ENPC PS21 CMOS error - any ideas how to fix?

[SWEnginerd]

A friend has an AMD K6-2/500 system built with an ENPC PS21 motherboard.
About a week ago, it started giving the following error message:
"CMOS checksum error - defaults loaded"
This happened AFTER the memory check, HD and CD-ROM searching, and the
attempt to boot from the floppy drive.

I advised him to try changing the battery; he did, and the first time
he tried to reboot, he got that error followed by a second error:
"CMOS battery failed"

After rebooting a second time, he only got the second error.

In case it matters, the OS is Win98 (original, *NOT* SE), with a patch
applied to it to allow the OS to shut the machine down properly (the
patch was from Microsoft's website).

Does anyone know what might be wrong and/or how to fix it?

Advthanksance!

 

[AkumaBao]

Well, I'm not exactly sure on what the answer is to this, but I have so info that might help. The two times I've seen this happen is when you try to update your BIOS, and the Flash option in the BIOS is disabled. Plus when you reboot from flashing your BIOS. The first error "CMOS checksum error - loading defaults" means that the motherboard is updating your BIOS to work with your configuration. What it seems to be doing, if this is a reaccuring problem, is that the CMOS battery is not able to store your setting thus having to reload them on a cold boot every time. I would first start with replacing your battery which is the battery on the motherboard that looks like a watch battery. ( small circular ) Most likely that will fix it, but if it doesn't you might need to flash your BIOS. Most likely you won't have to do that though. The reason it is probably trying to load from your FDD is that the default settings are being loaded, and it expects a boot disk for the startup. Your OS would not be a variable in this problem at all. Just the motherboard. Hope that helps. 😛