Lab Progress

So I finally made it to my lab this weekend and I really feel like I got a good, solid start on fixing up my old scrap computers.

I’ll start my update with the first of the five computers (which I’m code-naming “Simic” because I don’t know what to do with it). The system, in the state I got it, lacked a power supply, a HDD and an optical drive, but had everything else. To the best of my knowledge it has the following specs:

• A Micro ATX motherboard from an unknown manufacturer
• An AMD Sempron 3000+ Processor
• 2 Sticks of 512MB Dual Channel PC3200 Ram

I Installed a 430W power supply, an 80GB SATA HDD, and a DVDRW optical drive. The system booted once, then gave me a seemingly infinite string of “Inserting an index entry into index $0 of file 25” error messages. I let it run for a while and fiddled with something else. When I came back it was booting up Windows XP. I plugged in my keyboard and fiddled around with the files for about ten minutes before it suddenly restarted the entire system without warning. In hind-sight, I realize that I booted Windows onto a strange hardware configuration. The hard drive I used was almost certainly not from the system I installed it into, so it could theoretically be possible that something didn’t sync up properly and that could have been what caused the reboot.

After the POST, I got the first of what I’m assuming will be many, MANY error messages.

• “Ultra DMA Mode-6, S.M.A.R.T. Capable and Status BAD” (I like how ‘bad’ is in all caps… it really makes the component feel bad about itself)
• “Primary Master Drive – ATAPI Incompatible”
• “Press F1 to continue”

Also, more good news. Whoever owned this computer before it fell into my hands put a password on the BIOS configuration.

Looks like it’s back to the drawing board on this one. I’ll try replacing the hard drive with a potentially more stable one. I’ll also definitely have to look into reinstalling an operating system for this system. I’m still happy that I got it to boot up, even if the victory was short-lived.

The second of my five computers (which I am naming “Boros” because it is very, very loud) is an interesting subject. It powers on fine, and then the fan ramps up to the point where it sounds like a tiny jet engine. At first I thought this might just be a design flaw of the system, but after a swift Google search I discovered a couple possibilities. The first is that there’s some sort of dust inside the system (which is unlikely because I’ve already used compressed air to dust it). The second (and far more likely) is that the thermal paste between the processor and the heat sink is dried out. I suspect that this is the case because these are old systems I bought off eBay and don’t know how well they were maintained physically.

The third computer (named “Gruul” because it is dumb) is a much more ‘open and shut’ case. It powers on for half a second, then shuts down. On the front there is a small red light that flashes four times. This error message I found, after doing some quick research, means that there is a problem with the power supply. The power supply, I’ve found, is going to run me at least $20. Seeing as how this is the exact same system as the second computer, I plan on just swapping the power supplies. If this fixes the problem for the third, then I’ll dispose of the power supply and order a new one for the second.

So nevermind about Gruul. It turns out I just didn’t have all the connections made from the power supply to the motherboard. The funny thing is that I was about to unscrew and unmounts the power supply when I noticed one connector not hooked up. If this works now, I’ll be quite happy that luck saved me $20.

On the other hand, once Gruul was properly powered, it still showed no video. This leads me to believe that the integrated video card in the motherboard is dead. Given the Small Form Factor of the unit, I believe that finding a replacement video card will be expensive and difficult. I think I have found the computer which