Mmh... did my motherboard die?

[MasterPhW]

Yeah... I have a very bad problem with my desktop PC and hope that someone can help me: I bought a SATA to USB converter and plugged it into my first USB hub, without external power supply and it got disconnected... so I thought, to many input, try the other one with external power supply... but didn't worked either, same probleme, all external devices got disconnected and the USB HUB was "dead".

So I thought, I should probably try the normal USB... plugged it into and then all my connectors on the back of my PC lost connection! USB & PS2!

So no mouse input etc.

I don't know what I should do, my PC started into vista, but I couldn't control, so I've done a BIG failure: Removed the bios battery and hoped, that after that all will work like before, BUT now my PC awaits input and I don't even come into Vista anymore.

HELP! I have a lot projects on my Desktop PC and don't know how to save them!

[Jitway]

Yeah... I have a very bad problem with my desktop PC and hope that someone can help me: I bought a SATA to USB converter and plugged it into my first USB hub, without external power supply and it got disconnected... so I thought, to many input, try the other one with external power supply... but didn't worked either, same probleme, all external devices got disconnected and the USB HUB was "dead".

So I thought, I should probably try the normal USB... plugged it into and then all my connectors on the back of my PC lost connection! USB & PS2!

So no mouse input etc.

I don't know what I should do, my PC started into vista, but I couldn't control, so I've done a BIG failure: Removed the bios battery and hoped, that after that all will work like before, BUT now my PC awaits input and I don't even come into Vista anymore.

HELP! I have a lot projects on my Desktop PC and don't know how to save them!

 

Well the usb problem was most likely a driver problem with the converter at first. Vista is a pain about drivers and external devices. There is a possibility that you may have fried the usb ports but highly unlikely.

 

Now the bigger problem. When you removed your battery from MB you lost your CMOS. Which is stored in the chipset of the MB. This is what tells your PC or MB where everything is. So guess what. Get another MB. There really is no way to restore the CMOS. You would have to input everything in your BIOS manually and that is not gonna happen. It is like when your battery dies in a MB samething happens. All I can suggest is getting another board.

 

Hope this helps some. Sorry about your luck.

[Tynvar]

You could probably restore your cmos with jumpers. Most cmos now days have a backup feature. Check your jumpers in your manual to reset the cmos.

[Jitway]

You could probably restore your cmos with jumpers. Most cmos now days have a backup feature. Check your jumpers in your manual to reset the cmos.

Ya that is if you accidentally change you CMOS settings. But if you pull the battery and leave it out for any length of time all is lost. Backup and all.

[MasterPhW]

You could probably restore your cmos with jumpers. Most cmos now days have a backup feature. Check your jumpers in your manual to reset the cmos.

Ya that is if you accidentally change you CMOS settings. But if you pull the battery and leave it out for any length of time all is lost. Backup and all.

Even if I could restore my CMOS, my USB/PS2 problem would be still persistant! So I wonder, if there's any possibility to check if my USB/PS2 connectors are still working!? I also bought an internal PCI-USB Card, to check if these connectors are working, but they didn't worked either!

[Tynvar]

Is your pc working now? There are tools to check ports, and most of them free

[MasterPhW]

Is your pc working now? There are tools to check ports, and most of them free

My PC was booting fine, before I removed the Bios battery. But now it awaits input and doesn't boot to Vista. But even, if it would boot to vista, I have no input, so I can't start tools, which check my ports.

[Jitway]

Is your pc working now? There are tools to check ports, and most of them free

My PC was booting fine, before I removed the Bios battery. But now it awaits input and doesn't boot to Vista. But even, if it would boot to vista, I have no input, so I can't start tools, which check my ports.

 

And like I said the reason it won't boot and waits for input is because the CMOS is gone. It doesn't know where to find anything. Like for one where the hard drive is with the OS on it. Try and see if there is a flash for your bios on a website that makes the bios on it. You might be able to get the CMOS back that way. Booting up through a floopy with the flash on there.

[ken_cinder]

You could probably restore your cmos with jumpers. Most cmos now days have a backup feature. Check your jumpers in your manual to reset the cmos.

Ya that is if you accidentally change you CMOS settings. But if you pull the battery and leave it out for any length of time all is lost. Backup and all.

 

Hate to break it to you, but this is entirely untrue. I've run boards all the way back to 286s with no battery even installed, the ONLY thing that happens is it won't hold time/date or anything but default settings. Resulting in having to "setup" every time the power is off.

 

Hell the CMOS is nothing more than a GATE, to some type of flash. In a PC motherboard, usually EEPROM. In something like a portable device (PSP, tabletPC).....NAND. The bios merely checks CMOS for user settings and if none exist, reverts to it's defaults (And usually, saves a copy of these in CMOS even at default).

 

Now back to the problem at hand. You fed a device that is powered off 5v USB, an external power source of at least equal. Have you checked the device in another machine? If it's dead, it's a good bet you've killed whatever bus is responsible for handling interrupts between "PCI" devices, which would also explain nothing booting from any drive.

A good rule to follow, is that if a device can be USB powered, NEVER feed it external power at the same time. NEVER!

[MasterPhW]

You could probably restore your cmos with jumpers. Most cmos now days have a backup feature. Check your jumpers in your manual to reset the cmos.

Ya that is if you accidentally change you CMOS settings. But if you pull the battery and leave it out for any length of time all is lost. Backup and all.

 

Hate to break it to you, but this is entirely untrue. I've run boards all the way back to 286s with no battery even installed, the ONLY thing that happens is it won't hold time/date or anything but default settings. Resulting in having to "setup" every time the power is off.

 

Hell the CMOS is nothing more than a GATE, to some type of flash. In a PC motherboard, usually EEPROM. In something like a portable device (PSP, tabletPC).....NAND.

 

Now back to the problem at hand. You fed a device that is powered off 5v USB, an external power source of at least equal. Have you checked the device in another machine? If it's dead, it's a good bet you've killed whatever bus is responsible for handling interrupts between "PCI" devices, which would also explain nothing booting from any drive.

I don't know, why all hassle is about my CMOS, because I know, when I would get my inputs working, I could get it working, too.

But like I already stated, I don't get any input devices workin. My HDDs internal are working all perfectly. So I was wondering, if I get it back to normal, without any inputs or check whether my USB/PS2 devices can be restored to normal functionality...

[Jitway]

Not to get into a agrument with anyone here. But I still say remove the battery which you did and now it won't even boot. At least before you removed the battery it did boot, just did not function properly. Also a Pc will not boot without a keyboard in place most the time. So you could have fried your ports on your MB. I still say you just need to get another MB and don't try to power that SATA to USB converter that caused it till you make sure it works.