Checking mileage (hours) in BIOS

Newbie question: someone alluded to checking use hours in the Bios. How is that done? I want to find out if the cf29 I've got is Lolita or Whistler's Mother.

 

The hours in the BIOS started with the CF-29 1.6GHz model (MK4)... Prior models do not have it.

I don't see what the big deal is with the hours... If you change the hard drive and or DVD drive you've got all ne stuff. Who cares how many hours are on the processor? Think how many hours the old CF-27s & 28s have on them! They still work like a dream!

 

Ummm... Well, the CCFLs in the display have a finite number of hours in them, as well as do the electrolytic capacitors that are used EVERYWHERE...

mnem
Tempus fuggit.

 

Hmmm... Never thought about that... But then I am so used to swapping out parts.... As to the CCFL... Most of the hours on my Toughbook are with the monitor off as it just sits there on but with the monitor off... Waiting for me... Just wagging its tail.

As to the Electrolytic capacitors... I just dug this up... See if it makes sense to you...

Typical temperatures are 85C and 105C. Usually the life is 2000 or 3000 hrs at one of the above temperatures. The cap's life doubles for every 10C below that temperature. So for your cap, if the maximum temperature will only be 4C, then you can expect it will last 2^(4.5)*2000=32000 hrs≈5.1 years.
Typically, products are designed for about 5 years design life. So your cap would make it at 40C, but it would make it at say 45C.

End of life usually means the capacitance has dropped by 20% of its initial value.

One thing to remember is that the initial tolerance is usually 20%, so the initial capacitance could be only 0.8*Crated. At end of life, the capacitance will be 20% lower than that, so Ceol=0.8*0.8*Crated=0.64*Crated.
Products must be designed so that they still meet their specs at end of life, otherwise their life would end sooner. That means that your product has to work with a cap that is only 64% of its value.

 

I just checked mine. I got it brand new in 2006 (I think) and I've logged 12,350 hours on it. It's a 29N.

All I've had to change was the original HDD as it failed. I also added a backlit keyboard that I bought myself so I don't have to have my interior light on when I drive around and look for stolen cars by running plates.

1 year = 8,765.81 hours

 

TB -

LOL, yeah, well... we who fix this stuff knows that what is rated in the paper is very nearly NEVER what we experience in the real world. Most all of the computer equipment out there use DC-DC converters and switch-mode regulation of some sort; in fact, even INSIDE your Toughbook resides a number of high current switching regulator circuits. No matter what the capacitance values say they should be, the much more critical factor is the ESR of an electrolytic cap. This is something about 1 in 10 "professional" electronics tech even knows exists; it is a much more accurate representation of a capacitor's health and is nearly never tested for. Caps used in switch mode supplies get the crap kicked out of them by high ripple voltages; once upon a time we didn't HAVE capacitors that would take the punishment, so we had to design around it. But now we have mega-capacitors, so we design poor circuits with relative impunity. When I was a kid just getting into electronics, they said that in order to ceate a capacitor of 1F value, it would need to be the size of a house. Now we have that in a package the size of a bottle cap, and 20F in the trunk of our car.

Those design specifications represent a theoretical life under laboratory conditions where the cap is never abused; modern electronics DO abuse them. In fact, several industry studies are saying that 70-80% of failures in modern electronics are directly or indirectly caused by electrolytic capacitor failure; much of it due to high-ripple circuit designs used in EVERYTHING. They also suggest it is NO COINCIDENCE; capacitor selection & circuit design appear to be made specifically to produce a given product turnover rate.

As for the screen -

Yes YOU and I DO use the "green" setting on our computers to turn off the display when not in use; the people who may have owned our ToughBooks before us MAY NOT HAVE DONE.

mnem
EYEZ.

 

That brings up a good point. I remember 3 or 4 years ago having some SERIOUS troubleshooting issues 3 of 4 work PC's. After literally months of investigating, I finally stumbled across this http://www.badcaps.net/. And wouldn't you know it, when I looked closely at the caps in these troubled machines, they were almost all botulised (bubbled out). The symptons I was experiencing were similar to the thread here about the 72 year boot up, followed by normal ops. I wonder if he could have a cap issue as well?

 

Yeah, well - Google for "capacitor plague"... you'll be shocked by what you see. These guys are just the response, not the disease...

mnem
zhe shi shenme lan dongxi?

 

Well... Something else to be on the lookout for when diagnosing stuff... I'll have to look that up!

 

Oh ya. I knew after researching they weren't the cause. But they were the best place I found with what appeared to be the most information in one place, and screen shots of the bad caps to compare to.

 

Capacitors! I just had all the caps replaced on a couple of pieces of audio equipment from 1974. Some were bulging, but they were still functioning: those were the days when they built some things--like amps and blenders--to last. Thanks for all the info....

 

A few years back we replaced the motherboards on most of the Dull desktops we had at my base in the guard as they had the "bulging capacitors" and they were replaced under warranty. It wasn't all of them, just one or two specific capacitors on the board.

 

i hate bad caps-but they do keep me busy. and i agree the circuits are designed for a short "lifespan", oh just like this lcd monitor-turn off when not veiwing and turn the brightness down, it will run cooler and live longer.

mnementh i currently run 2F's in the trunk, oops it's a van now! i feel old, but i do wonder how much 20F's would hurt me? HEHE!

 

Hey dwagon, I know nothing about electronics or caps or usage meter in my TB but.... you never fail with funny captions! Urm... so what's up with this "lan dongxi"?

 

It's a quote from Firefly - one of the conceits of the show is that the common "second language" would become pinyan Chinese. Allegedly translates to "What is this cr@p?" or "What is this garbage?" depending on whom one asks.

 

Either way you look at it, the translation is correct. I was just thinking you had too much Chinese rice wine over dinner!

 

Too much rice wine?!? Wo de ma he ta de fong kung de wai sheng dou! is that POSSIBLE?!?

mnem
"Everybody dies, Tracey. Someone's carryin' a bullet for you right now, doesn't even know it. The trick is, die of old age before it finds you."