This afternoon, when I tried to install the Syllable operating system on my very old P-166 MMX box, I didn't really understand the partition part so I rebooted in the midway of the installation. Then, it doesn't boot correctly now. By "doesn't boot correctly", I mean that it doesn't start at all.

First, I see the memory check which says I have 48MB RAM. This is correct, ok. Then it goes on to scan for IDE devices, and it successfully finds the 2.1GB Quantum Fireball HD and the ATAPI CD-ROM drive. Then, IT JUST HANGS THERE!!!

Does anybody know what can I do?
I don't think it has to do with Syllable. I seldom use this machine. Actually, it has been one year since I last touched it. I don't know what to do now. Well, this is not my main machine so I don't mind if it dies. Just that I would like to find out why...

Thanks for any replies

You can post your experience about the death of your old hardwares here, too, I suppose

well i'd guess it could have damaged the MBR or partition atble on the drive, can't think of anythign else that could cripple it so early on. can you boot to cd or floppy? got another hard drive? can you access that harddrive via another machine?

I can't even boot with CDs... both Debian Woody installation disc which I have been able to boot without problems until today, and the Syllable boot disc which I successfully booted up once...

Since I don't have boot floppies at the moment so I can't try that but I think it should fail, too, since the system hangs much earlier than it even tries to boot. I don't know what is happening after the system detected the drives because there are no messages displayed. I suppose it is going to detect other devices as well before trying to boot from the drives, isn't it?

Thanks

I think it's BIOS failure. Plain and simple. I doubt whether the older BIOSes can be rewritten on, so the chip must have some problem.

I've also lost IDE channels in old boards... Actually one was a P120 that was my desktop machine till about 2000, then it died... I later found the the second IDE channel still worked and it is still running 24/7 til this day as a print sever... So try both IDE channels and stuff like that.

Ya, I think so, too. But I can still enter the setup screen and twinker with the settings. Just to make sure I reset it to factory default but still... no luck

If it is software problems I can still try my luck and search for solutions on the web... but when it comes to hardware... I feel so helpless... Somemore it is too old to find spare parts for it... not to consider worth it or not..

Koyi,

If you can still get into the bios then the bios must still be working. I think you damaged the MBR which would make the machine unbootable.

See if you can change the boot order of the drives listed in bios.

If you can then you should have the bios boot off the CD-Rom drive. Then try Running Damn Small Linux off the CD.

If you can do all of that then you may be able to "save" the machine.

Thorn

It's not too old to find parts for at all. It will be pretty standard all the way through. You may not find NEW hardware, but ebay is your best friend for old parts.

I still run 3 pentium 1 style boxes here 27/7... Firewall, printserver and one desktop net machine. They are still usefull and parts aren't too hard to find. Hardest part is probable the MB to find on it's own, but I pick up a lot of complete boxes at dumps and so forth.

Thanks for your replies

No, although I can still get into the BIOS setup, it hangs before it tries to booth from all the hard drive, CD-ROM and floppy drive. It just stops after detecting(not booting) the CD-ROM.

Ya, parts may be easily found in your countries but definitely not in Malaysia. (or anybody knows of any?) The only way I can think of is to ask around and see who amongst my friends have an old system that they don't want anymore... but does it worth the trouble is another question... It may be fun though but I don't need a print server but a working desktop..

Btw, I tried Debian Woody 3.1 on it, with XFree86 4.0(?) and fluxbox... mozilla 1.0 I think... and the speed is quite slow....

Thanks anyway

Koyi,

Have you adjusted ANY settings in Bios? And did you save the settings?

Now that I am re-reading your first post I think that your CMOS settings may have gotten damaged when you rebooted without installing syllabus.

The bios is ROM but the CMOS is writable if Syllabus was accessing the CMOS during the install to configure hardware detection then you are not going to be to boot unless you can restore/reset the configuration.

Here is a link that will explain the situation in more detail:

http://www.sysopt.com/biosdef.html

If you can reset the CMOS then I think you will be able to boot off a Floppy or a CD to get this system working again.

Good Luck,

Thorn

My mother board philosophy: Old mother boards don't die, they just need new cmos batteries once in awhile.

Thanks for the advices!

But my problem now is that I don't even remember the model of the motherboard since I bought it many years ago when I knew nothing about computers... So I don't know which jumpers are for what...

Is there a way to reset the CMOS settings? Like removing the battery and restoring it later?...

You can remove the battery, and while it is out you might want to check its voltage if you have a meter, alternately, mother boards typically have a jumper near the battery that is labeled with cmos clear. It will have three pins, with a jumper on two of the pins, just move it over and it will clear cmos, then move it back.

I followed your advice and the CMOS is cleared successfully. I confirmed about this by looking into the CMOS settings so I think there are no issues here. But yet the problem hangs around and it is still not booting... :-(

Thanks anyway.