C180 Boot Problem

[Joan Dolson]

We shut down one of our C180's yesterday. It was moved slightly to allow access to a power bar behind it. Now it will not boot -- after the LED's light up initially, LED 4 (system heartbeat) stays on and no more activity is seen. I am familiar with setting the monitor type at power on and am sure that it is not getting that far in the boot process. All fans sound like they are working and I can hear the internal disks start spinning.

We had a similar problem with another of our C180's 2 months ago. We solved the problem by removing SIMM pairs until we found a defective pair. Tried the same on this recent one, with no luck. Also tried reseating the system board and the disk pack.

Any ideas about what could be the problem?

[paul courry]

Normally, the first suspect is the disk drive. Open it up and look at the green light on the front of the drive. If it does not go off in 30 seconds your drive is bad.

[Shahul · Accepted solution]

Hi

It sounds like some loose connection. First what U will have to do is, remove the disk bay and pull out, then insert it properly and tighten the screws. Now switch on and see. If still problem open the box and see for mis contact between memory and board, miscontact between other cards and board..etc. Remove memory, other add on cards and put it back once again. Then close it properly and swtch on and see..Now atleast display should come. If still no display, U can suspect hardware..

Best opf luck

Shahul

[Joan Dolson]

Thanks for your responses. We actually put the disk pack and memory in another C180 and both worked fine there but not in the problem C180. Also removed the second video card from the problem C180 and reseated the disk pack and the main board several times. Still freezes right after power up, according to the LED's and doesn't even get as far as trying to display. I guess this C180 is toast!

Regards,
Joan