Advice on Motherboard Diagnostic Board

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RD

I have seen a bunch of different types of PCI plug-in analyzer boards all
over eBay. Finding info on the Internet about them is sparse. I have a
couple of suspect socket 478 motherboards with no bad capacitors and
seemingly in very good physical shape that will not pass POST. I've been
thinking about buying one of the analyzers and trying it out. Does anyone
have any experience with plug-in diagnostic/analyzer boards? I would like to
hear what you think about them.

RD
 
I have seen a bunch of different types of PCI plug-in analyzer boards all
over eBay. Finding info on the Internet about them is sparse. I have a
couple of suspect socket 478 motherboards with no bad capacitors and
seemingly in very good physical shape that will not pass POST. I've been
thinking about buying one of the analyzers and trying it out. Does anyone
have any experience with plug-in diagnostic/analyzer boards? I would like to
hear what you think about them.

RD
Click to expand...

I'm not an expert on them, but I too was curious and did some digging
about how they work. The post cards don't do anything on their own,
they just relay post codes from the bios, so they can give you more
specific details about what you would learn from a beep code for
example. If the motherboard/cpu is dead, the post card likely won't
tell you anything, because it depends on the motherboard and cpu to
run the post. So when you say that your boards will not pass post, are
you saying they don't run post at all, or that they give a post error?
If you are looking for more detailed error info, that's where the post
cards might be handy. If your boards aren't posting at all, the cards
probably won't help. At least, that's what I gathered.
 
yaugin said:
I'm not an expert on them, but I too was curious and did some digging
about how they work. The post cards don't do anything on their own,
they just relay post codes from the bios, so they can give you more
specific details about what you would learn from a beep code for
example. If the motherboard/cpu is dead, the post card likely won't
tell you anything, because it depends on the motherboard and cpu to
run the post. So when you say that your boards will not pass post, are
you saying they don't run post at all, or that they give a post error?
If you are looking for more detailed error info, that's where the post
cards might be handy. If your boards aren't posting at all, the cards
probably won't help. At least, that's what I gathered.
Click to expand...

No beep codes on the boards I want to check. The CPU has tested good in
other boards, so I think it is good. The CPU I have is an Intel Celeron
2.4GHZ Northwood.
 
I have about every one of them that came out.
I might have tried each once, and it told me
nothing that I did not already know .. I had
a bad mobo. I do much better by just swapping
parts in a minimal config. The problem with all
this junk is that "compatibility" among the various
parts is very time dependent. You can't put a
newer DVD in an older mobo. The BIOS won't
support it. I must have 20 nice Plextor CD drives
that are not compatible with anything new.
So "fixing" this stuff is a good trick at best
even if the parts are good, you probably can't
collect all the compatible parts you need to
build an efficient working PC.

johns
 
johns said:
I have about every one of them that came out.
I might have tried each once, and it told me
nothing that I did not already know .. I had
a bad mobo. I do much better by just swapping
parts in a minimal config. The problem with all
this junk is that "compatibility" among the various
parts is very time dependent. You can't put a
newer DVD in an older mobo. The BIOS won't
support it. I must have 20 nice Plextor CD drives
that are not compatible with anything new.
So "fixing" this stuff is a good trick at best
even if the parts are good, you probably can't
collect all the compatible parts you need to
build an efficient working PC.

johns
Click to expand...

This was the reply I was hoping for--someone with experience in using these
devices. I have some antiquated test equipment (50MHZ O-Scope, couple of
pulse generators, a logic probe, analog and digital multi-meters) and used
to do component repair on military aircraft a couple of decades ago. I was
hoping to get a jump on the troubleshooting by using one of these "cheap"
diagnostic boards. The peripheral devices are of no interest to me as I
would probably strip the MB down to bare essentials anyway. But your comment
regarding the timing of when the diag board was made does make sense as I
doubt any of the makers provide the ability to flash upgrade the firmware.
There is practically no information on the Net on how to go about
troubleshooting a motherboard other than obvious physical inspections, how
to interpret beep codes, and swaptronics. And believing that these boards
are throw away items baffles me. i.e., today, for Intel anyway, the Socket
775 boards are abundant and are relatively cheap (esp. with mfg's rebate
incentives), but Socket 478 boards are tough to come by and expensive.
"Upgrading" by buying a new MB, possibly RAM, definitely CPU, etc..gets
really expensive. And quite honestly, unless you are a hard core gamer or
making a living at multimedia productions, who needs all the new stuff??
Sure wish ppl would get into repairing instead of lining landfills with 5
year old computer components...

RD
 
The "makers" of this stuff have always known
that heat stress eventually ruins the electronics.
Electrolytics alone are maybe 5 years tops.
It just ain't made to fly in the belly of an F16
and keep you safe. Lifetime is maybe 5 years
reliable ... and then the designers just forget it
and move on. My feeling is the junk is probably
dangerous to dispose of in a landfill, and should
be sent to safe storage until somebody figures
out what it is good for. Maybe grind it to a fine
powder, and blow it through a selective sieve
system to collect out the valuable material ???
Newer systems are so far beyond the older
ones, that it is a waste of man-hours to put
that crap on-site, and expect an employee
to be productive with it. Right now, I'm recovering
about $100,000,000. worth of research data
off of a dead Maxtor One-Touch. That was a
stupid stunt if I ever saw one. The researcher
is in a world of hurt if I can't get it back. That
is the cost of old junk.

johns
 
I have seen a bunch of different types of PCI plug-in analyzer boards all
over eBay. Finding info on the Internet about them is sparse. I have a
couple of suspect socket 478 motherboards with no bad capacitors and
seemingly in very good physical shape that will not pass POST. I've been
thinking about buying one of the analyzers and trying it out. Does anyone
have any experience with plug-in diagnostic/analyzer boards? I would like to
hear what you think about them.

RD
Click to expand...

The BIOS POST routines write the number of the failing test, or the
previous test, to diagnostic port 0x80. All that the POST card does is
to display the 8-bit data written to this port. At least that's how
the original IBM AT did it.

- Franc Zabkar
 
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