201 and Parity Check both mean bad memory. 2004 gives you a hint which chip is bad: bank 2, bit 2 chip.

1701 should be hard disk failure (either drive or controller)

thanks for the lead... i decided to crack open the machine, and lo and behold, there were some mangled chips in banks 2 and 3.. two chips were half in the socket, and one chip had half the pins broken off... 😳 Inside, i was surprised to find a hard card, so I popped that out - i bet the drive is just dead but since it's actually IDE, i have a spare somewhere to try - that eliminates the 1701.

So i just depopulated banks 2 and 3. Togged the dip switch settings to only look at banks 0 and 1.

I boot up, and now it says

2055 201

how is this possible?? bank 2 is depopulated, and the dip switch settings are set to ignore that bank. I looked closely and there are no stray/broken pins stuck in the sockets.

it DOES, however boot to BASIC

derSammler wrote:

201 and Parity Check both mean bad memory. 2004 gives you a hint which chip is bad: bank 2, bit 2 chip.

1701 should be hard disk failure (either drive or controller)

The code 2055 201 indicates that the DIP switch settings are incorrect. That, and it looks like one of the chips is bent.

I've found this website that proves to be quite resourceful for the IBM PC's: http://minuszerodegrees.net/

Afaik, due to a bug, the 64-256KB 5150 main board does NOT support any other configuration than all banks fully populated.

DaveJustDave wrote:

i bet the drive is just dead

Another possibility is that the drive is suffering from "stiction", a common problem with older drives from the 80s. Basically, as they sit unused, the heads on older drives will literally become stuck to the platters, preventing it from spinning up at power-on. My AT&T PC 6300 also has a hard card with a similar model WD drive on it, and it had stiction issues. In order to get it going, I had to give it a little "gentle persuasion" (i.e. remove the drive from the caddy and swiftly twist/jerk it in a circular motion to loosen the heads from the platters). I still need to do this from time to time if I let it sit unused for too long.

yep! i just powered it on and off half a dozen times and it works

torindkflt wrote:

DaveJustDave wrote:

i bet the drive is just dead

Another possibility is that the drive is suffering from "stiction", a common problem with older drives from the 80s. Basically, as they sit unused, the heads on older drives will literally become stuck to the platters, preventing it from spinning up at power-on. My AT&T PC 6300 also has a hard card with a similar model WD drive on it, and it had stiction issues. In order to get it going, I had to give it a little "gentle persuasion" (i.e. remove the drive from the caddy and swiftly twist/jerk it in a circular motion to loosen the heads from the platters). I still need to do this from time to time if I let it sit unused for too long.