Here is a very interesting issue that I ran across this morning. The issue is interesting and the problem behind it is scandalous. When firing up your IBM 300 pl, and other IBM products, you may encounter an error that says something like “176 The system has been tampered with. Turn power to your system off and then on. Your system has now been locked.” The problem might be resolved by simply resetting the bios. You have to open up the computer for that one. …This might especially be true if you bought the computer used off of a corporate seller who instituted asset tag tracking. They may have set the asset tag in the bios. Resetting the bios will get rid of this error and the problem. It also could be caused by a loose RFID cable. Check all those things first. Or, the issue could be caused by bulging or leaking capacitors. And these leaking capacitors have to be replaced. The capacitors were bought from a company who messed up the capacitor production. But this company didn’t just screw the production up - they had stolen the plans from another company. Talk about a fiasco! You can read more about it here.
**Update: I just noticed that the above link has been changed.
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I also have the same problem. How do I reset the bios? Thx.
Administrator on
September 22, 2005
10:54 am
great question John. I had emailed Dennis the solution, but i will post it here for you and other readers. There are a three main ways to do this. 2 of them require that you open the box to access the motherboard. 1 of them can sometimes be found in the bios setup screens. To access this, look for on-display clues when u first boot. It is usually accessed by pressing the F2 key. The bios sometimes has a reset to defaults entry. Try that first. Now onto the harder ways. I believe that IBM posts a diagram layout of the jumpers on the motherboard. These are usually designated with a J2, J3, and so on naming convention. Jumpers are little black (sometimes white) rubber pin connectors. You are looking for the cmos reset jumper. If you can’t find that you can remove the cmos battery. Sometimes these are easy to remove, but sometimes they are a pain. They look like a watch battery. Remove it, wait a few seconds, and replace. if you run into problems, email me and i will work with you on it.
John on
October 1, 2005
10:41 am
I tried ALL of your suggestions and still couldn’t get the computer to boot. I eventually ended with performing a new install of Windows XP with the help of the XP setup disks. This wan’t a big deal since there wasn’t really anything worth saving on the hard drive yet. Thanks for your help anyway!
joemomn on
November 25, 2005
12:54 am
i got the msg 176 with a demand to enter admin password ,
when i just inserted my new soundcard.
Chijioke on
June 19, 2006
6:14 am
I manage a cafe with a lot of the IBM300PL computers and I have a similar problem but clearing the bois does not help. I noticed the a set of 3560UF capacitors(supposedly in Parallel) that are swollen but I can’t find 560UF capacitors in the local market. Is there another way around it?
david.s on
November 21, 2006
4:44 am
I have an IBM300PL which will not power on. Apparently due to the “Tamper Prevention” security. Happened after the box was turned off and the top cover was lifted off. Stupid thing will not power-on !!! Has happened twice now. The first time it happened. I just left it there for a about 3 weeks, came back and decided to turn it on, and what do you know ….It powered on ….
Patrick on
March 3, 2007
1:54 pm
Thanks for using my photo as well. Glad I could help that many ppl recovering their old servers for a few bucks
Patrick
Patrick on
March 3, 2007
2:00 pm
Reply on Chijioke’s post:
Those 3 caps are wired parallel to each other. That means they behave like 1 big cap of 3×560=1680uF.
Any combination that is close to this is acceptable, as long as the caps are suited for at least 25Volts (higher is good, lower is NOT OK)
We used 2 caps of 1000uF instead of 3 caps of 560.
Check out my post on the Java forum: http://forum.java.sun.com/thread.jspa?threadID=569551&start=0&tstart=0
R k Agarwal on
May 3, 2008
12:09 pm
One year back, I bought hundred of this IBM PL 300 systems, Now one after another this system is showing 176 error, how painful it is. Now I have done all permutation combination of batter,bios,cmos battery. Now what to do. capacitors is problem for me. PLease help I am losing customers.
How do you reset the bios?
I also have the same problem. How do I reset the bios? Thx.
great question John. I had emailed Dennis the solution, but i will post it here for you and other readers. There are a three main ways to do this. 2 of them require that you open the box to access the motherboard. 1 of them can sometimes be found in the bios setup screens. To access this, look for on-display clues when u first boot. It is usually accessed by pressing the F2 key. The bios sometimes has a reset to defaults entry. Try that first. Now onto the harder ways. I believe that IBM posts a diagram layout of the jumpers on the motherboard. These are usually designated with a J2, J3, and so on naming convention. Jumpers are little black (sometimes white) rubber pin connectors. You are looking for the cmos reset jumper. If you can’t find that you can remove the cmos battery. Sometimes these are easy to remove, but sometimes they are a pain. They look like a watch battery. Remove it, wait a few seconds, and replace. if you run into problems, email me and i will work with you on it.
I tried ALL of your suggestions and still couldn’t get the computer to boot. I eventually ended with performing a new install of Windows XP with the help of the XP setup disks. This wan’t a big deal since there wasn’t really anything worth saving on the hard drive yet. Thanks for your help anyway!
i got the msg 176 with a demand to enter admin password ,
when i just inserted my new soundcard.
I manage a cafe with a lot of the IBM300PL computers and I have a similar problem but clearing the bois does not help. I noticed the a set of 3560UF capacitors(supposedly in Parallel) that are swollen but I can’t find 560UF capacitors in the local market. Is there another way around it?
I have an IBM300PL which will not power on. Apparently due to the “Tamper Prevention” security. Happened after the box was turned off and the top cover was lifted off. Stupid thing will not power-on !!! Has happened twice now. The first time it happened. I just left it there for a about 3 weeks, came back and decided to turn it on, and what do you know ….It powered on ….
Thanks for using my photo as well. Glad I could help that many ppl recovering their old servers for a few bucks
Patrick
Reply on Chijioke’s post:
Those 3 caps are wired parallel to each other. That means they behave like 1 big cap of 3×560=1680uF.
Any combination that is close to this is acceptable, as long as the caps are suited for at least 25Volts (higher is good, lower is NOT OK)
We used 2 caps of 1000uF instead of 3 caps of 560.
Check out my post on the Java forum: http://forum.java.sun.com/thread.jspa?threadID=569551&start=0&tstart=0
One year back, I bought hundred of this IBM PL 300 systems, Now one after another this system is showing 176 error, how painful it is. Now I have done all permutation combination of batter,bios,cmos battery. Now what to do. capacitors is problem for me. PLease help I am losing customers.
R K