Hi: I was trying to install ATI ALL-IN-WONDER PRO card into my old PII Win98 SE, but can't install display driver. So I accidentally changed CMOS display from PCI to AGP. The computer won't boot anymore, and I don't have AGP slot in my motherboard. Moniter only showed "no signal input". How can I restore my original CMOS. It won't boot to floppy drive either. Computer power is OK and hard disk light is on. Can someone help me? Thanks!

Hi,
The first thing to do is to remove the CMOS battery.
You will have to open the computer case. BE CAREFUL if you do. BE sure to touch the case with your fingers before you put your fingers inside the computer. Static electricity from your body can literally fry computer chips!

Look on the motherboard for a battery. It looks like an oversized watch batter.
Remove it for about 30 minutes or so.
Then, put it back.

Some computers, after about 10 to 15 minutes or so with no CMOS battery, will re-set the BIOS back to the defaults.
Hopefully, this one will, too. You can then go back into the BIOS and setup your settings again. I am not sure this will work, but it is worth a try, depending on whether your computer returns to defaults.
Best wishes,
fredg
PS; Before you open up your computer, I would wait for other experts to have a chance to add other opinions. They might have a way to solve it, without opening up the computer.

Howdy:

Fredg has given you the easiest way to do it.. You could check to see if your motherboard has a "Clear CMOS" jumper and use that, but pulling the battery will work just as well.

Murray

Here's my 0.02$ worth from experience: if the battery has a clip that holds it down be very careful not to snap off that clip or you're toast. I learned that the hard way. :(

Yep like they said remove the little lithium battery which is most of the time in the center of the motherboard and it should reset. And a good thing while your doing that, if its original then buy another lithium the same type. Keep you from having more probs

I just want to make it clear that you can't get back into your CMOS the same way you did previously. Are you pressing whatever key press is used as you boot?

If you cannot, then removing the battery or setting the jumpers to reset the CMOS are necessary.

Hi, sorry, I was busy today and thanks to 5 responses in just one day. I started to work as all your advises, but didn't work. This was what I have done so far, remove the battery, change to new one, set the jumper from pin 1 & 2 to pin 2 & 3 then back, turn on and off switch 4 (as described by the original document to clear cmos), and none of them work. I even took out hard drive and try in my newer computer and the hard drive is OK. Right now when I turn on computer it runs but not signal go to moniter. Any other suggestions? Thanks to all 5 of you.

You know, it would be funny but make sure the screen is plugged to the computer :D

Hi, thebriggsdude, the screen is definitely plugged to the computer. Actually, right before I changed the display in cmos I was installing jump drive's driver and freeze the computer and I restarted the computer then change the cmos. May be double trouble? Thanks again!

Could be the driver is causing it, some cards etc won't respond but to certain types of computers. But the driver just might be the one causing it, I know when my friend threw a vid card is his old win98 machine all hell broke loose due to the drivers, he switched to linux though and no more probs. But not saying switch to linux, but it could be the driver. oh and try taking out the card for now, it might be when it froze the driver got corrupted, I know my win98 machine would do it with any card if I even touched it wrong or it froze while a driver was being installed it went ape on me.

Hi, thebriggsdude, thank you for taking time to show your interest. Can anything else be done if it is due to the jumb drive driver (new modern driver for old win 98?). The motherboard was not fried because hard disk led light and speaker works, they are all connected directly to motherboard. Thanks!

The driver should not be the problem. If it was, it wouldn't be causing problems before the computer even accesses the hard drive. What I recommend is move the video card to another slot and also clear the cmos, then boot up. If you give us the motherboard model maybe there is additional info out there. Finally some times it helps to remove the battery for 24 hours.

Gl

Now I have in others a driver trying to override another, plus in most computers you can change the battery out without losing anything in the cmos, just the time date etc. you should leave it out for a few hours.

Drivers can cause problems. But they aren't in effect when the computer first starts. The first thing that comes on screen (which most of the time you won't see) is the video card initializing. The next thing is the BIOS starting/running tests. At this point there are no 'drivers' being used. So if you can see this stuff, then it has nothing to do with drivers. Yes, I'd leave the battery out for a while.

Hi, thanks to both of you, phr0ze and thebriggsdude, I will leave the battery out until tomorrow and will let you know what happen. I don't know the brand of matherboard, It is an old P1 133 gateway. My main purpose is to know how to fix it, not that I really need it (only use it online in different part of the house, somehow the online speed is quite good). Thanks again.

Yeah you'll have to be careful when upgrading old stuff with new stuff, since mostly the new stuff has never heard of the old stuff driver wise etc. oh and old gateway, hope its reliable but I have had probs with lots od gateways

Hi, phr0ze and thebriggsdude, after almost 24 hours I put the battery back and still don't see the Bios. Can the bios be accidentally erased? Thanks!

No the bios should always be there. One thing to try, I did it one time ot a sony viao, start it up with the battery out, of it could be that you need to unplug the computer for a couple hours. Either that or you do need to take the card out and put it in another slot.

Hi, phr0ze and thebriggsdude, and all the nice people, just to let you know that I found where was the problem. I took the motherboard out and connected to another old computer with power supply and bios came out and computer worked again. The funny thing is the original power supply turned on and all the lights (hard disk and power lights) came on and fan was running, but no bios. Maybe when I was installing the card I accidentally sparked something in one of the power connections, but not the motherboard and power supply. Is it possible? Thanks!

It could be possible you knocked a connection lose.

Powersupplies die all the time and can lead to a wide range of problems. But unless it's a surge I've never seen a powersupply so bad that it will start the fans but not post. Dead supplies usually appear normal but when you try to put a load on them they can't keep up with the wattage demanded of them. I am glad you found the problem. This is the first time I've seen the powersupply this bad. Usually when powersupplies start to die, things start happening like blue screens in windows, certain drives not recognized, missing files reported by windows, etc.

Glad you're fixed.

Hi, phr0ze, this is the first time I heard of dying power supply since I am a beginner (like dying car battery?). I did notice A: drive was hard to recognize earlier then just went out right before post went out. Thanks to let me know.

Well its not like a dying car battery but same idea, its just where the components that carry the current and convert it to be used to each device wears out of sorts.