Re: CMOS Battery

[Herb Johnson <hjohnson@pluto.njcc.com>]

Tom, I work daily with a variety of old and new Pentiums. They all use
batteries to power their time-of-day clocks. The battery is sometimes
contained in a black rectangular epoxied or plastic part, which also
containes the clock. Dallas Semi makes some of these for instance. If you
can find the name of the company who made your motherboard/logic, you may
be able to find a Web site with a manual for the board - if you don't
otherwise have a manual. Even with the manual, you may or may not be able
to gind a replacment for this part. I don't know if the motherboard
manufacturers use a "standard" part or a "custom" part. LIkewise, the
name and model number on the battery-backed clock device might be found on
the manufacurer's Web site. In any case, these parts have a claimed shelf
life of a few years, although they last longer even in use.

Tom may know some of this information, but it will be of interest to all
TASS members who put together a machine for TASS camera use. It's also an
argument for using 486 systems for long term data collection,their
batteries are seperate and easily replacable or substituted with other
batteries. A clever person may be able to hack a battery onto a newer
motherboard, or it may have an external battery option jumper - Tom, if
you get the manual you may want to check for this.

Herb Johnson

Herbert R. Johnson              http://pluto.njcc.com/~hjohnson
hjohnson@pluto.njcc.com         voice 609-771-1503, New Jersey USA

             amateur astronomer and astro-tour guide
     classic S-100 computers restoration & parts as "Dr. S-100"
   rebuilder/reseller of classic Macs for your computing pleasure
          and senior engineer at Astro Imaging Systems

On Mon, 7 Aug 2000, Tom Droege wrote:

> Several people have suggested that I change the CMOS Battery.  Do computers 
> still have them?  Seems to me by now they would be using some sort of 
> electrical erasable memory for this job??  I don't see any battery in any 
> of my new computers.
> 
> Tom Droege
> 
> 
>