I have an older Chaintech mobo, 5IDM2 M105. To skip boring details, let me just say that in reasembling the system, I had booted successfully, but now the bios doesn't remember its settings, right down to the time. Consequently when win95 fires up, it knows nothing and tries to reload everything and hangs. Time of day,etc. are all wrong. I thought all motherboards had batteries, but I don't see one. The system had been unplugged for several days and is several years old. Would plugging it in but not trying to power on help it "get charged" or whatever? (My thinking is: Even when a computer system is not on, the transformer for the speakers is always warm, indicating there is some current going thru. Does the same thing happen with motherboards where batteries are not apparent?) I did accidentally power on the system on the case only to find out I had not plugged the power strip it was connected to was not plugged into the wall. I plugged the power strip in and there was a spark at the outlet. Would that have fried the bios/mobo? causing the bios to lose its function.