Archived from groups: alt.sys.pc-clone.gateway2000 (
More info?)
I went into Advance in the Bios Setup Utility, IDE Drive configuration and
set everything to auto and the system started up properly. I also changed
the battery. Thanks for your help
"Sunshine" <sunshinenews2000-nwsgrps@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:AeAfd.3378$bP2.1192@newssvr12.news.prodigy.com...
> Thanks Ben...will replace battery.
> <ben_myers_spam_me_not @ charter.net (Ben Myers)> wrote in message
> news:417e4bcf.3506523@news.charter.net...
>> Gateway tech support gave you bad advice. No way no how will
>> reformatting solve
>> the problem. Sheesh! Talk about incompetence.
>>
>> There are a couple of possibilities here for what went wrong:
>>
>> 1. The C2032 3v lithium battery has lost or is losing its charge, and
>> cannot
>> keep the motherboard settings charged up in CMOS. Replace the battery.
>> They
>> cost no more than 2 or 3 bucks.
>>
>> 2. Some information is "stuck" in the non-volatile RAM, different from
>> CMOS,
>> where other system settings are kept. The BIOS should have a reset NVRAM
>> option.
>>
>> 3. The most dire possibility is that the NVRAM is part of a now-failed
>> flash
>> memory chip. The motherboard flash memory chip has an area reserved for
>> the
>> BIOS program which runs when the system starts up. It has another area
>> reserved
>> for the Windows (Linux too!) Plug-and-Play information. Every time
>> Windows
>> boots up, it rewrites the PnP info, whether it has changed or not. This
>> has the
>> effect of wearing out the flash memory chip, which can endure only a few
>> hundred
>> thousand write operations.
>>
>> A G6-350 system is old enough that its flash chip could have failed.
>> Unlikely,
>> but possible.
>>
>> Replace the battery, reset all settings to their BIOS defaults, and see
>> what
>> happens... Ben Myers
>>
>> On Tue, 26 Oct 2004 05:00:30 GMT, "Sunshine"
>> <sunshinenews2000-nwsgrps@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>>>I spoke w/Gateway tech support concerning the boot sequence problem.
>>>They
>>>walked me through setting the boot sequence to no avail. We tried
>>>setting
>>>each of the drives to the first boot sequence; the floppy, the hard drive
>>>and the CD-rom. We also restarted w/the W98 cd in the drive. Each time
>>>the
>>>response was Drive not ready. Insert Boot disk in A:\. Gateway
>>>recommended
>>>that I reformat. I don't understand how reformatting would solve the
>>>problem
>>>if my problem is in the bios. I would like to do what I can to save the
>>>files on this drive. Any suggestions? Thanks
>>>
>>>"Tyrone Jackson" <tycobb@earth.net> wrote in message
>>>news:vz2fd.18429$nj.12630@newssvr13.news.prodigy.com...
>>>> 1. 1st IDE device
>>>>
>>>> Ty
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> "Sunshine" <sunshinenews2000-nwsgrps@yahoo.com> wrote in message
>>>> news:SCOed.10189$Al3.8971@newssvr30.news.prodigy.com...
>>>>>I have and old G6 350 that I changed the boot sequence on trying to set
>>>>>CD-rom as the 1st boot sequence. Well that didn't work. I changed the
>>>>>boot sequence back to 1. floppy disk, 2. 1st IDE device, 3. Atapi
>>>>>CD-rom,
>>>>>and 4. network. Now at startup its asking for a disk in drive A.
>>>>>How
>>>>>do i get it to startup normal again.
>>>>> Thanks
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>
>