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Having trouble installing a piece of hardware? Want to know if that peripheral is compatible with Linux?

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Old 06-02-2008, 10:32 PM   #1
des_a
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2005 E-Machines T3882 LED Issue


OK. First of all I'd have to tell you that this question needs to be answered specifically by someone with this kind of computer, as it's very specific. It also needs to be answered by someone prefferebly who's never needed to open the case before, but someone all the same with all technical skills and abillities to safely open the case and work on it. Prefferebly too, if someone has a way to post a picture or something to this somehow, it would help.

Now, I've learned lots about how to do things inside the case of computers. I've never built a computer to date, but I'm familiar with the general components and how to do stuff such as add/remove hard drives. I'm also familiar with some electronic circuts, only I'm still new enough at it that I'm not too advanced compared to my software skills.

So, here's the story. Origionally, I bought this computer in 2005. This didn't come with a floppy drive. It was the only computer I could afford at that time too, as far as new computers. I had some skills even back then to add/remove some drives. What I decided I had to do, if I needed a new computer, was buy the computer, then buy a new floppy disk drive. Then I simply had to put the floppy drive in the computer and then it'd have a floppy drive and meet my requirements that I needed it to meet.

Back then, I was not able to create simple electronic circuts or anything. I was only capable of doing simple things such as this. I didn't know how it worked, I just knew how to add and remove it. Well, it was the first time I'd worked on that model of computer. When I first work on a certain model of computer, with hardware and drivers, there's a little bit of learning to do before I'm as effective as I could be. So obviously then, I did not know everything I'd have to open to get to it.

I got the job done, however, I ended up disassembling some of the cords that go from the power button to the motherboard. I saw how it connects to the motherboard. It's a replacable attachy thingy. There is a black thing with 2 wires connected to it. This black thing, slips over 2 pins where it connects. There are several of these on the motherboard in various places. There are 3 of these such wires comming to and from the front panel. They are all seperate. They all have different color wires. Now each wire on each black thing is a different color, though none of these colors are the same as any other of those colors.

Remember that back then, I knew nothing about electronic circuts themselves. So, when I undid those things to get to the floppy drive, which I really didn't have to do, I forgot to take note of where they go. I thought that they could go to any one of those pins in any direction in any place that they reached. I soon found out I was wrong.

Now, here's my knowlege now. I know now that what the pins are is ways for external wires to allow communication between certain kinds of devices. This includes the power button on the mother board. So when I placed it back, I found it doesn't work the same, I thought. It boots and runs fine, and has done so for ages. It's been able to run "normally" all the way since I bought it. It's no longer running Windows XP Home Edition, but it's running Mandriva Linux 2008.0. That proves it runs. I've also upgraded to a 300GB hard drive, and I've made the 80GB hard drive the slave. I added a DVD burner that can read/write rewritable DVDs. Screws here and there are changed, etc. But I've really done nothing else in the way of "rewiring" the motherboard's operation.

So the first thing I need to know is about the power buttons LED light. What should it do? When the computer is off, should the LED light be on all the time? Should it go off when I turn the computer on?

Or is it what I'd suspect now that I'm older and wiser. Should the power button light be off all the time and turn on when I turn the computer on and stay on all the time? If so, I've had it wired wrong.

The first light scenerio is what it did before I just tried to tamper with it again for the first time in years. Now it mostly does nothing. Why did I tamper with it? Because the more I investigate, the more I'm believing that the second scenerio should be true. I did not play with the power button's power by moving it to a different spot or oriontation. It boots, "works properly", and has for years now. No problem. It runs programs, it runs different OSs, etc.

The second thing the matter I now suspect, is the hard drive LED light. It always does nothing. That's probably a big indication that it's wired wrong. However, knowing electronics somewhat, I now believe that since I know about polarity, one way may cause it to malfunction and possibly "blow it out". The other way should work. Therefore I possibly believe that it could be blown out, but I desire to attempt to check this as well. Maybe part of the function of the black things though is to eliminate the polarity problems. That's possible. It could work like a kind of a diode. Now even if the HDD LED light is non-functional, I bet that could be replaced by me easily at the point I am now, compared to then. Then I might actually have it functioning perfectly properly. We'll end up seeing!

What I refuse to do, however is modify in ANY way the things related to it's power source. My current self imposed rule is I'll work on pretty much any circut as long as it's powered by batteries. And I don't like to work with high voltage batteries if I can avoid it. The exceptions of course, come into play when repairing things for a special purpose. This possibly falls into that category as far as rewiring. However I would assume that since it boots alright that the power button is wired right polarity and all. The LEDs? This is the problem.

If anyone can help me on this, it would be apriciated. As LEDs aren't dangerous to mess with in this case, I am open to only free forms of help right now, such as forums like this.
 
  


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