the crapaq demon computer from hell

[elacious]

Ok sit tight this is a long one...
My cousin got this Compaq 5190 from a friend. The friend and his wife had split up and the computer was shipped back here and apparently was damaged in shipping. When he turned it on, he got nothing. The friend had it looked at by a shop out here, which had told him there was something wrong with the motherboard, and it wasn¡¯t worth fixing.
I personally know the guy who looked at it and that¡¯s his answer for everything that stumps him. I have been the "second opinion" several times after people have gone to him and it turned out to be something so simple. Also he used to be just a Mac technician and he recently (in the past two yrs) started doing pcs, so his opinion doesn¡¯t mean much to me.
I told my cuz to bring it by and I¡¯d take a look. When I put it on the table, I got no video. Opened it up and the ram had come out of the slot, so I reseated it and turned the power on and it came up fine. When I moved the case a bit I heard a screw floating around. I thought maybe if the screw had hit the MB when Joe Shmoe was lookin at it, it would have shorted it out and maybe that¡¯s where he came to that conclusion. I couldn't believe it. I also noticed that the hdd wasn't mounted. It was just kind of hanging out on top of the cd rom drive. For those of u who are familiar with Compaq¡¯s, you know they don¡¯t give u much room to work with... so I found an old rail that worked and mounted the drive. I was psyched for my cousin because the guy just gave him the computer...and (up to this point) there was nothing wrong. It has a DVD player, 128mb ram, 10GB hdd AMD 500mhz. pretty nice for free. The whole point of a comp for my cuz is he just started his own business, and wants to install QB to keep track of stuff. . SO I installed all the software and everything...and I rented a DVD to test the player. It worked fine, except it was very choppy. I figured we could add more RAM so I checked the specs on the board and added a 128MB pc133 DIMM. Worked like a charm. So I write up the paperwork, and my sister had stopped by and I go to show her how cool the DVD was on our cousins new free computer...so I turn it on and I get while initializing device configmg windows protection error...I am familiar with this error...dealt with it before. Then I had restarted and I get himem.sys missing.... then a bunch of other memory related errors. Ok so I assume it¡¯s the new RAM and I take it out. Restart... I get not enough memory to start windows.... then registry errors.... missing command.com... every time I restart there¡¯s a new one. SO I swap the RAM to a new slot...ran a diag...updated the ROM...Pretty much all of the above. Same thing. Frustrated, I turned it off. Next day I go to turn it on, I get nothing. I got power, but no video, no post beeps. I basically took everything out and set it up on the table to test by process of elimination... I don¡¯t even know what happened because all of a sudden it worked again. SO I put it all back together. I had even put paper washers on the screws, and more stand offs just in case. And by this time, from troubleshooting...and because of the registry corruption and all, I reformatted the HDD and did a clean install. I had it up and running for 2 days straight with no problems. Then I turned it off. Last night, I turned it back on...and those lovely errors are back again. First the himem.sys, then missing command interpreter. I just turned off the power. I'm really discouraged. I had told my cousin that it was workin and he was so happy that he didn't have to go buy a new computer. Now I'm back to square one. I'm not making any money off of this, its just one of those damn favors from hell!! LOL But Its bugging me and I really want to know what the deal is. Does anyone out there have any suggestions? Maybe you have had the same kind of problem? Is there any kind of utility that will test the MB? At this point I think I'm just going to put all the stuff in a new case and MB. (Proprietary PS so I cant even use the case) I mean he still makes out pretty well seeing that he doesn't have to buy all the other stuff. But it still kinda sux

[joelen]

i had an almost identical situation with a compaq myself- same type of errors, etc... turned out to be a bad MB... replaced it with a pc chips board, sold the customer an OEM copy of windows (compaq wanted $200 for a new board-- i bought a similar board for $75... compaq restore cd would not w2ork on it of course...) installed and it worked great- and has been for 6 months.....

[jbar1]

Compaqs and HPs do not like to run well with a Fdisk/Format because of their Bios setup. These machines use a propriatery bios that is stored on the HD. This is the main reason I have no use for them. If you want them to run right you SHOULD us their recovery disk. If you need to change the MoBo, May I suggest an A-Bit or Azus and I think that Microstar also has one that will work. Then you will have a real Bios to work with

[goldmeier]

You are right. I did put way too much time into it. My reason is that a wipe/install never comes out pefect. You (at least I) always forget to save some sort of file or program that the user "needs". Nothing critical of course. Email I backup. Word and Excel docs... But there is always something I miss.

Anyway, I reinstalled the computer from the Sony recovery disks. It reformatted and reinstalled everything that came preinstalled, and I hten installed the addons. Everything works fine so far.

Musta been the virus. Weird because he has updated antivirus and the program caught and quarantined the virus.
Oh well,


Thanks
Rafi

[KINGofBLEH]

Originally posted by goldmeier:
You are right. I did put way too much time into it. My reason is that a wipe/install never comes out pefect. You (at least I) always forget to save some sort of file or program that the user "needs". Nothing critical of course. Email I backup. Word and Excel docs... But there is always something I miss.

Anyway, I reinstalled the computer from the Sony recovery disks. It reformatted and reinstalled everything that came preinstalled, and I hten installed the addons. Everything works fine so far.

Musta been the virus. Weird because he has updated antivirus and the program caught and quarantined the virus.
Oh well,


Thanks
Rafi

Where the HE!! did that post come from?

Anyways, try Compaq's support site for a copy of the BIOS recovery and get it to boot to a win98 floppy bot disk. It has worked for me in the past.

[elacious]

yes yes I am all to familiar with compaqs rompaq setup bios whatever they want to call it. That was one of the first things i learned about compaq (aka crapaq) years ago!! (And the main reason i hate them.) I'm like 99% sure that the board is bad. I have already sent for a new one. Thanks for posting!

[DualP3Guy]

Your first problem, you are using a Compaq but, since you got it for free i will let that pass. That is what they are worth anyway. Other than that I would have to agree that it could be a faulty mobo. All i can get from it is that it sounds like a hardware conflict. It is not software if it goes away and comes back even after being reformatted. I would do what you said again and lay everything out. First the CPU, video card, memory, HDD, FDD, CD, keyboard, and mouse in. Try reformatting and installing windows and all that stuff with that. If that works try adding the other peripherals one at a time. If it does not work with minimal hardware in then I would try a new mobo. They can fail. One of mine did. Come to think of it it sounds like your problems. It started getting worse and worse until it would not even boot which is where it is now. That is when i upgraded to Dual PIII. I love my Dual PIII and have had no problems since then. Now that I have said all of that and thought as i wrote, I would not be surprised if the problem lies in the mobo. If you need more help email me at [email protected]. I am A+ certified so I am definatly ready to take on the challange. lol.

[Darren Wilson]

Originally posted by jbar1:
Compaqs and HPs do not like to run well with a Fdisk/Format because of their Bios setup. These machines use a propriatery bios that is stored on the HD. This is the main reason I have no use for them. If you want them to run right you SHOULD us their recovery disk. If you need to change the MoBo, May I suggest an A-Bit or Azus and I think that Microstar also has one that will work. Then you will have a real Bios to work with

Not all Compaq's & HP's use the 'Hidden Partition' type BIOS. I had a load of DeskPro 133's & Vectra 166 base units in my last place of employment and not one of these used the HDD BIOS, but Hardware based. My HP Vectra XU 6/200 P-Pro base unit sitting next to me here has a hardware BIOS as well.

[DonJ]

Just in case you haven't already, go here Compaq's download website.

Go to Presario Desktop/Series 5100/5190. There are RomPaq's and diagnostic utilities listed there. Also, the service manual can be downloaded...it's in .pdf format...so you will need Adobe Acrobat to view it.

Let us know how it goes...Good Luck!
DonJ

[elacious]

I'm so done with this computer....I wasted hours for nothing. All the components are integrated, so process of elimination was limited to a few things...the ram, the cpu
and the hdd. None of which made any difference. I'm convinced it's a bad board. Maybe one of these yrs when I have some free time (yea right) I'll put it up on the bench again, but for now, time is money and I don't have much to spare

[Wayward Clam]

We are all agreed that Compuke is the real problem here, and I agree it is probably the mobo.

Microscope and Troubleshooter both have mobo tests, by the way. Microscope has a trial version you can download.

BTW, DON'T throw out any rails that are on the CDROM and 5&1/4" drive if it has one. Those rails are a *&^%$#@ to find and Compuke wants like $20 for a set of them.

Also, I have yet to run across an HP with an on HD CMOS, but thanks for the heads up that some of them are out there...

P.S. Did you run a virus scan on it?

[3fingersalute]

The last couple of Comcraps I worked on, have had a real BIOS as well, AWARD based I believe!

[jbar1]

Not all Compaq's & HP's use the 'Hidden Partition' type BIOS. I had a load of DeskPro 133's & Vectra 166 base units in my last place of employment and not one of these used the HDD BIOS, but Hardware based. My HP Vectra XU 6/200 P-Pro base unit sitting next to me here has a hardware BIOS as well.

AH how right you are. I stand corrected. I knew that some of the earlier systems had both award and phoenix. Most comcraps I see are HDD Thanks for the correction