Win98 -- Win98SE = No PCCard Detected

Question

I have an old Latitude CPi D300XT that came with Windows 98. To be able to use a 802.11g wireless PCCard I needed to upgrade to Win98SE. Checking around at the support site indicated i needed to update the BIOS from A03 to A12 (the latest), so I did that. BIOS setup defaults were restored, http://support.euro.dell.com/support/topics/topic.aspx/emea/shared/support/dsn/en/document?c=uk&l=en&s=gen&dn=FA1035267 though I changed the checks at boot time from Minimal to Thorough. I performed a Thorough scan of the HD. I installed Win98SE over the old Win98 installation, having first copied the CABS files to the HD, removed PCCards and USB devices. A memory error was found at bootup in one of the two 64MB chips, so memory size was set to 39MB. I swapped the modules and it went up to 103MB. Went into BIOS setup and checked everything was OK. Tried to buy a 128MB module as replacement for the so-so one, but EDO memory is hard to get by and expensive... Everything looked OK, but when I inserted a PCCard it wasn't detected :-( There's no tray icon. Opening 'PC Card (PCMCIA) Properties' in Control Panel shows both sockets as empty. It also shows 'Show control on taskbar' checked, 'Automatic selection' checked at Global Settings. Checking in Device Manager, at 'PCMCIA socket' shows two (one for each socket) 'Texas Instruments PCI-1131 CardBus Controller'. They are set to 'Exist in all HW profiles', to 'Use automatic settings' -> IRQ 11, and has 'No conflicts'. Since the CD drive doesn't read CD-RW disks, I needed to be able to access the net and local network. I installed an old Netgear MA-401 802.11b USB wireless adapter and it works. I downloaded the Dell Diagnostics diskettes and the different possible updates of video, touchpad and IDE drivers and available fixes. Windows Update'd all that seemed necessary, but nothing helped. I have tried several working cards, but none is detected. Searched more through support both on Dell and Windows sites, and these forums. Some similar occurrences could be found, but always with a cause that wasn't possible for me (like it had to be an upgrade to XP, one special PCCard had an error...) One thread was interesting, but I doubt the BIOS upgrade to A12 could be at fault? Surely many upgrades since A07 can't all have a problem, that would have been experienced by many owners? Here's the (locked) thread: ' A07 UPdate caused PCCard devices to not be detected After installing the A07 Update my PC Card Socket services appear to be working according to device manager but regardless of what PCCards I plug in (that I know work) they are not detected and the two slots show empty. I also cannot read any CDs I put in the CD-ROM Drive that was working just moments before doing this update. Got it! I reversed the update. In this particular example I created a CPIA_A05 Bios update disk. Boot with the disk and bypass Config.sys and Autoexec.bat (hold down left shift or F5 at Startup) Run CPIA_A05.exe You will be prompted to confirm replacement. All is well know with PC-Card Socket Devices and CD-ROM.' http://forums.us.dell.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=latit_upgrade&message.id=166&query.id=92366#M166 Any ideas?

tommypeters · Answer

No-one has any clue? Do you think another sub-forum would be better?

Locked Topics – Laptops General

Was this post helpful?