Asus eeepc boots normally only if bios settings are reset

[hamid1]

So, I now have this Asus eeepc 701 laptop with original Xandros Linux OS. I don't know anything about its history

Problem is that it seems to work properly only if bios settings are not saved:

1) If I disconnect all power sources (incl. bios battery) the settings are obviously reset to default values. Bios will complain about this and if I press F2 it will use default values and boot into OS and work fine (atleast the time I have tested so far)

2) After shutdown if I keep power sources plugged in (the machine saves settings from first boot) and try to boot again graphics will be corrupted and the machine will eventually lock up when the OS loads to desktop. Remove all power sources and repeat step 1., everything is fine.

One theory is that the bios has been modded and it contains some overlocking, altough I would assume cpu would be overclocked even with default bios settings? I don't know if I dare to try bios flashing. Could bios chip be damaged?

Any suggestions?

 

[VirtualLarry]

I would try different RAM. Reason being, is that when you clear the CMOS, the BIOS runs the RAM in basically a "failsafe" mode, until it can get the timings configured / detected, which it then saves in CMOS.