Some strange possible BIOS issues

[forzahorizon3guy]

so a day or 2 ago.... i got a old optiplex GX 260... from my local thrift store with intentions of turning it into a 2nd file server...

Now heres the weird part about it

its that they had it setup with keyboard and everything to show that its completely functional... i bought it but once i got it home it suddenly dosent boot or anything it gets stuck in the bios with the error of

Unable to boot press F1 To try again... i press F1 same message...

because so far this is explainable... i know everything works at least on the hardware side but could be bios be corrupted?

Sorry if its a dumb really simple issue im good with hardware... but even a basic software issue can stop me.....

 

[geofelt]

If there is no os installed, you will not be able to boot.
See if you can't get into the bios.
While powering on, repeatedly press del and f2 which are the usual ways to get into the bios.

 

[forzahorizon3guy]

well i know their is a Operating system preinstalled due to i saw and ran DXDIAG on it before i bought it... so i can confirm WINDOWS xp is on it...

 

[forzahorizon3guy]

and yes i can get in the bios it just refuses to boot

 

[geofelt]

Try setting the bios options to default.
Possibly on such an old system the cmos(usually cr2032) battery is no longer working and able to hold your settings.
Is the boot priority first for your hard drive and not something like a cd or floppy.

 

[stdragon]

That can happen if you've plugged in a USB hard drive of some sorts. Also, the HDD might be having intermittent issues powering up. As such, it wouldn't enumerate. The only way to be sure is to go into BIOS and see if the internal HDD is being identified as a piece of hardware that's online and ready to be used. If you don't see any SATA device connected, then that's the source of the problem.

For starters, turn off and unplug the computer. Wait about 30 seconds, then reconnect both power and SATA cable connections to ensure a good contact.

 

[stdragon]

BTW, you said OptiPlex GX260. Are you sure? Jesus, that's really OLD! Not even SATA. It's IDE / PATA (UDMA)

If it's truely IDE HDDs, you'll need to validate the ribbon cables and that the MASTER/SLAVE jumper settings are set correctly.

 

[william p]

Do you have a keyboard plugged in? It may need to be PS2 on a system that old.

 

[forzahorizon3guy]

yes its a PS2 keyboard and yes i meant optiplex GX260... its not like you need a core i9 just for a file server so calm down...

and yes it has a new c'mos i do that with every
system i get

 

[forzahorizon3guy]

and yes as in the GX260 it has 2 ide.... a pentium 4 512mb ram... yes that GX260..