Question Vintage HP computer not always booting up.

[Nilthandrik]

I recently reassembled the parts from an old HP computer with the intention of using it for windows 98 retro gaming.

MB - ASUS K7M (HP OEM)
CPU - AMD - Athlon 1000 (AMD-K7100MNR53B A)
GPU - ASUS AGP-V3800 Nvidia TNT2 32Mb
PSU - (New) Corsair CX450M (did not want to risk using the old one)
also has a floppy and hard drive plugged in.

Some times when powered on the fans will come on and floppy will test and drive will spin up but no display at all.
Other times I will get the display but it will hang on POST. Since it's an oem all it shows it the hp logo.
If I get lucky and have a boot floppy inserted I get the "all good" POST beep and get to a prompt.

I've tried reseating the CPU (it's a slot a one), and the GPU.
I've also booted it with the floppy and hard drive unplugged, but without a boot disk it will always get stuck on post screen.

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[Lutfij]

I've tried reseating the CPU (it's a slot a one), and the GPU.
On the ram, CPU and GPU's gold contacts, use an eraser to gently wipe them clean off of any carbon deposits. Remove any eraser lint that you can see, then reseat them.

Have you tried another HDD, reinstalling the OS in DOS?

 

[TerryLaze]

New PSUs have way lower amps on the 12v rails so it might be that your new PSU just can't provide enough amps for the old system.

We are talking about a 25 year old system here.
Chances are the mobo has some capacitors that are barely hanging on so they work sometimes but mostly not.
Could help if you could upload some high res close ups of the mobo.

Also emulation has come a real long way and playing windows 98 games on 86box is a real viable alternative, most of the times it's actually better than the real thing.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xghrSaKn7yM

 

[stonecarver]

https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/asus-k7m-hp-oem

I'm just assuming the motherboard has a new battery.

It's been a long . long time but I can't remember on the AGP slot if when the motherboards changed to the " back than newer AGP 8x " if the older GPU's with the 3 slots on the older cards were interchangeable to the 2 slot port.

If I get lucky and have a boot floppy inserted I get the "all good" POST beep and get to a prompt.

What does the prompt say?

Have you been able to ever get to BIOS ?

 

[TerryLaze]

https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/asus-k7m-hp-oem

I'm just assuming the motherboard has a new battery.

It's been a long . long time but I can't remember on the AGP slot if when the motherboards changed to the " back than newer AGP 8x " if the older GPU's with the 3 slots on the older cards were interchangeable to the 2 slot port.


What does the prompt say?

Have you been able to ever get to BIOS ?

I'm not the OP but:
Dos 6.1
c:\> _

 

[Nilthandrik]

On the ram, CPU and GPU's gold contacts, use an eraser to gently wipe them clean off of any carbon deposits. Remove any eraser lint that you can see, then reseat them.

Have you tried another HDD, reinstalling the OS in DOS?

I'll try cleaning the contacts and see if that helps.

I tried two diffrent drives both were checked on another computer. There is currently no os. I was able to fdisk and format the drive but when trying to install windows 98 it would not recognize the drive as formatted properly.

New PSUs have way lower amps on the 12v rails so it might be that your new PSU just can't provide enough amps for the old system.

Could help if you could upload some high res close ups of the mobo.

Also emulation has come a real long way and playing windows 98 games on 86box is a real viable alternative, most of the times it's actually better than the real thing.

I've tried using the original PSU from the computer but the issue still occurred.

I'll try and get some pics to upload here of mine.

You're right, emulation would probably be a lot easier. But it's not the same experience as using the real thing.

I'm just assuming the motherboard has a new battery.

It's been a long . long time but I can't remember on the AGP slot if when the motherboards changed to the " back than newer AGP 8x " if the older GPU's with the 3 slots on the older cards were interchangeable to the 2 slot port.


What does the prompt say?

Have you been able to ever get to BIOS ?

The battery is a new one.

The gpu is the same one that came with the computer, and back then there were never any issues.

Prompt is what you get with boot floppy. Options for CD-ROM support or not and network or not. Then the classic A:\