Emachine t1855 problem.

hello all Ive been visiting these forums for a long time. But have most always found the answer`s to my questions until now. I am working on a e machine t1855 for a friend. Ya I know totally out of date piece of junk but its all he has at the moment. And he recently had ram fail on him,so he bought 2 new Kingston 256 mb sticks of ram. Capacity: 256MB
# Chip Configuration: 32M x 64
# Type:168 pin SDRAM ----- NON-ECC--- 16 chips - Industry Standard
# Speed: PC133 133MHz

And previously it had 2 256 mb ram chips in the machine. And it worked fine until one failed. And now we can not get the machine to boot in safe more or at all. It reads the ram in the bios,but will not boot with the new ram. we have tested the ram in another machine and the ram is fine. We have windows xp on the machine,and have recently cleared the cmos. But nothing we have done this far has worked. Any advice would be greatly appreciated....

 

You said it previously had 2 x 256mb memory sticks, and that only one of the two has died. Have you tried to boot up with the other stick? And what exactly is happening when you try to boot? Do you get any error messages? Does it just lock up? Does it reboot? If you can provide some details, we may be able to help.....

 

I have been able to get it to boot into xp normaly with one of the new sticks (256 mb Kingston) and one stick of 128 mb. But when I put both stick of new Kingston in it,it wont boot into safe mode nor will it boot into anything. It just keeps comeing back to the screen. last known good configuration,safe mode ect. And I get no error messages it just wont boot. I went into the bios and the 512 shows that its there. But I cannot get it to boot up unless I use one of the new sticks and a 128 stick i had laying around.

I hope this helps, im not sure of the bios version. But as far as i know it has not been updated. Thanx for the reply.

 

According to Crucial
http://www.crucial.com/store/listparts.aspx?model=T1855
the maximum memory the computer can handle is 256MB. Since that is the case, I don't think you will get it to boot with 512MB installed.

 

Ya I have also checked crucial,but it had 512 ram in it. http://www.ec.kingston.com/ecom/configurator_new/modelsinfo.asp?SysID=13045&mfr=eMachines&model=eMachines+T1855&root=us&LinkBack=&Sys=13045-eMachines-eMachines+T1855&distributor=0&submit1=Search

And it has previously had 512 in it, but now it has come up with for the 1st time acpi driver needed.

 

Two things, Before you do another thing order a new powersupply for that machine if it is the original. I'd hate to give you good advise and then have you smoke the board, hard drive or both. I have a nice little parade of E-machines that take themselves out and I've traced it back to the power supply failing.
Now second, If you try each stick of ram that you just bought and each one fires the machine up individually, try a Bios update to get the mobo to support the increased ram. Also try blowing out Slot B with compressed air, I've run into problems where dust has caused the ram to be identified incorrectly.

 

Thank you for your reply. The e-machine t1855 will fire up with 1 256 stick and one 128 stick. But for some odd reason it will not fire up with only one stick of anything in just one bank. And yes I totally agree power supply could very well be the source of his problems? But at this point he doesn't want to spend the $ on a new power supply unfortunately. Until we have exhausted all other possibilities. And the pc will boot with 384 mb of ram in it,but will not boot with 512. Contacted Kingston and they said although the ram is new its outdated for his machine. Send it to them and they would upgrade it for a small fee. Does that make any sense? And if the power supply were failing,would it boot 384 mb of ram but not 512? The 512 reads in the bios but does not boot,and unfortunately I have yet to find a update for the bios on his machine.

 

No the power supply is a seperate issue. Just an observation and not at all important to the problem at hand. So you can't start the system with one stick of anything? in either slot? you should be using the slot closest to the processor, and the machine should boot on a single dimm. PC133 is out dated for everything, but I've never heard of one stick is outdated vs another. in the future I would go with crucial but for right now, try blowing out all of the slots with compressed air and putting one of the original sticks in the closest slot to the processor and let me know what happens.

 

The power supply died will re-post when new one comes in. Thx all

 

I tried to tell you. Please get back to me if the hard drive or mobo is cooked when you reinstall the PSU. It's very common.


***ANY ONE READING THIS POST WITH AN E-MACHINE T SERIES. CHANGE YOUR PSU NOW, DON'T WAIT UNTIL YOU HAVE A PROBLEM*** Once you do that they seem to run forever. I buy these dead ones up for 5.00 ea just for the XP sticker on the back so I can put XP on older laptops. The draw back is what to do with 20 funky looking CD-RW/DVD-Rom combo drives. So far I've cleaned the front off one and put it in my imac, I've put one in a computer that I didn't care what it looked like but I've still got a few more to deal with. The processors usually survive but the mobo always gets cooked, and the last bunch have been failed hard drives.

 

Will do as soon as he gets the new power supply ordered. He is buying a 300 watt vs. the stock 150 watt. Dont know if thats gonna help his problem,but I will post when the power supply is installed.

Thx to all for the advice

 

Sorry it has taken so long to get back to you. My Uncle just got new 250 watt power supply today,and e-machine booted up just fine. But he still has same problem with kingston ram. It only reads 256not the 512 he has in it . So i dunno he swears it had 512 in it,until one stick died. So he bought new kingston 2/256 and it has never read 512 sense.... Thx :confused

 

If it says the max is 256MB
http://www.crucial.com/store/listparts.aspx?model=T1855
why is he wasting money putting in RAM that the computer can not use?

 

Try looking for a bios update to fix the problem. I'm glad to hear it came back to life. It's still junk but hopefully it will be junk that works for a few more years.

 

I totally agree its junk, my 11 year olds pc is way better lmao. But its just something he picked up free and wanted to learn on.

Corsair says 256 is max,but other information he has found says different. Just trying to help him live and learn. Thx for all the input and advice...