First up, the CMOS Battery was leaking. The battery was not dead as the machine retained its CMOS
Data and Clock, but these batteries MUST be replaced at the first sign of leakage.
On the rear of the mainboard locate and desolder the three joints shown.
I use a de-solder tool to remove most of the solder then heat the joints and ease the battery free.
With battery removed, use the de-solder tool to remove excess solder from the holes on the mainboard.
If any battery leakage has occurred, clean it as best you can.
Fit the new battery to the mainboard. I had to adjust the leg spacing to match the holes on the PCB.
Solder in place. take care not to overheat the joints and have to much heat soak into the battery.
Another view of the newly installed battery.
With the mainboard out I removed one of the two 8Mb Simm's and replaced it with a 64Mb FP module.
Just to give the machine a little more RAM. I will add another 64Mb later.
With the mainboard out, it's the time for that OS upgrade. So, out came RISC OS 3.5 and in 4.39
This is the minimum OS version any RISC OS machine should be running for later software compatability.
Mainboard re-fitted to the chassis.
Out came the original 420Mb Conner Hard Drive and it has been replaced by a MAXTOR 13.6GB 5400rpm drive.
Hard Drive fitted, cables for IDE and Floppy in place. i-Cubed network card fitted along with PSU.
The stock CUMANA (Panasonic interface) CD-ROM drive was replaced with a modern LG CD-RW drive.
This is in the first slice of the machine.
First Slice fitted to the base and cabling reconnected.
Second Slice fitted along with 4-slot backplane and processor.
Installation of RISC OS Six went smoothly by using the installer on the CD.
The machine is booting to RISC OS 6.06 Note that 6.06 is softloading, so RAM is now shown as 66MB.
This machine still only has 1MB VRAM and is still on a ARM 610 Processor.
Both these Items to be upgraded at a later stage.
RISC OS Six splash screen on bootup.
Here we are at the desktop. Running at 1024x768 and 256 colours. Due to only 1MB VRAM.
A reference shot of the newley upgraded machine up and running.