Probably stupid question, but

[Gene Heskett]

On Sunday 25 August 2013 07:03:32 Colin Law did opine:

> On 25 August 2013 03:48, Gene Heskett <gheskett at wdtv.com> wrote:
> > ...
> > This particular command you note above hung on the MSTTFonts config,
> > and nothing I could do would clear that EULA screen
> 
> You should have been able to tab to the OK option and hit enter.
>
Tab...  That may have been the only thing I didn't try, but poked around 
quite a bit.  It was as if the keyboard had been disabled at that point, 
usb keyboard & usb mouse.  I even (heavens forbid, he actually read the 
EULA) read the EULA to see if it mentioned how to accept it, but sadly no.
 
> > ...
> > 
> > While I think about it, whats the max memory a P4 can handle?  It has
> > 512 megs in it  now and I have 2Gb of the same speed DDR 400 memory
> > and its very unstable, won't live long enough to get memtest started.
> >  It was good memory that last time I checked it 2 years ago, been in
> > a static bag since.
> 
> I think you will find that 512MB is very tight, certainly with base
> Ubuntu, though perhaps Xubuntu is ok with less.  Though that should
> not stop you getting to memtest.  If you cannot reliably get the boot
> screen and memtest then you have a hardware problem.  Once a system is
> up and running then what appears as inconsistent operation can be due
> to timing or other such problems, but if you do not get consistent
> behaviour before even booting then there is a h/w issue.
> 
> Colin

With the A07 version of the bios, my 2Gb sticks would work about 10% of the 
powerups, with the A09 version of the bios flashed in, all I'm getting with 
the larger memory is a power led that has about a 20ms off stutter at 1 
second (approximately) intervals.  Someone mentioned that Dells were known 
to demand genuine Dell memory, but both have exactly the same socket 
keying, and both are labeled DDR 400.  And I don't putz with that stuff 
without grounding myself to the machine first, a side effect of having a 
CET certificate on the wall above me.  Its fairly stable with the original 
pair of 256meg sticks.  I left it running when I quit last night to see if 
it would crash overnight with just the 512M in it, but have not been out to 
check on it yet this morning.  Everything was jammed full of dust bunny's 
that it took me quite a while to clear out with the air hose so I expect 
there is a good probability some of the caps in it are about fried.  I'll 
take a closer look for fat cap tops later today. It claims to have a SATA 
connector too, but its MALE?  Might work, but I've never seen a SATA 
without the outer molding before.

Checking the PSU at a drive connectors, the 12 volts is about 11.7 and the 
5 volts is 5.11 so the psu seems to holding up well and thats another known 
Dell weak point.

And its xubuntu I installed & when I installed htop, it says its booted on 
127 megs of ram, so it does have a little wiggle room, emphasis on little.

Thanks Colin.
 
Cheers, Gene
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