4 ms·

> Log virtual POST codes to a text file for a physical motherboard I'm troubleshooting to see where it's hanging up That sounds awesome but my brain can't foll

> Log virtual POST codes to a text file for a physical motherboard I'm troubleshooting to see where it's hanging up That sounds awesome but my brain can't follow today. What did the setup look like here? My brain's looking at a test motherboard, then at 86Box (which would presumably run on your main system), and I can't figure out how to connect the dots.

accrual 2y ago
Definitely! I've been meaning to write a post about it. I had a 486 motherboard that would hang somewhere during POST. I have a POST card that displays the current code from the ISA bus, but even with my phone camera in slow-mo mode, I wasn't able to capture the full list of codes - the value on the bus changed faster than what the POST card could output. I turned to 86Box and found a very similar 486 board with the same chipset. There's an option to install a virtual POST card and show the codes in the application's status bar, but this also went by too fast for me to see what was going on. So I downloaded the source, found the file for the POST card, and edited it to write the codes to the console as well. Then I fired up the virtual board again and produced a complete log of the POST codes during a cold start. Together with the complete list from 86Box plus the codes from the real board, I found it was completing many steps but hanging on "chipset initialization". I still have some work to fix it, but it at least gave me some insight I wouldn't have otherwise had. :)
- exikyut 2y ago
  That is crazy and awesome that the virtual POST card (brandnewsentence) modeled the real environment so closely. Feels obvious that it would line up - once proven, haha. I would have been yelling at an Arduino (and possibly a shift register) wired to the 7-segment LEDs... (I don't do hardware :D but I would've been convinced it was necessary)

accrual 2y ago

Definitely! I've been meaning to write a post about it. I had a 486 motherboard that would hang somewhere during POST. I have a POST card that displays the current code from the ISA bus, but even with my phone camera in slow-mo mode, I wasn't able to capture the full list of codes - the value on the bus changed faster than what the POST card could output. I turned to 86Box and found a very similar 486 board with the same chipset. There's an option to install a virtual POST card and show the codes in the application's status bar, but this also went by too fast for me to see what was going on. So I downloaded the source, found the file for the POST card, and edited it to write the codes to the console as well. Then I fired up the virtual board again and produced a complete log of the POST codes during a cold start. Together with the complete list from 86Box plus the codes from the real board, I found it was completing many steps but hanging on "chipset initialization". I still have some work to fix it, but it at least gave me some insight I wouldn't have otherwise had. :)

exikyut 2y ago
That is crazy and awesome that the virtual POST card (brandnewsentence) modeled the real environment so closely. Feels obvious that it would line up - once proven, haha. I would have been yelling at an Arduino (and possibly a shift register) wired to the 7-segment LEDs... (I don't do hardware :D but I would've been convinced it was necessary)