X41 won't boot, CMOS checksum bad

[pgoelz]

Yeah, I know this sounds simple but I'm not sure it is. First a bit of background....

My two daily drivers are my two X61s. The x41 was just sitting collecting dust so I decided to see about modernizing it. Upgraded it to Windows 7 (from XP) and then had lots of issues with Windows Update freezing. Finally managed to get about half way through the 227 updates before it choked. Since this seems to be a very well known issue on slow single core machines I decided to just toss in the towel, image the Win7 installation for posterity and put Linux Mint on it. That went fine but I found Mint to be more sluggish than Windows 7 so I decided to go back to Win7. Since the X41 only has two USB ports and my DVD drive requires power, I ended up removing the HD and reimaging it externally on my desktop. That completed successfully.

However, when I reinstalled the HD in the X41, I got an error 251 (CMOS checksum bad) and it refused to boot to HD or DVD even after loading BIOS defaults. Note that prior to removing the HD for reimaging, it was booting fine even after removing power and the battery. The CMOS battery reads 3.02V on the bench (not sure about in the machine) and the date and time remain correct even after leaving it totally unpowered overnight.

If I remove the HD and try to boot, sometimes I get the error 251 and sometimes not. If I install the HD, it seems to take longer on the BIOS splash screen before it tries to boot. The HD does spin up and access briefly but then it spins back down and the screen goes black with the fan running.

Could this just be a bad CMOS battery? Does it rely on a good CMOS battery to boot even while continuously powered after a reload of the BIOS defaults?

I thought this might have been the infamous PUIS issue that Windows 10 used to cause (the HD was restored by Acronis under Windows 10) but A) it was plugged into a USB adapter, B) I did a safe eject and C) it does spin up for several seconds and is recognized by the BIOS when I go into the boot section.

I can always either borrow the CMOS battery from one of my X61s or make a new one from a coin cell, but I'm thinking there is something more serious going on here? No big deal.... I don't currently have a use for the machine since it is old and slow. But it bugs me that it died.... I don't suppose there is anything that Linux could have done to it that would survive a BIOS reset? The HD was totally wiped and reformatted for the reimaging. And it won't even boot to DVDrom with the HD removed..... it looks like it starts but then it dies.

Paul

[brchan]

Strange, but I would start with swapping out the CMOS battery. Also try reformatting the drive to see if it changes anything. It is unclear to me if you can still boot from USB, but you may consider booting with tiny core linux for these machines.

[pgoelz]

Wow, that was fast! I didn't actually think anyone read the X41 forum any more

I replaced the CMOS battery with one I made from a brand new coin cell. Same issues.

I can NOT boot from CDROM. It starts and the drive accesses, but then it stalls and the drive seems to be stuck in a loop with a pulsing head laser. Somewhat similar to what it does when it tries to boot normally from the HD.... the HD spins up and you can hear it accessing a couple times, but then it stops, the HD spins down and the screen goes black.

Note that I usually get an error 251 CMOS checksum bad error even with the HD removed if I power up and then press the blue button, so I suspect there is a more serious issue.

I am in the process of reformatting and restoring the Win7 image again (via my desktop). There might have been an issue with the previous restore since the partition showed up on my desktop in computer management (under administrative tools) but did NOT show up in Windows explorer. I don't think this is the root issue, but I'll post back after the restore completes.

Paul

[pgoelz]

OK, update time.

I restored the HD again in my desktop and the X41 still does the same thing. I think last night when I restored the HD the first time in the desktop I may have damaged it. I plugged it into a USB to IDE adapter so the desktop could see it but forgot that it needs separate power. I plugged it straight in to the USB adapter's 2.5" port but forgot about the 2.5 to 3.5 IDE adapter I should have used have that routes the power to a separate plug. Minus that adapter, the HD powered up and could be accessed and written to, but I suspect the power was being supplied by the address lines since it was not plugged into a legitimate source of power. This may have damaged something in the HD.

This morning I used the correct 2.5 to 3.5 adapter and separate power and it still works. However.....

1. Although the HD seems to function normally using the power adapter that came with the USB adapter, it also seems to get abnormally warm.

2. Using the 2.5 to 3.5 adapter, powered by one of the spare power plugs in my desktop and plugged straight into the desktop's IDE port, the HD whines but does not actually spin up. It also is not detected by the MB either in BIOS or by the HDAT2 PUIS reset utility I have (bootable CD).

My best guess is that the HD is damaged and draws excessive current which the USB adapter power supply can handle but the X41 MB power goes into foldback and does not fully power it. This excessive current may have damaged the power supply X41 MB as well, since it does not boot to USB CD and produces a bad BIOS checksum error when I press the blue button during boot. If other devices are also powered from the same source, that could explain the funky issues and possibly the CMOS errors even though the clock keeps good time.

Since it is an X41 AND before all this started I was not able to get past the issue where Windows Update locks up trying to search for the remaining 100+ updates, I think I'll just shelve it for now. Can't bear to toss it since it is in pristine condition. Maybe I'll get a brainstorm some day. What the hey... it has been on the shelf since I got my first X61s many years ago, so no huge loss.

Paul

[brchan]

Have you tried booting from a USB stick, instead of USB CDROM? If you can, you should be able to easily run linux distros that run entirely into ram, such as puppy linux, Tiny Core (best in my experience), slitaz, among others. You can take out the USB stick once everything is loaded, and the performance will be much better than from your HDD. Internet and wifi should work out of the box and you can use the system similar to a Chrome OS. Of course, powering it down will cause you to lose any data, but some distros (ie. puppy linux) can be installed directly to usb sticks, so no data loss.

X41 machines are great systems, but W7 is too heavy for them anyway. My school had 2 X41 units set up as kiosks that ran W7, and it was painfully slow. The intel graphics is the major bottleneck (and cpu, to a lesser extent).

[pgoelz]

Yeah, if I get the energy I'll try booting from USB. I may already have Linux on a thumb drive around here somewhere. But no matter what, there is something wrong on the MB since I get BIOS bad checksum errors when I press the blue button if I boot without any USB device or HD plugged in. Ditto if I pull power and battery and then plug the power back in and try to boot without pressing the blue button. That should not be and it didn't happen until after I did the (assumed) failed restore last night that (assumed) damaged the HD.

Actually I found Windows 7 ran fine on it even with the 1.5GB RAM it has.... until Windows Update choked. Maybe a tad slow to boot and open Firefox compared to my X61s, but mostly quite snappy and respectable. Better than Linux Mint, actually. That was a bit of a surprise.

Paul

[pgoelz]

OMG, IT LIVES!

I rooted around and found a bootable thumb drive with Macrium Reflect on it. And surprise, it actually booted. With the HD installed, Reflect could see the HD and its contents too. It still would not boot off the HD, with the same issues. However, while poking around in the Macrium Reflect menu, I found a startup repair option. I ran it with all options checked (MBR rebuild, set active, etc.) and to my amazement, it booted. I'm running a defrag to clean things up and then I'll try some reboot scenarios to make sure it is really back to 100%. But at least one boot is better than none......

Paul