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Just purchased the computer I used in elementary - having trouble though

dreniarb

Member
Joined
Aug 8, 2016
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27
I recently purchased an IBM 5150 off ebay. It was the first PC I ever owned. My grandfather bought it for me in 86 or 87. It was the catalyst that lead me down the path to being where I am now, a network administrator. Enough nostalgia though! :)

It arrived fine last Friday, packed well. I plugged everything in, powered it up, and it booted to DOS on the c drive. It took a while to get to a prompt though - a cursor came on the screen and flashed for quite a long time, longer than I remember it took 30 years ago... anyways I popped in one of the 5.25 disks it came with and was able to browse the files on it. I felt really good about it. I didn't have time left in the day to check it out more so turned it off and left it for the weekend.

This morning I powered it up and the screen went white. I never received the usual long beep and two short beeps. So I turn it off for a few seconds, turn it back on and I get the beeps. Screen turns normal and I get a flashing cursor. Eventually I get this screen but it locks up there and won't go past it, just a flashing cursor:

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I try a few different disks instead but now it won't go past this screen, and I get what appear to be error codes?

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I remove everything except the EGA card and power it up. BASIC loads up just fine.

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I plug in just the floppy controller and plug up a 5.25 drive, same error as before. Locks up at the DTK screen.

I remove the floppy controller and plug in the hard drive controller and connect the drive but it's just this error message:

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Can anyone help me with this? Kind of bummed right now... :/

Thanks
 
Here are pics of the computer and the different parts in case it's helpful or if anyone is up to giving me some info about any of them.

The layout before removing the cards:
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This is an Intel 287 XL Math CoProcessor. The box came with the computer. I assume this allows the computer to function as a 286?
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Without anything plugged in. Everything looks to be in good condition.
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I'm not sure of the significance of this?
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Took a pic of the dip switches in case I bumped any of them during my time monkeying around.
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Power supply.
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Hard drive, a Seagate ST-225. I believe this is a 20mb drive?
tn_20160808_104223.jpg

The EGA card. I am not sure what kind.
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This was the only significant marking I could find on the EGA card. I have not googled it yet.
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The math coprocessor card.
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The cpu itself?
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I suppose these switches go between 8088 and 80286 as they are labeled. Not sure what cache on and cache off does though?
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One of the 5.25 drives.
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The other 5.25 drive.
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I was quite excited to see that this was a 1.2m drive!
tn_20160808_104521.jpg
 
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The hard drive controller:
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It's Western Digital I assume?
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The floppy controller:
tn_20160808_104639.jpg

The only significant marking on the reverse side of the floppy controller.
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A multi input output board. I had never seen something like this with the odd attachment that hangs off the back of the case. :)
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This bend in the MB concerns me a bit. I wonder if I should place something under it to support it and make it more level?
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Error 201 indicates a bad memory chip. The 40xx code indicates which memory chip(s) to look at first. I think that would mean a bad chip in the second bank on the motherboard.

Edit: Your floppy controller is capable of supporting high density disks. The 1.2MB drive is supported as would a 1.44MB 3.5" drive if you want an easier time transferring to more recent systems.
You have correctly identified the parts.
 
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Very nice loaded up system there!

The 64-256k marking indicates how much memory is supported directly on the motherboard. This is important as it means your board is filled with 64k ram chips. Earlier 5150 boards were 16-64k and used 16k ram chips.

That looks like an IBM EGA card, and it appears to have the memory expansion. The expansion is uncommon and really makes the EGA card useful.

That floppy controller is also very nice. It is a Taiwanese 8-bit high density floppy controller. Somewhat generic but not common and everyone wants one of these because they can use 1.44mb 3.5" drives.

That I/O card looks fully loaded and should bring your computer to a full 640k of RAM. Those would also be 64k ram chips, so you can take some chips from the last bank to get the motherboard RAM working. Although given the bend, they might just need re-seating.

A bad ram chip would likely cause the other problems with DOS not booting.

Chances are the 5150 you used originally didn't have that much RAM, so the power on RAM test went quicker.
 
Error 201 indicates a bad memory chip. The 40xx code indicates which memory chip(s) to look at first. I think that would mean a bad chip in the second bank on the motherboard.

Edit: Your floppy controller is capable of supporting high density disks. The 1.2MB drive is supported as would a 1.44MB 3.5" drive if you want an easier time transferring to more recent systems.
You have correctly identified the parts.

well that is fantastic news about the 1.44mb drive! The cable does have that particular connection on it so I will certainly be trying it out once I get past this memory error. I am hoping to transfer data TO the 5150.

i will update as i make progress.
 
Very nice loaded up system there!

The 64-256k marking indicates how much memory is supported directly on the motherboard. This is important as it means your board is filled with 64k ram chips. Earlier 5150 boards were 16-64k and used 16k ram chips.

That looks like an IBM EGA card, and it appears to have the memory expansion. The expansion is uncommon and really makes the EGA card useful.

That floppy controller is also very nice. It is a Taiwanese 8-bit high density floppy controller. Somewhat generic but not common and everyone wants one of these because they can use 1.44mb 3.5" drives.

That I/O card looks fully loaded and should bring your computer to a full 640k of RAM. Those would also be 64k ram chips, so you can take some chips from the last bank to get the motherboard RAM working. Although given the bend, they might just need re-seating.

A bad ram chip would likely cause the other problems with DOS not booting.

Chances are the 5150 you used originally didn't have that much RAM, so the power on RAM test went quicker.

This is really exciting news to hear. Particularly about the possible use of the 1.44mb floppies. My main goal is to get some old programs loaded up on here and one thing I've been concerned with is how to go about doing that.

You are correct, the computer I had as a kid only had 512k of ram. I have lots of memories of trying to squeeze everything I could from it to get things to work. I also only had CGA so having EGA is really awesome. :)

Is there a particular technique I should use to reseat these ram chips? There isn't a ton of room inside the case to work around in. I am fine with removing the motherboard to do this but I don't want to make a bad situation worse.
 
Well, a bit of good news but not completely. I put all the boards back in and the computer booted up!

tn_20160808_140306.jpg

Dos 6.2 is installed which would have been a surprise had I not just heard from the seller who said the computer used to belong to an engineer at his place of work. I that explains why the computer is so beefed up.

I turned it off then back on but only got the white screen. So I unplugged it for a few seconds, plugged it back in, powered it up and it booted up properly again. Makes me want to never turn it off again! :/

My next attempt is with a 3.5" drive.
 
Some power supplies (even some "modern" ones) must be powered down for perhaps 10-30 seconds before they will power on again. That is usually not such a big deal, but 5150s don't have a reset button!
 
Ok you didn't post a pic showing the whole MB, so I'm little confused.

There's a picture showing an 80286 processor, and you have 1.2 Mb drives; so I could guess you have a 5150 case with a 5170 motheboard.... but one picture is showing 8 bit ISA slots, while the 5170 has 16 bit ISA slots (unless some early version uses 8 bit slots, I'm not sure...). Well, honestly I don't understand if the picture with the 80286 chip is about the motherboard or about an add-on card.

If the 286 is on the motherboard, it could be some AT clone motherboard from Taiwan...?

It there any IBM logo and code on the motherboard? Can you identify the 8088 DIP chip on it?
IBM 5150 and 5160 use the 8088 processor and 360 kb drives, while the 5170 uses the 80286 processor.

Can you post a picture showing the whole motherboard?
 
Ok you didn't post a pic showing the whole MB, so I'm little confused.

There's a picture showing an 80286 processor, and you have 1.2 Mb drives; so I could guess you have a 5150 case with a 5170 motheboard.... but one picture is showing 8 bit ISA slots, while the 5170 has 16 bit ISA slots (unless some early version uses 8 bit slots, I'm not sure...). Well, honestly I don't understand if the picture with the 80286 chip is about the motherboard or about an add-on card.

If the 286 is on the motherboard, it could be some AT clone motherboard from Taiwan...?

It there any IBM logo and code on the motherboard? Can you identify the 8088 DIP chip on it?
IBM 5150 and 5160 use the 8088 processor and 360 kb drives, while the 5170 uses the 80286 processor.

Can you post a picture showing the whole motherboard?

The 286 is on a 286-add-in card, or the so-called 287-coprocessor card, while the motherboard is a proper IBM 5150. The EGA is also a proper IBM one with the EGA memory expansion card.

All in all it's a well equipped machine! Pretty maxed-out in terms of being a 5150.

For the memory error issues, it sounds like one of the RAM chips might have a loose connection. I would suggest "reseating" all socketed RAM chips, or at least firmly press them into their sockets.
 
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Lots of IBM 5150 info at http://minuszerodegrees.net

Your posts indicate:
* 64KB-256KB type of 5150 motherboard
* The SW2 switches on the motherboard are set for 640K (conventional memory)
* 256K of that is on the motherboard (4 banks of 64 KB) and the remainder of 384K will be on the Quadram Quadboard card (6 banks of 64K)

The first 201 memory error you show is "40DF 201", and the next shown is "40AB 201".
On a IBM 5150 motherboard, the "40" component of your 201 errors indicates address 256K, which corresponds to the first bank of RAM on the Quadboard.
The "DF" and "AB", indicate the bits in error, with "DF" and "AB" indicating lots of bits in error.

DF = 11011111
AB = 10101011

So, inconsistent bit failure.

Well, a bit of good news but not completely. I put all the boards back in and the computer booted up!

It sounds like removal/replacement of the Quadboard may have been the fix. (fixed poor connection to motherboard ?)
 
... This morning I powered it up and the screen went white ...
... I turned it off then back on but only got the white screen ...
In case it is relevant, a white raster showing on an EGA monitor typically results from lack of video/sync signals.
You should be able to reproduce it by successfully booting the 5150, then disconnecting the video cable from the EGA card.

At boot time the sequence is:
1. Power supply generates POWER GOOD signal (see [here]) taking motherboard out of reset state (i.e. motherboard starts).
2. Power-on self test (POST) on motherboard starts to execute.
3. At some point, the POST gets the EGA card to initialise itself.
4. EGA card outputs video/sync signals.

So what could intermittently cause that 'EGA white screen' symptom at computer power-on time?

* Intermittent EGA card
* Intermittent EGA monitor (including video cable)(including corroded pins in plug)
* Poor connection of EGA card to motherboard
* Intermittent motherboard (fails to start, or starts but POST does not reach the EGA initialisation point)

* Intermittent power supply (lack of POWER GOOD signal results in motherboard not starting)
* Intermittent short circuit on the motherboard (overloads power supply)
* Intermittent short circuit on the power rail of an expansion card (overloads power supply)
* Intermittent short circuit on the power rail of something else (e.g. drive) (overloads power supply)

The last four would be ruled out if you observed a good POWER GOOD signal when the 'EGA white screen' symptom was present.
 
Hard drive, a Seagate ST-225. I believe this is a 20mb drive?
Yes.

The EGA card. I am not sure what kind.
The IBM EGA card.
Detailed at [here].

A multi input output board. I had never seen something like this with the odd attachment that hangs off the back of the case.
The operation manual is at [here].

By the Quadram Quadboard photo at [here], yours appears to have its original battery. If so, it may not be long before the battery starts leaking, if it hasn't already. A leaking battery may damage the Quadboard (and sometimes nearby items).
 
Is that EGA monitor plugged in to the back of the 5150's power supply? That will normally come on even if the power supply itself decides not to start. Also, what model of monitor is that?
 
Is that EGA monitor plugged in to the back of the 5150's power supply? That will normally come on even if the power supply itself decides not to start. Also, what model of monitor is that?

It is a Samsung CD-1453M1. It plugs straight into the wall, not the back of the power supply.

tn_20160809_092129.jpg
 
Before I forget and get carried away with other replies I want to say thanks to everyone for all the help and info! Pretty amazing how active and responsive this forum is.
 
I've cycled through 5 different 3.5" drives and a handful of floppies. Honestly I do not know if any of these are actually good but I keep getting "General failure reading drive b:" every time I try to browse for files. The drive does light up and seek but errors out every time.

tn_20160809_092112.jpg

Perhaps this question should be on a separate thread but I'm wondering how I can go about getting files to this computer? Would love to get Kingdom of Kroz going. Dosbox just doesn't run it correctly.... :)
 
I've cycled through 5 different 3.5" drives and a handful of floppies. Honestly I do not know if any of these are actually good but I keep getting "General failure reading drive b:" every time I try to browse for files. The drive does light up and seek but errors out every time.

View attachment 32551

Perhaps this question should be on a separate thread but I'm wondering how I can go about getting files to this computer? Would love to get Kingdom of Kroz going. Dosbox just doesn't run it correctly.... :)


If you have a working HDD, you can transfer any file using a serial or parallel cross cable and LapLink from a DOS or Windows computer to your 5150 hdd.

If you use a parallel cable you should use a source computer with DOS or Win9x, because XP and newer OSs don't allow a straight access to LPT.
I use to transfer files from Win7 to Win98 by the LAN; then I run LapLink 5 on both Win9x and IBM XT to transfer them to their final destination.

Note that LapLink can be trasferred itself to a PC using a serial cross cable, you don't need floppies for that; it is self explained by Laplink.


If you can't find LapLink write me in PM, I will mail you a copy.

------------------------

About floppies: I had many troubles in the past with bad floppies. I got a bunch of 5.25" disks who remained for years in a wet environment.
Now when you try to use them, they leave some debris on the FDD heads, resulting in a not working unit until you clean the drive heads with alcool. Probably this is not the case, but you have been warned ^_^
 
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