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486DX Freebie

D

dengelland

Member
Joined
Dec 19, 2008
Messages
47
Have a friend that made a contribution to my favorite charaty, (ME).

Middle model computer?
No markings on case, no markings in case as to manufacturer.
No manufaturer marks on mobo, but by reading here and searching with Bios string it was made by PC chips.
AMIBIOS date 10/10/94.

Has 2 hard drives, 1 1.44 drive, 1 cd rom, 1 5.25 drive, & 1 tape drive.

Battery was dead & it lost every thing in setup.
Can reach setup but my nuts & bolts training hasn't trained me as to what the setup needs in it. Set up asks for A drive, B drive, Master HD, & Slave HD.
What goes where and what about the other drives?

It is supposed to have Win95.

I'm the nuts&bolts man, but am trying to gain new knowledge.

Thank You

David
 
When it start's up you should see the AMI BIOS screen and somewhere near the bottum it sould say press XXXXX to enter setup...

If not on the AMI BIOS screen try pushing F-1, F-2, esc, delete...



dengelland said:
Have a friend that made a contribution to my favorite charaty, (ME).

Middle model computer?
No markings on case, no markings in case as to manufacturer.
No manufaturer marks on mobo, but by reading here and searching with Bios string it was made by PC chips.
AMIBIOS date 10/10/94.

Has 2 hard drives, 1 1.44 drive, 1 cd rom, 1 5.25 drive, & 1 tape drive.

Battery was dead & it lost every thing in setup.
Can reach setup but my nuts & bolts training hasn't trained me as to what the setup needs in it. Set up asks for A drive, B drive, Master HD, & Slave HD.
What goes where and what about the other drives?

It is supposed to have Win95.

I'm the nuts&bolts man, but am trying to gain new knowledge.

Thank You

David
Click to expand...
 
Try pressing "Delete" when memory counts, or "F1" after the error message appears. There should be some lines on the startup display telling you what to press (if anything else).

You problably needs the specs for the HDD's. That's Cylinders, heads, sectors, and maybe some other (optional) numbers. This info is likely to be printed on the physical drives. Remember, drive C is the one jumpered master and drive D is the one jumpered Slave. If the numbers doesn't work, google the drive's product number and see if it should have other numbers set in BIOS. FDD's are plain standard, set drive A as 3.5" 1.44Mb, and drive B as 5.25" 1.2Mb (360Kb if 1.2Mb doesn't work).

If you can find the battery(/pack), you might want to replace it with a new one (google the product number along with the word "battery", and you might find some netshop selling it, but make sure that it is new-old stock, not used.)

Good luck.
 
F1 gets to set up, its what is needed there that I am having questions.
Got a new battery from Radio Shack.
Googled Western Digital 2250 and am getting specs for it, then will get them for Seagate that I think is the slave because it is at the end of the ribbon.

I saw a link somewhere in this forum that lead to motherboard pictures & specs but seem to have lost it. Didn't save it. Seems part of the address was (hackers), can any one lead me to it?

Thank You

David
 
It doesn't matter were on the ribbon it is unless it is set as CS. Check the jumpers. All you need to know about the HDD is normally printed on the label.
 
dengelland said:
I saw a link somewhere in this forum that lead to motherboard pictures & specs but seem to have lost it. Didn't save it. Seems part of the address was (hackers), can any one lead me to it?
Click to expand...

You mean Total Hardware 99?

Here is the mirror I usually use.
 
Auto detect

Auto detect

I have a 486 with a '92 AMI BIOS. In the BIOS setup (first screen) is the option AUTO DETECT HARD DISK.
If yours has that, use it and it fetches the geometry (cylinders/heads/SPT, etc.) from the IDE drives themselves and set those into BIOS setup for you.

If your BIOS (dated two years after my AMI one) doesn't have the AUTO DETECT HARD DISK option, it might the case where you can set drives C and D to type "AUTO".
 
modem7 said:
I have a 486 with a '92 AMI BIOS. In the BIOS setup (first screen) is the option AUTO DETECT HARD DISK.
If yours has that, use it and it fetches the geometry (cylinders/heads/SPT, etc.) from the IDE drives themselves and set those into BIOS setup for you.

If your BIOS (dated two years after my AMI one) doesn't have the AUTO DETECT HARD DISK option, it might the case where you can set drives C and D to type "AUTO".
Click to expand...

Wouldn't surprise me if it got autodetect. However, my 486 (also AMI '92 BIOS) does not got autodetect.

If it haven't gotten autodetect, use Drive Type 47, and you'll be able to type in the numbers by hand.
 
Yes, once in the setup screen, using the up/down arrow keys and the + - keys on the numpad, you should be able to select the previously mentioned "drive type" of "auto".
 
There should be a selection on the first menu screen to set everything to default values. That, along with autodetection of the hdds should get you going long enough to test out/learn about other options (there's lots of AMI BIOS info available on daNet). If trial & error, be sure to note previous settings that work, so you can go back in case sum'n goes wrong.

--T
 
per said:
Wouldn't surprise me if it got autodetect. However, my 486 (also AMI '92 BIOS) does not got autodetect.
Click to expand...
With your '92 AMI BIOS not having auto-detect and my '92 AMI BIOS having auto-detect, that suggests to me that '92 was the year that AMI introduced auto-detect into their BIOS'.
With dengelland's AMI BIOS being dated 2 years later, it's sure to have some form of auto-detect.
 
Autodetect for HDs was popular when PCI models came out with built in IDE ports (same with late model VLB boards). If the board is a straight ISA one then unless the controller does autodetect I don't think the MB BIOS will. Autodetect was also common on IDE caching controllers and late model VLB IDE cards. Should be found in 1994 models.
 
Unknown_K said:
If the board is a straight ISA one then unless the controller does autodetect I don't think the MB BIOS will.
Click to expand...
The kind of auto-detect used for IDE drives is done at the software level, not at the hardware level. It's just an extra command ('identify drive') that software (which includes the BIOS) can issue to the IDE hard drive.
So it doesn't matter whether the IDE ports (hardware) are built-in to the motherboard or are provided on a card (ISA or otherwise). The BIOS is going to be able to issue commands to the IDE drive (such as 'read sector') and 'identify drive' can be one of those commands.
 
It's Alive, It's Alive.

Every thing is going except maybe the 5.25 floppy and the tape drive.

Anyone have a suggestion for a CDRW instead of the CDR so I can transfer files from the Lab equipment at work from 5.25 to CD ?

By the way after lookin at 1725 motherboards on total hardware 99 I couldn't find a PC Chips board or any that looks like mine, maybe I don't need to


Thanks for the help

I'm sure I'm not done, but it's a whale of a start.

David
 
modem7 said:
The kind of auto-detect used for IDE drives is done at the software level, not at the hardware level. It's just an extra command ('identify drive') that software (which includes the BIOS) can issue to the IDE hard drive.
So it doesn't matter whether the IDE ports (hardware) are built-in to the motherboard or are provided on a card (ISA or otherwise). The BIOS is going to be able to issue commands to the IDE drive (such as 'read sector') and 'identify drive' can be one of those commands.
Click to expand...

Yea I know it is software, but some BIOS didn't bother untill later in the 486 era. Linux bypasses all the BIOS stuff to go direct to the drive on install so you don't even have that 512MB limit some older DOS systems had.

Very early IDE drives had issues when using different brands together and trying to set master and slave. Makes me wish they all had SCSI (except when I remember the costs of those drives and controllers back in the day).
 
dengelland said:
Every thing is going except maybe the 5.25 floppy ...
Click to expand...
1. Maybe it's a 360KB drive rather than a 1.2MB one (or vice versa), requiring appropriate change to the BIOS setup, and use of appropriate media.
2. If you search these forums, you'll find that a common problem with unused 5.25" drives is that the two rails that the head assembly slides on, need to be cleaned and relubricated.

dengelland said:
By the way after lookin at 1725 motherboards on total hardware 99 I couldn't find a PC Chips board or any that looks like mine, maybe I don't need to
Click to expand...
I can't see any requirement.
 
dengelland said:
Every thing is going except maybe the 5.25 floppy and the tape drive.
Click to expand...
Just in case you aren't aware, the tape drive will not appear as a drive letter (under DOS or Windows) - it's not that kind of device.
The tape drive is utilised via special software that may still be on the hard drive.
 
I forgot I skipped the 5.25 in the setup. Went back in setup and set it as 680 & now it is recognized.

David
 
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