memory upgrade broke system

pdc76

pdc76

New Member
my next door neighbor got an old computer from his dad yesterday. it is a 300mhz celeron with 64mb ram. i told him i'd help him out and went in search of my old pc100 memory. turns out i have 2 sticks 128mb each. that should speed things up a bit.

this computer was running fine, just real slow. i opened it up, saw his 64mb stick in the center of three slots. i removed his, and installed mine. turned it on, it powers up, fans spin, but the monitor light just blinks. nothing on the screen like it's off.

so i put his ram back in it (same spot and all) same problem. i tried several different combinations with his and my ram, but the monitor hasn't seen an image since before i messed with it.

i have no idea what happened. i know all the memory works fine. anybody have any ideas? what can i do?
 
pdc76 said:
i tried several different combinations with his and my ram, but the monitor hasn't seen an image since before i messed with it.
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tried many different combinations. just his, just mine (both), just mine (one), just mine (the other one), his and mine (his in 1st slot), his and mine (his in second slot), etc....

computer powers on, fans spin, but it's like i blew the video card or something. is that even possible?
 
i removed the battery, unplugged it from the wall, and hit the power button. i let it sit for a half an hour. then i connected everything back up, same thing. think i should try the jumper (if there is one)?
 
memory was seated fully, with both tabs snapped in on the sides every time. i've installed many memory sticks before, but never had them mess up a system.
 
i'm gonna go mess with it some more here in a minute. i'll post back with any results. i just don't get it though.
 
ok, i figured it out. this thing randomly worked and didn't. i had it running twice, and it shut down by itself with the same symptom on restart. it was the frikkin battery. i messed with that thing for 3 days, and it was a battery. i never had one go on me before so i didn't even think about it. the battery was way low, that's why it came on only sometimes. just goes to show you, sometimes it's the dumbest thing so check everything!

thanks for trying to help though. no i didn't put the memory in while running, lol.
 
pdc76 said:
ok, i figured it out. this thing randomly worked and didn't. i had it running twice, and it shut down by itself with the same symptom on restart. it was the frikkin battery. i messed with that thing for 3 days, and it was a battery. i never had one go on me before so i didn't even think about it. the battery was way low, that's why it came on only sometimes. just goes to show you, sometimes it's the dumbest thing so check everything!

thanks for trying to help though. no i didn't put the memory in while running, lol.
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even the motherboard without the battery...it still can boot up and will not restart by itself....just when you start the machine, it normally displays something like "the bios config is not set and you can press F1 to continue" message

so i doubt that the psu is not stable....i.e. may be too old
 
mcyi9ky2 said:
even the motherboard without the battery...it still can boot up and will not restart by itself....just when you start the machine, it normally displays something like "the bios config is not set and you can press F1 to continue" message

so i doubt that the psu is not stable....i.e. may be too old
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I agree with him. Ive had batteries die on me before and its never done that to me. just says that the bios config isnt set. Got the same error messages.

not saying that it wasnt the battery. just seems kinda weird.
 
well, it's been a whole day and there has still been no problems since i changed the battery. it would turn on before, but nothing appeared on the screen. like i said, this pc is very old (celeron 300mhz). it has a 3gig hd for crying out loud. i've played several games on it, ran a slideshow, played some music, watched the screensaver and restarted it several times since yesterday, and it boots up fine now. no problems any more.

it never restarted by itself. i restarted it.
 
lol wierd, aren't batteries only there so your stored information on the cmos isn't erased? Oh well, glad to hear its working :).
 
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