Anyone ever had to replace a CMOS battery in a Pc?

[jon-nyc]

@axtremus said in Anyone ever had to replace a CMOS battery in a Pc?:

Last time I replaced a CMOS battery was for a Mac LC III, that’s probably in the mid- or late-1990s. I no longer remember how I did it.

As Mark points out, it’s trivial. It’s just a little button battery, CR2032 I think.

The hard part is getting to it.

[jon-nyc]

Thanks Copper!

[mark]

@copper said in Anyone ever had to replace a CMOS battery in a Pc?:

How to Open The Body Of Dell 2320 All In One Desktop:

Man! That looks painful.

[Klaus]

Sell it for a few dollars less and let the buyer replace the battery. Problem solved.

[George K]

@klaus said in Anyone ever had to replace a CMOS battery in a Pc?:

Sell it for a few dollars less and let the buyer replace the battery. Problem solved.

Would it start up without a good battery?

As a buyer, I would be skeptical of someone selling a computer, "Guaranteed to work after you put a new battery in it, but I can't show you that because I don't know how to replace the battery."

[Klaus]

Usually computers don't need the battery to start and run. The only effect of a flat battery is that time and maybe settings get lost when the power is removed.

[jon-nyc]

It is fine now as long as it stays plugged in.

When you boot it after having the power unplugged you get this godawful beeping and a big screen saying CMOS checksum error. I’ve discovered you can get by it by updating and saving the date.

But yeah, that would basically mean selling it for parts or maybe a little more. I’d just give it away locally and tell the taker what it needs, but the boy gets the money for the sale.

Also learning experience for the boy... (and I’m not just talking about all the new swear words he’ll learn as I struggle getting the cover off lol)

[jon-nyc]

Ok so the boy and I did it together.

Could have been worse. Had to remove the stand and the optical drive to get the back cover off. Which gave me this:

Taking off the mother board cover revealed it, top right of this photo.

[Loki]

Congrats. Great lesson on how to approach a tough situation and fix without breaking. Kids are generally tempted to go too fast, give up or lose interest.

[George K]

Well done.

I've done battery and SSD replacements in a couple of MacBook Airs. With a good instructional video from Other World Computing, it's pretty simple, though complicated (I used to tell my residents that heart surgery isn't necessarily hard, just complicated, don't confuse the two).

The hardest part is keeping track of the tiny screws and remembering, or noting, where each one goes.

As a matter of fact, I remember taking apart some "jellybean" iMacs and installing larger hard drives in those (It's that German pr0n, you know).