My pc display clock at screen

[devonwoody]

My screen clock is losing around 6 minutes a month on its timing, not serious, but do I have a problem looming? (Time machine, OEM. athlon processer, XP)

 

[kityuser]

6 minutes a month is a massive loss !!!

I`ve worked with several RTC (real time clocks) both designing and using, is the pc overclocked?

I`d expect maybe a second or 2 a week.

is the pc left on?


it could be a virus corrupting the clock........


steve

 

[Steve Maskery]

DW

One cause of this can be the battery on the motherboard. This battery supplies power for things like the CMOS settings, which need to be stored even when the PC is switched off.

If you are lucky, the battery will be replaceable, like a big watch battery. Just lift it out and pop in a new one.

If you are unlucky, it will be soldered in place inside a housing, and you'll need an electronics engineer to sort it out for you. More likely it will mean a new motherboard (which usually means new processor, fan, memory , perhaps case - in fact, for that little battery, you may have to have a whole new machine )

Have a nice day.

Cheers
Steve

 

[wizer]

how old is the PC? Sometimes a faulty or dead bios/cmon battery can cause time loss. What version of windows do you have? in XP you can get it to synchronise the time over the internet.

 

[devonwoody]

Have a nice day.

Cheers
Steve


Nice reply Steeve

 

[devonwoody]

how old is the PC? Sometimes a faulty or dead bios/cmon battery can cause time loss. What version of windows do you have? in XP you can get it to synchronise the time over the internet.

Had a look XP home edition version 2002 service pack 1.

PC 2 years old.

 

[kityuser]

sorry, I assumed the MB battery would have been checked/changed already




its probably this (as other people have stated).

regards

steve

 

[Anonymous]

PC RTCs have always been notoriously bad - your exesive time loss is probably due to the motherboard battery as stated here.

Why not log into one of the online atomic clocks that update your Windows time automatically when online?

Do a search in google and you'll find loads of programs to do this

 

[devonwoody]

Thanks for info re pc clock.

I shall have to take the side off the PC and see what the battery connection situation is.

I came into the pc world around 6 years ago in the days of windows 98 and I remeber reading at that time that I had to have the cmos settings to hand if installing a new battery. Is this still necessary for XP and if so can anybody steer me through the setup. ( I have a time restore disk)

 

[Midnight]

Devon... a battery retro-fit couldn't be easier... honestly...
Most mother boards have a header close to the battery for just such a thing; a proper replacement has the appropriate connector to push onto the header. The last 2 I've fitted came c/w a velcro pad to stick the battery wherever it was convenient. This negated the need to de-solder the standard battery; as soon as there's voltage on the back up header, the original cell is bypassed....

 

[johnb]

If you go to Internet Time in Date and Time Properties in the Control Panel you can set the internal clock to synchronise the time with one of the internet time servers. This can be done automatically (it does it once a week) and you can also synchronise on the spot.

 

[devonwoody]

If you go to Internet Time in Date and Time Properties in the Control Panel you can set the internal clock to synchronise the time with one of the internet time servers. This can be done automatically (it does it once a week) and you can also synchronise on the spot.

Thank you johnb

That has been set but I note the next syncro. is the 6 th April at 12.31 so if I am not on the web at that time I assume I shall miss the update?

 

[johnb]

I don't know whether it retries if oyu aren't online - but I doubt it.

However, if you do a "synchronise now" it will set the next update to the same time of day - so you could do so at a time you are sure you will be online.

 

[devonwoody]

Thanks.

By the way

Note you message coming in to me is one hour earlier than our summertime.

 

[johnb]

devonwoody wrote:

Note you message coming in to me is one hour earlier than our summertime

It arrives the forum with the correct time.
Must be a quirk of your system or the notify mechanism (?) not recognising times of messages from other parts of the world (in my case, sunny France)?

 

[devonwoody]

devonwoody wrote:

Note you message coming in to me is one hour earlier than our summertime

It arrives the forum with the correct time.
Must be a quirk of your system or the notify mechanism (?) not recognising times of messages from other parts of the world (in my case, sunny France)?

my problem and now solved

 

[devonwoody]

My display screen clock lost another 6 minutes again this week, so I took the side off my PC and looked for the battery. It looks like the clip on type of battery, IS THAT SO? photo attached.

Next problem

I dont have a start up disk (windows XP home edition OEM) or a windows program disk.
If I remove the battery will power be lost to my start up (memory?) when I restart my computer from cold. ?

(Time computers will charge me £1 per minute if I go to their technical support line and they waste the first 20 minutes going through all the details etc. )

 

[DaveL]

Devon,

That is the battery, should be no problem in buying a new one. I would handle the new one with a cotton hanky so not to get thumb grease on the contact surfaces, just me being picky but the contacts are not carrying a very high current so a layer of grease can cause problems.

You should not need a startup disk. The things that might be lost are the COSMOS configuration settings. You get to the setup pages buy pressing a key as the machine does the POST (Power On Self Test). The key to press may be displayed as the starts, it can be Delete, Insert or one of the function keys. I suggest that you try to get to the setup pages before you change the battery and make notes of the settings in case there is anything that gets lost and you need to re-enter it.

 

[devonwoody]

Thanks Davel

I thought there was something like that (cosmos) problem in the background, I remember reading something around 4 years ago.