Last Post: 11-14-2004, 08:23 AM
  3. Bios upgrade-dell latitude
    By GanglyLamb in forum Tech Board
    Replies: 4
    Last Post: 06-18-2003, 01:55 PM
  4. BIOS Calls
    By Tech in forum C Programming
    Replies: 7
    Last Post: 03-07-2003, 05:43 PM
  5. various BIOS questions
    By Waldo2k2 in forum Tech Board
    Replies: 14
    Last Post: 01-24-2003, 07:01 AM