Clock losing time... battery problem?

[Binoculars]

My computer clock is losing about 10 minutes a day. From my early days of a 286 I seem to remember something about a CMOS battery? Do they still exist? Am I on the right track? If not, where should I be looking?

Celeron900, W98SE.

[Naples Air Center, Inc.]

Binoculars,

Yes, mobos still have batteries on them. Three causes of time loss are:
[list=1][*]Bad Clock Generator on the mobo
[*]Antivirus Program
[*]Virus or other Malware[/list=1]

Take Care,

Richard

[Binoculars]

Thanks Richard. Given my security measures I'm happy to eliminate the second and third, so what do I do about number 1?

Board: ASUSTeK Computer INC. TUSI-M REV 1.xx
Bus Clock: 100 megahertz
BIOS: Award Software, Inc. ASUS TUSI-M ACPI BIOS Revision 1011 10/15/2001

[Naples Air Center, Inc.]

Binoculars,

Do you lose time when you turn the computer off? (Do you leave power to the computer when you shut down?)

Do you lose time if you leave your computer turned on and running for a couple of days?

I would first try uninstalling your antivirus program and leaving the computer on for a couple of days. (Do not connect to the Internet.) Lets see if it still loses time.

Take Care,

Richard

[Binoculars]

Don't connect to the internet for a couple of days????



Good God man, do you know what you are saying?

The potential cure is FAR FAR worse than the disease, I'm afraid. Who needs a clock on a computer anyway?

I never switch my computer off, btw.

[HughMartin]

Your battery is probably soldered to your motherboard so unless you are confident with circuit board soldering, I would leave well alone.

I use a neat little program called "ClockWise" by RJ Software. It runs in the background and updates the computer clock to an atomic clock everytime I log on. It also has various other utilities like tracking how long you spend on the internet, alarm functions, calendar, sunset/sunrise/time zones etc.

I think Windows xp also has a clock update function somewhere.

[Naples Air Center, Inc.]

HughMartin,

Mobo Batteries are not soldered to the motherboard. Here is a picture of my Mobo:



You will notice the battery above PCI Slot #3.

Binoculars,

You can log on to the Internet if you like, I was just mentioning staying off the Net if you are afraid of logging on without your Antivirus Software installed. Since you leave your comp on 24/7 (as I do), the battery is not the problem. The battery only comes into play when you turn your computer off and removed the Power Cord from the Power Supply.

When you connect to the Internet, do you use a WinModem? (That can cause the clock to lose time too, since it pulls cycles from the CPU in order to run the Modem.)

Take Care,

Richard

[Binoculars]

No Richard, I have an ADSL modem.

Unless you know of any spyware issues concerning the program Hugh mentioned, I think I'll just give that a go. Sounds as though it should do the trick.

Cheers,

Binos

[Tonkatoy]

Real time clocks in PCs are notorious for their inability to keep time.

If you don't want to pay for the additional features of Clockwise, there is a small utility called Atomic Timesync from AnalogX that is freeware. All this does is keep your PC clock synced to internet time.

Ian

[Naples Air Center, Inc.]

Binoculars,

The Mobo clocks are very inaccurate as Ian mentioned, that was the primary reason M$ added the clock sync to WinXP.

If you are sure there is nothing wrong with your system software wise, I would just go with the AnalogX's Atomic Timesync. Mark Thompson does some really tight program coding that is some of the best you will ever find.



Take Care,

Richard

[The Nr Fairy]

And if you're running Windows XP, try this from a command prompt:

net time /setsntp:ntp.bluecoat.com

net start "Windows Time"

and see if that keeps your clock current.

[Binoculars]

Thank you all gentlemen. I took the advice on Atomic Clock some days ago and haven't had a problem since.

[Ausatco]

I know it's been said before, but isn't it amazing that you can buy a $10.00 Mickey Mouse watch at a toy shop and it will keep better time for as long as the battery lives than the clock in your $2000 computer.



AA