On Sat, Dec 27, 2008 at 9:53 PM, John R Pierce pierce@hogranch.com wrote:
Lanny Marcus wrote:
<snip>
the PSU in your Dimension 2400 (a celeron system with the i845gv chipset) may not work with a PCI-Express motherboard as they've changed hte PSU spec to require significantly more +12V than in older ATX designs. Also, Dell is fairly notorious for using PSUs that are just barely adequate for the system as originally configured.
John: Now that the holidays are over, I plan to take the box for the motherboard repairman to look at the motherboard and power supply. Hopefully, Monday or Tuesday.
I did discover that the fan (Exhaust?) for the CPU Shroud is dead. I have suspected a heating problem....
Today, I wanted to put in another hard drive, in case of a disaster when the box is in the shop. I now know why the Dell (Spanish language) manual does not show how to remove a hard drive in the Dimension 2400 series. Took off the bezel, expecting to find 2 or 3 screws holding the HD in place, as in our Compaq Evo and 3 other Dell Dimension boxes. No screws there. They must have some special method of installing hard drives in the factory and/or some special tool. It is going to go to the shop with my hard drive in it, instead of one that has nothing important on it. I did a backup today... I could see two (2) screws. One I could get to. The other one, they must have a special tool in the factory.... And, they never anticipated anyone replacing a hard drive in a Dell Dimension 2400 box? I'm sure it can be done, but not like in our other desktop boxes, where it's a snap.
I won the box in a raffle, which is like a gift from God, so I can't complain, but that's another reason (in addition to the USD$237 cost of a new motherboard delivered to our house) I probably will not buy another Dell.
Hoping he can figure out why the four (4) Diagnostic Lights on the motherboard are Yellow (the Capacitors I can see look OK, if that's a way to judge them...). If nothing else, the damage was probably caused by overheating.....
All of the other symptoms, some of which were major, went away, after I seated all the connectors, RAM, etc. :-)
If the Power Supply needs replacing, hopefully any Generic ATX PSU will be OK. As you wrote, they stopped using Proprietary connectors. That is a big "PLUS". :-)
I saw a Foxconn sticker on the motherboard, which surprised me. I think years ago, Dell put Intel OEM motherboards into Dimension boxes.
Thanks for your help on this! Lanny