I'll keep this short for now. I was given a PS/2 as mentioned in the title, but when I power it on it only shows a black screen with a blinking cursor. There are no beeps.
I have tried removing the SCSI card to rule out any issues caused by that, and I have tried reseating all of the cards and reseating the BIOS ROM on the processor card. Also installed a new CR2032 battery.
There are no visibly bad or corroded capacitors or other components on the board.
I can build a PC-compatible with my eyes closed and I have hundreds of parts for those, but this is actually the very first PS/2 system I have ever worked on, so I am at a loss for how to diagnose this issue. I cannot use any of my ISA\PCI diagnostic cards, and I can't find anyone else reporting this issue online.
The closest thing I could find was one small comment on this page which talks about an endlessly blinking cursor, but it mentions this happening after a memory test, which I have not seen any indication of on mine:
If I remove the memory card entirely or remove all of the RAM I get a 0211CZ error on screen with a blinking cursor below it. This is, so far, the only thing I have been able to get to come up on it at all. I have also tried the RAM sticks individually with no change.
Any suggestions to further diagnose it?
EDIT: Just realized the specs on this seem a bit strange based on this list:
en.wikipedia.org
The outer cover is marked PS/2 Model 90 XP 486. The front of the chassis is marked 8590-0H9, which says it should be a DX-25Mhz, 4MB RAM and 1.44MB floppy, but this particular system has a DX2-50Mhz, 20MB RAM (obviously upgraded), and a 2.88MB floppy. Maybe the CPU was upgraded too at some point, but the original owner of the machine gave it to me and he said it worked when he last powered it on back in 2007, so I don't think this is some kind of hardware incompatibility problem.
I have tried removing the SCSI card to rule out any issues caused by that, and I have tried reseating all of the cards and reseating the BIOS ROM on the processor card. Also installed a new CR2032 battery.
There are no visibly bad or corroded capacitors or other components on the board.
I can build a PC-compatible with my eyes closed and I have hundreds of parts for those, but this is actually the very first PS/2 system I have ever worked on, so I am at a loss for how to diagnose this issue. I cannot use any of my ISA\PCI diagnostic cards, and I can't find anyone else reporting this issue online.
The closest thing I could find was one small comment on this page which talks about an endlessly blinking cursor, but it mentions this happening after a memory test, which I have not seen any indication of on mine:
If I remove the memory card entirely or remove all of the RAM I get a 0211CZ error on screen with a blinking cursor below it. This is, so far, the only thing I have been able to get to come up on it at all. I have also tried the RAM sticks individually with no change.
Any suggestions to further diagnose it?
EDIT: Just realized the specs on this seem a bit strange based on this list:
List of IBM PS/2 models - Wikipedia
The outer cover is marked PS/2 Model 90 XP 486. The front of the chassis is marked 8590-0H9, which says it should be a DX-25Mhz, 4MB RAM and 1.44MB floppy, but this particular system has a DX2-50Mhz, 20MB RAM (obviously upgraded), and a 2.88MB floppy. Maybe the CPU was upgraded too at some point, but the original owner of the machine gave it to me and he said it worked when he last powered it on back in 2007, so I don't think this is some kind of hardware incompatibility problem.
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