My mums computer is not working. At first It said something like, CMOS time and date not set. But would boot up if Esc was used. Now that I have put a new battery on the circuit board, it gets as far as saying Flopy A: Installed, then does nothing. It will let me get into set up (F1) but I don't know what to do when I am there. I did set the time and date though.
I don,t want to wipe what is in the machine. Any ideas?

There are settings you will like to adjust to speed up things a little:

standard cmos settings

hd settings manualy set to user type LBA mode (not autodetect)

1 quick POST - enabled
2 Boot sequence 1 -c (or hard drive) 2 - a (or floppy)
3 Floppy disc boot seek - disabled
4 any cash that you see - enabled (in some instances the choice can be (int/ext))

That should help you a little.

Thanks, I will have a look at it tonight, all I have done is put a new battery in the computer, it was low, I tested it. (0.65volts, instead of 3volts).
All I get on the screen is:

AMIBIOS (C) 1992 American Megatrends Inc
Bios Version 1.00.02.CJO
0024576KB
Please Wait...
Keyboard.....Detected
Mouse..........Detected
Hard Disk 0 Installed M1612TA
ATAPI Device Installed
Floppy A Installed


I do have a start up disk on floppy, but don't know where that takes me to!
I don't want to lose what is in the memory.
Mike.

Have no fear.
The instructions I gave you should get your booting faster.

Tip:
Do it step at the time, so you can keep track of changes you make in bios, just in case you make system not work. Specialy HD settings for they are only ones that can make your system not boot.

My, oh my..
I just realised that your system hangs at booting. (key word: hang)

Kind of reading lapsus.

Bad battery can mess up the custom bios settings (CMOS), so what you want to do is load system default settings and then apply those I've recommended.

Post the results.

you may also need to go to manual detect harddrive in the bios

Worst case scenario would be flashing your bios. Very risky procedure.