cmos battery

[risen]

I have a system that worked fine for years and then all of a sudden will not start. There are no beeps. It simply starts for a second and then shuts off. I have norrowed it down to the motherboard, cpu or memory.

My question is: could a dead cmos battery be the cause. Or in other words would a dead battery cause it to not start or would it simply cause settings to not be saved (clock, etc.) Thanks.

 

[robtk3]

If I remember correctly, a dead CMOS battery will force you into the BIOS screen at every boot. Are you sure it's not the power supply?

 

[risen]

I have swapped out all other parts. Thanks for the information. I think the board is bad.

 

[Puffnstuff]

A dead cmos battery should not affect your ability to boot.

 

[robtk3]

I agree but after every cold boot you have to go through BIOS setup again.

 

[2kfire]

What Robtk3 said. I had a CMOS battery die on me (measured the voltage, it was like 2.4). The computer would restart, but the clock time would be way off, and every 2 or 3 restarts I'd have to go into the BIOS. So personally, I don't think it's the battery either.

 

[mlc]

makes sure the switch (115v/230v ??) on the back is correctly set.. otherwise you will experience similar symptoms....

otherwise it sounds like a PSU problem or some type of short ... in which try booting with only the ram, cpu, and graphics card.. and disconnect all cd/dvd and hdd drives, etc..

i would also take the battery out and try resetting cmos anyway... and also try shorting the case switch across the pins to rule that out...