BIOS won't set

Working on a Dell Optiplex GM10a20 with Phoenix ver 1.10a20. Was in the process of installing a new hard disk and got the following error disk drive seek failure. I checked all the connections but kept getting seek errors. Different boots I got a couple of different errors one saying controller error and one saying a disk 2 error. I thought that the bios might have a wrong setup and when looking in it it did not have the current or new drive parameters correct but it would not let me set the new parameters. I was trying to put in parameters for a Caviar 4.3 gig drive. Any advice on bios upgrades or other advice would be much appreciated.

 

First thing to try is to clear the BIOS. There is usually a jumper on the motherboard that will allow you to do this, but you'll need a manual to identify it (unless you have an unusally well labelled board). If you can't find one, booting without the CMOS battery in place will usually have the same effect. Boot without battery, shutdown, put the battery back in and boot again.

Also try booting without the hard drive, floppy drive, mouse, keyboard, or PCI/ISA cards installed. Just motherboard, CPU, RAM and video. You should be able to boot successfully like this (to the POST screens anyway). If that works, do it again with the keyboard installed and see if you can change the BIOS then. If it works as it should then, I would suspect that it is not the motherboard at fault.

If that doesn't work then BIOS upgrade is probably the next thing to try. You need right BIOS to get a successful upgrade. So the Dell site is the place to go to find the right BIOS upgrade.

In the past I'd have been more cautious about going for a BIOS upgrade as the process can easily stuff the board. However, nowaday parts of so cheap that replacing the motherboard is not the big problem it once was. This might be the point to upgrade with new Motherboard, CPU, RAM and case.

 

Hi robwhite,

The BIOS setup instructions are here:
http://docs.us.dell.com/docs/dta/stingm/00000037.htm

There does not seem to be a clear CMOS jumper as such.

I have not seen a recommendation to boot the system without a battery installed before, but suppose it would be the same as booting with a flat battery. Leaving the battery out for a few minutes should reset the CMOS. When you remove or replace the battery make sure all power is disconnected from the machine. Probably won't help, but suggest you get a new battery, I have seen cheap brands for $1.

The problem may be in the IDE controller. You could connect the data/ribbon cable from the harddrive to IDE (header) connector 2 (swap with the CD drive's connection?) and see if the BIOS identifies the drive and sets the correct parameters.

Use diagnostic utilies from Western Digital to diagnose the harddrive. It may be starting to fail. Dell has two sets of diagnostic utilies listed in their downloads for that model, but they may be very simple tests.

I saw a BIOS upgrade listed for an "a20 ", make certain that the upgrade is for your model. An upgrade would probably only help if the current BIOS has become corrupted somehow.

Matt
Edit: Always worth trying to disconnect and reseat the drives connectors (data and power) they may have worked loose or do not have a complete connection.

 

robwhite,

I think that, if you can access the BIOS setup program, just choose the default settings (there is usually that option) and you needn't fuss with the battery or jumpers on the mobo.

Re: disk error, you need to check jumpering as well as connections, and check ALL the HDDs junpers. If all are correct, the BIOS should find the disk params automatically.

 

No battery needed to boot.

mattman,

I have an older pentium box that has a proprietary battery, dead and no longer available. It boots and runs windows98 just fine but of course it doesn't keep time or retain any but the default settings.

 

Hi Sparrow,
I have a 486 "test system" that is the same....always seems to be 1990 nowdays . I just wonder about the effects of running the machine without some sort of connection across the battery connectors, that is, running without a battery installed, even a dead one. I always err on the side of caution, but then again, I am probably too cautious and there may be no ill effects.

Cheers,
Matt

 

Straying off topic but .........
Found just about every odd-ball battery I've ever needed here