[vox-tech] Problems with a motherboard.

[Stephen M. Helms]

Jeff Newmiller wrote:

> On Sun, 10 Feb 2002, Stephen M. Helms wrote:
>
> > OK,  I will admit defeat here.  I am try to fix a computer for my wife's
> > coworker (its actually for her kids).  She said that the floppy was not
> > working, so I focused on that and the floppy is working great.  The
> > problem I am getting is the computer freezes up on boot generally after
> > it shows the plug and play specs to the screen.
> >
> > At first I thought it was the memory so I went out a bought a new memory
> > module for it (128MB) and I still get the same problem.  I also tried
> > three seperate 32MB modules I already had and get the same problem.
> >
> > Any advice would be appreciated.
>
> What devices are plugged into the slots?  Have you removed all
> nonessential cards? What is the boot device sequence in the BIOS? Have
> you checked the hard disk and floppy cables to be sure they are connected
> well? Can you be more precise about the message on the screen when (or
> just before) it freezes?

It is a motherboard with all the componets integrated (VIA GRA PC100) and
there are no add in cards (nothing to remove).  I have tried removing all of
the cables (IDE,floppy parrallel, etc.) as well.

I can't be any mores specific on where it freezes, because it is not always at
the same spot.  Sometimes it goes just to the rectangle with the cpu info
etc., sometimes it makes it to the PCI information, sometimes it makes it to
verifying DMI data (sometimes rebooting afterwards) and sometimes it boots to
the hard drive (windows 98) or the CDROM(Demo linux of course!).  I have
recently even had it lock up on me in the BIOS.

I have also tried underclocking it to see if it was a CPU problem with no
success there either.  I am guesing either the motherboard or the processor
has a problem.

Thanks,
Stephen