M5SIB 'Pegasus' MB Dead

[joolsv]

My little sis has an old Packard Bell Club 40 PC thats has a M5SIB 'Pegasus' motherboard, which stopped working one day while she was on the net.

When it is switched on, the PSU works, can hear the CPU fan, Hard Dive e.t.c. but there is no picture, and I know it does'nt try to boot up.

I think its a BIOS problem, so I cleared it, but nothings changed.

Can anyone help please, coz I have searched everywhere inc. Packard website but cant find any help....

Thanks...

[NickS]

No beep even ? That sounds bad. I would remove the RAM, disconnect all disk drives, remove any option cards and then try again. Do you get a beep ? Should be a more-or-less continuous beep meaning no RAM.

[joolsv]

No beep even ? That sounds bad. I would remove the RAM, disconnect all disk drives, remove any option cards and then try again. Do you get a beep ? Should be a more-or-less continuous beep meaning no RAM.

Thanks for reading and writing back, i should have been more specific to what I have done.

My Specs are:

Socket 7 Cyrix M2 233MHz http://www.uktsupport.co.uk/pb/mb/pegasus.htm
160Mb RAM (128+32)
3Gb HDD ATA-33
PCI Soundblaster
ISA Graphics 8Mb

First I tried removing the PCI sound card and ISA graphics, powered up, lights come on front case showing PC is on, Hard Drive is accessed, PSU and fan are working, and the floppy drive light comes on and stays on.
Nothing else, Nada !!

I know that the PC does'nt boot up, just the Hard Drive keeps spinning for 1-2 minutes then stops, but the floppy light always stays on !! (wish it was just a graphics card problem).

Ive tried with the onboard garphics switched off and ISA in, Nothing.

Read somewhere in forums that BIOS might be problem, so tried clearing it using the jumper (Jp2), Nothing !!

Checked that all the jumpers are in the right positions, Nothing !!!

I was wondering if the CMOS IS to blame, dont know how, but maybe it needs to be flashed.

Can this be done, though I cant boot into DOS/Win or see anything on screen ??

Thanks for your Help........

[joolsv]

Forgot to mention,

I dont get any beeps at all, coz when it was working I'll only get one beep during POST.

Also tried what you said by removing EVERYTHING, hard drive, all peripherals, RAM and floppy, all that happens is the front LED comes on to say PC is on, PSU and CPU fan come on, but still no beeps

Thanks.......

[NickS]

Read somewhere in forums that BIOS might be problem, so tried clearing it using the jumper (Jp2), Nothing !!
I was wondering if the CMOS IS to blame, dont know how, but maybe it needs to be flashed.

You have those the wrong way round. The CMOS is cleared with a jumper, the BIOS gets flashed.

OK, I would put some RAM back in and connect only the FDD. Drop the CPU speed to 60MHz for now in case something is dying.

Check whether the CPU is getting warm. Sudden death can sometimes happen when a transistor in the voltage regulator gives up.

It sounds as though the BIOS may be in a BIOS recovery mode if it is running the FDD; sometimes the FDD motor and light come on but the BIOS is trying to use ISA I/O and cannot use the on-board FDD. I would put a bootable diskette in the drive and see if the machine actually tries to read it ( do you hear the head being moved?). If the BIOS has been corrupted (I am not sure how if she was simply surfing the net) then you could try the recovery techniques listed in FAQ #9 and #27 at the www.wimsbios.com main site. There is a BIOS (patched for 128GB HDD, incidentally) at http://wims.rainbow-software.org/

[Ritchie]

I agree with all of Nick's suggestions, but also suspect that the mobo is basically dead. The mobo seems to have some functionality as it needs to provide the power LED, but functions related to video output and other functions seem to sound as if they have died.

The other thing I would do is put in a known working CPU (I don't know if you have to set a jumper to allow configuration of a new CPU if it is not the same one) and known working RAM, disconnect everything else from the board inc. front LEDs except for power cables to mobo and try it then using on-board video (with the clear CMOS jumper set). That failing then try an actual known good video card.

I would also remove the clear CMOS jumper entirely and leave system powered off overnight to see if it recovers.


I know modems can recieve line surges which damage components (and also power surges) but I have not heard of a modem recieving a telephone line surge and causing what has happened to your system (ie: video). But I do know of a case of someone I knew who was using a computer and dial-up modem on the Internet during a thunder and lightning storm - after switching off that night the board never powered up again afterwards, so hypothetically that could have either been a power or telephone line surge.

[edwin]

I have a dead compaq presario here that was hit by a telephone line surge. modem was crisply roasted, mainboard is completely dead, similar symptoms.

[fireb1ade]

Hope you dont think that I am being rude, but if you give up on this motherboard, could I offer to buy your bios chip?
I can be contacted by messenger on scrotyballbags@hotmail.com, thanks very much!