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Hardware Problem



Greet the Monday morning sun all,

I aplogize for the roundabout way I am sending this message, but my
USWest email is sticking its tongue out when I try to post directly.

I am looking for a solution to a problem I ran into this weekend.  It
isn't Linux related but hardware related.  I have a Dell 120c that
shortly will become my Oracle database server.  I went to boot it on
Sunday and nothing.  Taking the thing apart, I have determined a couple
of things... when powered on, the harddrives are spinning but nothing
happens.  I can put in a disk into the floppy drive but it is never
read. It like the box has no bios or it is not reading the bios.  The
motherboard for my new PC will not be in until tommorrow so I cannot
swap parts to see if the video card or the harddrives are toast but I
believe they are fine.  How can I check to see if something has happened
to the bios if nothing comes up.  What keeps the bios in the flash
memory of the machine, is it the trickle of power from the lithium
battery?  Could that have died and taken the bios with it?  One other
possibility I thought of: how often do motherboards go belly up?  I am
definately out of my comfort zone on this one. Ideas anyone?

--
Perry Hoekstra

dutchman@mn.uswest.net