Examining the BIOS chip, working result, I can save the content, everything seems ok, so the FIC PA2010+ Rev.4.1 card still has ⚓️ hardware problems, I have already solved some, but maybe 🤔 there are others that maybe I missed, this card is interesting for me 🧐, because it is in ATX format, I have very few S.7 ATX, most are AT or Baby AT, the VIA chipset is not as fast as the Intel equivalent, often at least for me, they are slow and despite various attempts, I have never seen the best scores approaching, maybe 🤔 this argument I could review, doing some comparison tests with different motherboards, and with different brand chipsets, from memory it seems to me that I don't have S.7 SiS chipsets, only ALI VIA and Intel, including also those rebranded.

Anyway, going back to the PA2010+, there are probably some RAM slots to replace, the sealing clip is missing in one of the SDRAMs, and in those with 72 PIN, there are crooked contacts, but in general the card is not in excellent condition, the solders are not shiny ✨, in short, it would take a treatment to revive the contacts.

I continue with a BIOS chip from another motherboard, an ASUS MEZ-M REV 1.03, it is a card for Celeron Mendocino, uATX format, Intel i440ZX chipset, theoretically you can also put the PIII, but for these I think you need an adapter, or a modification to the CPU.
The BIOS chip is the usual Winbond W29C020-90, I think it was quite common in the MB of the period, I removed it and inserted it into the programmer, but not to reprogram it, at least not now, I wanted to see if it works, and if it was possible to make a copy of what is stored there, and yes no problem.
So this time too, there is a hardware problem to solve, it seems like a useless job, but it helps a lot to know what to look for, at least it halves or eliminates the doubts, about what works and what does not work.
At the end of these tests, I will know what I can recover, and what I will have to repair.

This ASUS MEZ-M motherboard, I've had it for about twenty years, it was given to me along with other hardware, because it was a lot of broken hardware, together with this ASUS there was an ASROCK K8Upgrade-NF3, which I repaired, it was among the first motherboards I repaired, while this one is not yet ⚓️ managed to make it work.

The card is interesting in my opinion 🧐, there is no BX chipset, but the cheaper ZX, in addition to the motherboard I also had the Celeron 433 CPU, the RAM and the video card, ATI RAGE II AGP, which I tried on other PCs and they work.

The uATX format is a bit limiting for the number of expansion slots, but there are all, one AGP three PCI and one ISA (sharing), note that there is integrated audio, and that therefore you can do without a special audio card.

The last motherboard (for now) not working, from which to extract the BIOS, is a DFI CB61, purchased in 2002 and never working, the board is new, unfortunately the original box was lost, but I still have the manual and CD Driver set, I think there were also the cables for the drives, but I think I used them in some PCs (at that time).
The BIOS chip is still a Winbond W29C020C-90B, it was readable and I saved the content, here too there is an almost certainty of a hardware failure, or alternatively a bad contact somewhere.
In the next few days I will see if I have some free time, to examine the contents of other motherboards, with DIP32 BIOS chips or alternatively PLCC32, but this programmer has a DIP8 socket (which I have never used), these chips are used on more recent motherboards, such as the LGA775-771, I will try to try a DIP8 chip as soon as possible.

Here is the DFI CB61, an i440 BX S.370, a rather unusual pairing, because the PIII are usually FSB 133, and the BX is according to Intel FSB 66-100, there are still some Coppermine PIII FSB 100, the card never worked, I have no idea why, the seller had some the same ones, maybe I had bad luck, maybe the others worked, from what I saw it is not an easy card to find, in the retroweb there are various BIOS, but there is no manual, I have the paper version, which I could photograph if someone would like to put it online.

According to the manual, the maximum multi X, is 8X, which would be equal to an 800 MHz or a Celeron 533, I am quite sure that you can go further, so more than 850 MHz or Celeron 566 MHz or more (FSB 66).

The Asus MEZ-M BIOS dump is also good.
It is the 03/15/99-i440ZX-MEZ-M-00 Revision 1008 BIOS for this board.

Comparing your MEZMXX.BIN with the copy from TRW, I see some small differences in the BIOS Setup Defaults, like for HDD S.M.A.R.T. support and Wake on LAN.
So someone modified your BIOS, but it is still valid.

Note that there is an updated Revision 1010 BIOS for the MEZ-M on TRW.

Finally, your DFI CB61 BIOS dump is also valid.
It is the 05/11/2000-i440BX-FD-2A69KD4FC-00 Revision for this board, and is identical to the copy from TRW.

Note that there are several updated 2002 BIOS Revisions for the CB61 on TRW.

I hope you get these nice boards repaired.
Ciao, Jan

Chkcpu wrote on 2025-03-13, 19:30:

The Asus MEZ-M BIOS dump is also good. It is the 03/15/99-i440ZX-MEZ-M-00 Revision 1008 BIOS for this board. […]
Show full quote

The Asus MEZ-M BIOS dump is also good.
It is the 03/15/99-i440ZX-MEZ-M-00 Revision 1008 BIOS for this board.

Comparing your MEZMXX.BIN with the copy from TRW, I see some small differences in the BIOS Setup Defaults, like for HDD S.M.A.R.T. support and Wake on LAN.
So someone modified your BIOS, but it is still valid.

Note that there is an updated Revision 1010 BIOS for the MEZ-M on TRW.

Finally, your DFI CB61 BIOS dump is also valid.
It is the 05/11/2000-i440BX-FD-2A69KD4FC-00 Revision for this board, and is identical to the copy from TRW.

Note that there are several updated 2002 BIOS Revisions for the CB61 on TRW.

I hope you get these nice boards repaired.
Ciao, Jan

Ciao Jan
Thank you ☺️ a thousand
I hope 🤞 that among the various BIOS chips, which I will try in the future, there is one that can be useful, currently I have found out of six chips in total, only one defective, this bodes well that the P5F76 can work with a new chip, regarding the other five, the motherboards must be checked to understand what problem is?
In fact I hope 🤞 to be able to repair at least some, some are not easy to find, but for example of the Olidata OLI-BX I have the same working card, so comparing it with the broken one, I could with a little luck 🍀, find where the problem is, for the others instead, today I have more knowledge and I can do more accurate investigations, but I don't have professional equipment, such as oscilloscope or tester for SMD, so the chances of success are limited.
If it's okay with you, in the next few days I'll continue, with other cards and related BIOS chips, unfortunately 😣 some have the chip soldered, for those I can't do anything, I wouldn't know how to detach it, and then instead of re-welding it, I would put a socket, usually PLCC32, returning to the types of chips, in some 486 there are DIP28, I don't know if there is a DIP32-DIP28 adapter for the nano USB?

With the motherboards and their BIOS chips, for now I'm done, because I've finished those without visible faults, and removable BIOS chips, I have other boards with a soldered chip, but I'm not able to remove it, I risk irreparably damaging the motherboard.
However, there are some other boards left, which I will look for in the next few days, so far all the boards, except one, had working chips, a sign that in all of them there is a HW fault.
The last two motherboards are, an S.370 M6VCG, with a BIOS chip DIP32 AMIC A290021T, in reality in this one, I knew that the chip was probably good, and in fact it was.
The other one is an ASUS P5KPL-SE, for this one the chip is a DIP8, it's the first chip of this type that I put in the programmer, I thought it could be faulty, because I repaired the board and it didn't show any code, instead it seems to be ok, so it means that something else is still faulty, or there could be a bad contact in the 775 PINS of the CPU.

Here are some photos of the ECS M6VCG REV: 1.2, there are some work to be done, some capacitors need to be replaced, plus some back tracks, they need to be repaired, there are some deep scratches, and some of the tracks are cut, this is not a problem if they were sufficiently spaced, unfortunately the scratches are in some places, where the tracks are smaller and closer, repairing them is possible, but it takes patience and the help of a microscope would be the best thing, the one I usually use, to enlarge it's fine, but there is not enough space to work, I have to see if it is Possible to increase the focal length, if you gain a few centimeters, it could be enough, to do this type of work (microwelding).

The BIOS chip is an AMIC A29021T70, from 1MBit (256KB), the MB chipset, is an VIA (NB VT82C694X), the Socket is a 370, so you can put all the Intel CPUs up to the Coppermine, and even the modified or adapted Tualatin, you can also install the VIA C3 CPUs, and in fact I would have an 866 MHz one that I would like to try, in the past I tried a 600, and it was a total disappointment, maybe the 866 MHz one could have some integrated Cache, in the 600 was missing the L2 (0KB), and in the bench it got results Bad, at the level of a 233-266, never had such a poor processor!

Another motherboard, which I have been repairing for a long time, is this ASUS P4S533-VM REV 1.02, visually it is like new, only a couple of times it showed a BIOS screen, then nothing, so to dispel any doubt, I decide to remove the BIOS chip, and try to extract the contents, this type of PLCC32 chip, is not read with the programmer, to read it you need the Legacy card, so I insert it and extract the contents, the chip is an SST SST39SF020, the BIOS should be AWARD (in reality there is a sticker with PhoenixBIOS written), so far everything simple.
The difficulty begins now, because more than a fault, I think there is a bad contact, perhaps in the BGA socket of the CPU, it is possible that some tin sphere does not make contact, and therefore on a couple of occasions, somehow the contact was there.
The board is a uATX with integrated Audio LAN and Video, SiS chipset, one AGP slot and three PCI.
I tried several years ago to change the capacitors (around the CPU), there were OST 3300uF 6.3V, replaced with Rubycon, unfortunately it was useless, that work was of no use.

From what I have seen, almost all motherboards (except one) do not have problems with the BIOS chip, this is the final result, so every single motherboard must be checked well.

One of the motherboards, in which there was the greatest suspicion, was the Chaintech 5TDM2, because sometimes it displayed a post code C0, a sign that it was trying to start, unfortunately I don't know the reason why it didn't continue, but since I had, a number of motherboards between my paws, it happened with another card to see the same code, the card is an ASUS P4S800-MX, not to be confused with the P4S533-VM visible in the previous message.

The problem of blocking on C0, could be caused by the RAM voltage, or by the chipset, maybe there could be a defective Mosfet, I don't think it could be short, because in the power supply intervenes the short circuit protection, which does not happen here.

We'll see if we can do some checks on Chaintech, I hope to find something anomalous, and to be able to solve it.

I thought I was done with the BIOS to check, but actually I would have three more cards, they would be these:

MSI MS-6309 S.370

LS 6ABX2V Slot1

LS K7MKLE S.462

Who knows, if among these motherboards, I find a non-working or defective chip, it is almost certain that I could put one back into operation, but we will be able to know, only after checking the chip.

I have already downloaded the BIOS from the respective chips, of two of the three motherboards, I can't find the LS K7MKLE S.462, I must have put it somewhere, for now I don't know where, let's start with the LS 6ABX2V Slot1, and continue with the MSI MS-6309 VER:2 S.370.
The Slot1 card, suffered a failure on the +12V line, I solved a problem with Slot1, and theoretically I was very close to the solution, for this reason, I wanted to make sure that the BIOS chip works, so as to be sure that we need to look for a HW failure (let's hope so).
Regarding the S.370, the card worked, but in my opinion it had an incorrect BIOS, which created problems in its operation, unfortunately one day while I was inside the BIOS, it froze, and did not restart, the BIOS chip and its contents make me think, that maybe with the correct BIOS, it could work again (?).
What's the difference, in the "retroweb", the board has a different SB chip, here I have a VIA VT82C686A, while it should be a VT82C686B, it may seem like nothing, but in reality it could make it not work, or work badly, maybe the SB I have was on VER:1, and therefore you have to use that one. Assuming that the motherboard has not been damaged beyond repair, using the wrong BIOS.

Finally, after several searches, I found the motherboard I was looking for, the Lucky Star K7MKLE VER:1.3, this board worked, but shortly after the first BIOS screens, it froze, this happened a few times, then at a certain point it stopped working, I can't explain why, but today I would like to do some tests and some attempts.
First I removed the BIOS chip, just to see if it works, the chip is an MX 29F002NTPC-12, these are chips that are seen in some motherboards, not as common as Winbond, they could be an equally valid alternative, if the pinout matches.
Connected the chip to the USB reader, I extract the stored bin file, it will not be useful for anything in particular, but it could be useful as a backup copy, it is now a habit to store BIOS from non-working motherboards, but it was possible to avoid detaching the chip if the board worked.
Looking at the board today, I can see the things to try, the battery should be replaced, and the CPU I would change with another one, I don't know if there was enough thermal paste in this one, maybe the problems were due to a bad contact between CPU and heatsink, we'll see if it will work again, but I don't think I can do these tests today.

On the Lucky Star K7MKLE VER:1.3, I must say that it always worked badly, shortly after the repair I performed (some time ago), after replacing some swollen electrolytic capacitors, most of them in the VRM area, plus other smaller ones in other places, it didn't seem like there was still something to replace, because visually they were perfect, but this often doesn't mean that they should be changed instead.

Since the first boot tests, it manifested a problem, which was sometimes more or less fast, at a certain point it crashed, let's say within 2-3 minutes at most, sometimes it didn't have time to load DOS, others it stopped at the BIOS screen, then at a certain point, after a dozen starts (about), it no longer worked and stopped showing post codes, I think I tried a second CPU, instead of the Duron 850 that I had put, maybe an Athlon 900, however it didn't went again.

Yesterday I took this card between my legs, there is still ️ the Duron 850 and an SDRAM bank, and I tried to do some tests, after extracting the content from the BIOS chip, in short battery change and CPU change, I use a Duron 1000, although everything seems ok, the boot test did not work, this time it didn't really start!!!

In the past it happened that some PCs, pressing the PWR-ON, did not do anything, that is, the fans do not turn and the LEDs are all off, let's say the equivalent of not pressing the start button, here there is no doubt that it is that one that does not work, because there is not there, I use a screwdriver to connect the two PINs, on PCs with 81X series chipset, usually the battery change solves this problem, but it also happened to me that it was some defective electrolytic capacitors, to create this problem, then if I change them all and it does not work, evidently there is another problem somewhere.

Wanting this card is not essential, but it helps to solve the problems, which can be found in other motherboards, if for example the replacement of all the remaining electrolytic capacitors, solves the problem and starts, other boards with similar behavior, could have the same problem, that is, electrolytic capacitors do not visually bulge, but basically to be changed.

I changed MB, since the LS K7MKLE didn't show anything, I'll try with the MSI MS6309, strangely this one doesn't do anything either, and yesterday I suspected that MB wasn't the problem, so I change the power supply, I put a higher quality one, and the card starts, and it shows some post code, at this point I'll have to redo all the tests with the LS and Duron 850 or 1000.

But in that card you need an ATX power supply with 20 PINs, it is not possible to use one with 24 PIN, because there are some electrolytic capacitors on that side, which prevent the insertion of the 24 PIN connector.

The problem of the MSI MS6309, is that when it shows codes it stops (usually) on d1 d0, or just after 14 d1, this problem was already there when it was malfunctioning, doing a reset it stopped on d1 d0, I suspect that the problem was due to an incorrect BIOS, the VER:2 should have an SB with final letter B, mine instead despite being a VER:2 has an SB with final letter A, those with final letter A are usually in the VER:1, so I think you need the BIOS of the REV:1, while the current one should be right if the SB Had the final letter B.

I forgot to mention that on the MSI MS6309, I put a Celeron Mendocino 466 MHz CPU, I have several in my collection, they are quite robust CPUs, which also withstand some overclocks, you can't make it go to FSB 100, but surely at 75 it goes.

I had tried to put a Celeron 900 (Coppermine) CPU, but there was something strange, from the speaker you could hear a strange whistle, and it only does it with that CPU, in short I went back to 466 and the whistle disappeared!

So now I want to do a couple of tests, first reset the CMOS, and see what happens, then I change the video card with an ISA, and finally if nothing changes, I will change the BIOS, writing the one of the VER:1, instead of the VER:2.

Although I believe that the problem was initially created by a BIOS update, and that for some reason, it was not possible to put back what was originally installed, the problem of the different SB, seems an unimportant thing, but I think it is a big problem, because maybe it has functions that are not there, it is something that has already happened in the past, with a different SB VIA chip.

I don't know the reason or why, they made this MB with a previous SB, and why there is no warning on which BIOS to use, but if the problem is that, putting the one of the VER:1 I should solve it.

For the problems of the MSI MS6309 VER:2, checking my notes, the BIOS present in the chip, is the latest version of the VER:1 (A6309MS V1.9 110801), it can be found on "retroweb", along with other previous versions.

Unfortunately I wouldn't know on which PC it was installed, that motherboard seems to exist, in some slightly different versions, and it was used, on various PCs, like HP PB etc...

Perhaps it is possible that the original BIOS was a customized version, based on AMI, and that at some point, it was updated with this version of:1.

Or if it's right, it could be that they reset the CMOS (jumper 2-3), and turned on the motherboard, it was damaged, because I noticed that by closing the Reset PINs, it makes noise from the speaker, even if it seems to work.

Finally a comment on the electrolytic capacitors, they are original, but they do not bulge, this can be a problem, in the VRM area there are five 2700uF 6.3V of TAYEH, plus two other 1500 uF 10V, I'm starting to doubt them (and not only), at this point.

In the next few days I will have very little time, to test and try the MB, currently I have on the desk, the MS6309 that does not start, or rather tries to start, but most of the time it gets stuck on some post codes.

I tried to understand, if changing RAM or CPU, you could finally start, but nothing, so I decide to do some checks.

The first thing I did was measure the PINs of the Mosfets or regulators, present on the board near CPU RAM AGP and Battery, they are these here:

Q18 and Q13 (CPU) CEB6030L and 32N032L

Q5 (RAM) 603AL, Q23 (VGA) 603AL

VR5? (Battery) 1084 CE

All have three PINs, the first (1) on the left, the second (2) in the center, the third (3) on the right, this one looking from above and with the pins below.

The voltages found can be very important, to understand what problem there is:

Q18 (1) +0.20V (2) +3.25V (3) +0.07V

Q13 (1) +8.30V (2) +4.40V (3) +3.10V

Q5 (1) +0.02V (2) +3.29V (3) +3.30V

Q23 (1) +11.40V (2) +3.29V (3) +3.30V

VR5 (1) +4.80V (2) +3.35V (3) +0.00V

Carefully analyzing these values, there is something strange in the first two (Q18 and Q13), there should be the voltage of the VCORE, something around 2.0V (x Mendocino), while there are more than 3. XV, very high voltage, there are two things, either it has already fried the three Celeron CPUs, plus the P3-750 that was originally there, or the motherboard could overload the CPUs.

The reason for these values?

There can be many, the most likely is a failure in that circuit, or they could be the condensers gone, with very high ESR, we'll see in the future maybe I'll try to remove some, just to understand how the others could be, being now old, changing them badly for sure doesn't work.

I thought that the CPUs tested on the MS6309, could now be useless, given the voltage beyond 3V, but to see if they survived, I needed another Motherboard, one that in the past I tried all possible CPUs (even the VIA C3), and I did some overclocks, unfortunately I couldn't do the most interesting one, the Celeron 1200 at 1600 MHz, but apart from that, for the tests I should do, it's perfect

Before starting the tests, I start with the CPU and RAM that is present, a Celeron 1100 (Coppermine), and a 128 MB PC1XX bench, I have not put for the moment the IDE CF adapter, with CF memory card with DOS and Phil's bench.

I start to try some RAM, among those I find one of 256 MB, which I thought had a lower capacity, after trying some, I start to try the small cut, 16 32 and 64 MB, maybe 64 I'm not exactly small, but for some PCs with only one SDRAM slot, it could be the only way to have more RAM, as I try them, I start to discard those that don't work, but one observing it better, has a visible problem! I leave any possible comments to you, the RAM works!

At the end of the tests with RAM, I find a dozen or more RAM faulty, plus a couple of problems, one of these does not detect the right amount (128MB), but stops at a strange value just above 64 MB.

I switch to the CPUs, and both the Celeron 466 and the 900 work, fortunately they have not been overrun, and they are not the ones preventing the startup, I continue the tests with other CPUs that I have on the bench, and I find a broken P3-1000 (no post code), and a Celeron 1000 that starts but reports a problem with the RAM (non-existent), I put these two away, in these conditions they are useless and create problems that are not there.

Small update on the P6IWP-FE motherboard, I discovered on the "retroweb" that it was also produced by PCChips, it can be found here:

Https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/ ... 771lmr-2-0

To see how it goes, I tried with three different Celerons, Phil's benches, the CPUs I chose are these:

466 MHz (7X FSB66)

766 MHz (11.5X FSB66)

900 MHz (9X FSB100)

The results apart from a few bench, I think they are quite normal, considering the i810 chipset, with integrated video, which uses 1 MB of RAM, currently I have two SDRAMs of 16 MB each, in total 32 MB, for DOS it is more than fine, for Windows I would go to 64 MB or more.

The results are these, in order of CPU speed, so 466 766 and 900:

2) 148.5 | 159.5 | 197.1

3) 129.8 | 141.4 | 164.4

4) 35.1 | 37.8 | 51.4

5) 79.0 | 93.9 | 111.8

6) 29.5 | 35.3 | 45.2

A) 269.64 | 282.92 | 336.44

B) 62.45 | 64.95 | 81.90

C) 68.6 | 81.1 | 94.7

D) 28.4 | 32.6 | 38.3

The others I usually do, like e) give results equal to c), maybe it depends on the video RAM limited to only 1 MB, who knows if in the BIOS there is the possibility of increasing to 2 or 4 MB?

I also tried n) (Speedsys), and with the 900 it crashes, while with the 466 and 766, it gets 531.82 and 874.68.

The next test will be with the Celeron 1100, which was on this motherboard, I don't remember which one came with the motherboard, I think I remember it was a Celeron 566 MHz.