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Vent: A customer's busted laptop taught me the '5 beeps' thing is not always RAM
Last Tuesday a guy dropped off a Dell at my bench in Tacoma with 5 beeps on boot, and I almost swapped the RAM sticks right away out of habit. Before I did, I pulled up the service manual PDF and it said those same 5 beeps can also point to the CMOS battery being dead on that model. I popped in a $4 coin cell and the thing posted fine, no RAM swap needed. I had been reading beep codes by memory for 10 years and never checked the manual for that board. Does anyone else keep a folder of service manuals for the exact models they see most, or am I the last one doing that?
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charles8361mo ago
Man, that same thing happens everywhere. I catch myself cooking the same 5 meals on autopilot until my wife points out the recipe card is right there and I've been doing it wrong for years. Muscle memory makes you skip the book even when the book is sitting on the counter.
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