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IBM PC Server 330 won’t boot

R

RetroMagic

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Joined
Oct 6, 2024
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12
Hi! I recently got an IBM PC Server 330. However, I can’t get it to boot, and I don’t even know where to start. Here’s what I know.
  • The hard drive bays (four IBM Ultrastar drives are currently installed) have a green light on for each but none of the drives spin up - the amber activity lights never come on either
  • I set the system jumpers from tamper protection to CMOS clear to see if that changed anything - the rest match the diagram on the inner side of the case panel
  • I replaced the CMOS battery to see if that changed anything
  • The keyboard blinks the num/scroll/caps lock lights on power up
  • The fans all run
  • No beeps from the system speaker
  • Processor gets warm (not bad just enough to know it's doing something)
  • Reseated the RAM and voltage regular module on the daughter board at the bottom of the main board
  • Don’t see any internal damage or leaking
  • Ethernet Enable LED on the system board is on - the three RAID lights are off
  • No video is outputted
  • Other drives like the CD drive and Zip drive power on
  • Below are the system indicators and the descriptions from the manual
 

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Mind posting some pictures of the full machine? It looks cool.

Otherwise, tried standard troubleshooting procedures yet? Take out everything except CPU minimal ram graphics and see if it'll post.
 
Could be a failed/faulty drive, As its a server it likely has the drives setup in a RAID configuration.
Try disconnecting power and data cables to all hard drives.

Also check the monitor you are using is working.
Try booting from a floppy disk if you have one.
If you can get the display working check BIOS settings

Dave
 
The hard drive bays (four IBM Ultrastar drives are currently installed) have a green light on for each but none of the drives spin up - the amber activity lights never come on either
Click to expand...
The drives may be waiting for a spin-up command from the SCSI controller.
Try booting from a floppy disk if you have one.
If you can get the display working check BIOS settings
Click to expand...
From what he's showing he can't do either of those. The system is halting somewhere in POST before it can let the user do anything.

Since you have already done the basic tests (the tamper switch, CMOS battery etc) you will have to start unplugging disks/boards and get the system to a minimal config and hope it's something there causing the hardware fault.
 
@hunterjwizzard I'd love to post photos of the full machine - it does look neat!

@hunterjwizzard @oldcomputerdave @NeXT I tried some other things in addition to that tonight.
  • I didn't unhook the CD or floppy drive - didn't want to get too far into the weeds this late.
  • Not sure what all I can unhook, to be honest.
    • I removed all of the RAM sticks except for one.
    • I removed both expansion slot cards - one was for the ZIP drive so it also got unhooked.
    • I removed all of the hard drives. Interesting - I also tried pressing the power button on the hard drive units - the green power LED started blinking and pressing it again made the activity light come on then go off along with the green light becoming solid again. Based on the manual, a blinking green light means it's safe to remove the drive. The manual states both lights will be out if it's defective. So, the drives are apparently powered on (just not spinning) and inactive. Makes sense that they're waiting for the spin up command (haven't really worked with SCSI much so I'm not too familiar with it).
  • I moved the Clear CMOS/Tamper Detect jumper from Clear CMOS back to Tamper Detect.
  • I tried moving the Normal/Recovery Boot jumper to Recovery Boot - after it didn't change anything, I moved it back to Normal.

Something that makes me wonder - the Security Indicator light doesn't turn off. The manual states that means a security hardware or software error occurred relating to tamper-detection software that is installed and enabled. The system has two physical keys. One is clearly for the front door. But, I have no clue what the other one is for (two different sizes). When I got it, it lacked the front door and only had the smaller key included. I decided to order a front door for completeness - it came with a larger key and the same smaller key. I'm looking all over the system and I don't see another key hole. Is something else locked and it's telling it to do nothing? I don't know - just speculating.

I also attached the PDF manual I found for it online.
 

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It only allows for 10 files - here's the last picture. Unable to do the manual - it's too large.
 

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You mentioned having security software "installed", does that mean on the hard drives/operating system?

I'm wondering if doing everything to bypass the security and get it to post might be the way. It seems like there should be possible to boot in an unsecured mode just to get a post screen or bios access.
 
oldcomputerdave said:
Have you checked ALL voltages are correct from the power supply?
Click to expand...
I thought about that but it has three power connectors to the motherboard that I don’t recognize. I found what voltages they should be, but I can’t find any info on which ones to jump with a paper clip to power it on.
 
hunterjwizzard said:
You mentioned having security software "installed", does that mean on the hard drives/operating system?

I'm wondering if doing everything to bypass the security and get it to post might be the way. It seems like there should be possible to boot in an unsecured mode just to get a post screen or bios access.
Click to expand...
I have no clue what that means, unfortunately - I’m just getting that from the user manual stating what the light means.

That’s what I was wondering too. I tried locking the front panel door to see if it had a sensor or something - that didn’t help. I set the jumper to from Tamper Detect to CMOS clear - that made no difference. It had a recovery boot jumper - that made no difference. It has a “Boot Lock” jumper. One says “Boot Lock”, the other says “Boot Lock Protected”. It’s on the protected one - based on the schematic, that’s the default. Not sure exactly what that jumper does though. I went ahead and tried that one too and it made no difference.

I guess I could resort to seeing if components are being sold online and start swapping things out until it works. I was hoping it’d be something simple - and maybe it is and I’ll just end up with spare parts - nothing wrong with that. But, I didn’t want to just go straight to that as a solution.
 
it seems like there should be a middle ground between "tamper protection" and "clear CMOS". It'd be damn near impossible to service these things otherwise.

I don't really know a whole ton about these specific systems but I've worked with a bunch of machines with chassis intrusion detection, it was always possible to disable that so you could work on the machine.

I'm curious - can you unplug everything connecting the case to the board and connect just the power switch?
 
hunterjwizzard said:
it seems like there should be a middle ground between "tamper protection" and "clear CMOS". It'd be damn near impossible to service these things otherwise.

I don't really know a whole ton about these specific systems but I've worked with a bunch of machines with chassis intrusion detection, it was always possible to disable that so you could work on the machine.

I'm curious - can you unplug everything connecting the case to the board and connect just the power switch?
Click to expand...
It most definitely feels like there should be a middle ground without having to clear the entire CMOS. I just can’t figure out if it even has such. It does have a jumper to bypass a password but it hasn’t even gotten to such a point from what I can tell. It has a C2 Security Connector that I think is in relation to the LogicLock feature but it has nothing connected to it nor can I find any meaningful information on how it works.

I wonder if IBM made it so that only they could or someone with a special tool could. There’s something about a system management feature that can be installed - there’s a jumper to say if it is. I just wonder sometimes since there just isn’t much info on these and I don’t know why. They’re very cool looking systems and I figured they’d have more info on them but it’s like finding all the pieces of broken needle in multiple haystacks. I have a couple PS/2 systems and while I find them fascinating, just like this server, I’m just mind blown how complicated they are - hardware and software. Makes it both interesting and frustrating at the same time. More fun when you figure out something, at least.

I did some more digging and found a hardware maintenance manual. It says that the only thing required for operation is the motherboard, processor card with a processor and 1 memory module, and the fan (I’m guessing to the processor since it has two others). So, I did that and unfortunately it still does the same thing. I tried removing the terminator card on the processor board too - it didn’t include that or the voltage regulator module in the list of required components for minimum operation. I didn’t try powering it on without the voltage regulator module though - that seemed like a bad idea after reading what it’s for.

I’m wondering if it’s just got something completely faulty and it’s unable to reset the security light? I don’t know what else it would be agitated about.
 
I’ll be getting them in the mail later this week, but I ordered a PSU, a motherboard, and the processor card along with the smaller components associated with them minus the CPU. I also was able to find the missing air baffle - not sure exactly what its purpose is. I’ll likely just swap out all the parts at once versus one by one in case a fault in one could possibly damage another. I can safely store the original parts - who knows - maybe it is something simple - they may come in handy. Or if they’re totally toast, they’d look pretty in a shadow box.

I’ll keep you all posted if that fixes it. Thank you all for your help!
 
I can happily report that the system works great with the new components! The manual said that if the PSU voltages were correct (didn't know how to confirm that) then first suspect the system board and then lastly the processor board. It also mentioned that if no error codes were emitted from the system speaker, then the system board or speaker are faulty. I can confirm the system speaker works great. So, I'd say that either the PSU or system board were at fault. Either way - I got a working server now. Thank you again everyone!

And a side note that I figure many of the folks on this site know but I'll say it anyways. I was reminded of something very important when completing this project. When you decide to part with a piece of tech - wipe your drives please. I now have a server that can boot into an install of Windows 98 that's full of stuff that isn't mine.
 
hunterjwizzard said:
Find anything fun on there? So far my best salvage-drive find is some pictures of a Victory Ship.
Click to expand...
That's a fun find - not what you'd expect! I didn't take too much time to look since it was about midnight, and I got up at 4a, but they had a lot of productivity/utility software on that machine. They had also partitioned the drive into what looked like around 15 drives. I was going to see what that was all about before wiping it. What a sight to open My Computer and have to scroll.
 
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