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NUC replacing CMOS battery

SM4
Novice
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I know this is not the perfect forum match but I am desperate.

NUC D54250WYKH : Cant remove motherboard to replace CMOS battery.

The audio jack sticks out past the frame/body preventing motherboard from being lowered out of the box. Have not found any information on web in 2 weeks of searching.

Seems the jack must be removable because somehow it was assembled.

I know its an old system but it has served me well over 10 years. It is still my main system.

Any help would be appreciated. Next step might have to be removing part of the box.

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n_scott_pearson
Super User
9,706 Views

There is a video that walks you through this process: Intel NUC D54250WYK - Motherboard and cooler removal.

...S

View solution in original post

14 Replies
n_scott_pearson
Super User
9,707 Views

There is a video that walks you through this process: Intel NUC D54250WYK - Motherboard and cooler removal.

...S

SM4
Novice
9,654 Views

Thanks * 1e6.

I thought this would be too old to get anyone's attention.

Unfortunately the D54250WYKH seems to be sufficiently different to the D54250WYK (no H) that the procedure in the video does not work. There also seem to be differences in the layout of the internals.

FYI the enclosed pdf shows the problem. I am contemplating removing the "prongs" on the audio socket. Their function is not obvious unless they just prevent the audio jack from sticking in too far.

Thanks

S

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n_scott_pearson
Super User
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No, the motherboards used in the WYK and WYKH are the exact same. The only difference, implied by the addition of the 'H', is that this is the tall chassis with 2.5" SATA drive bay and, consequently, there are differences in things like the conductive foam pads added. I use a small slot screwdriver and (gently!) pry out the chassis wall until the connector will pass by. I have transferred motherboards from one chassis type to the other on multiple occasions (I was part of the design team).

As for what's in the video, I do not know the pedigree of the system that they had, but it could have been a pre-production or engineering sample system and thus there could be slight differences. It is also possible that they came from different factory runs and thus could have had 'cost reduction'-type changes made to them.

...S

SM4
Novice
9,624 Views

You have made my day.

I put together a NUC D34010WYKH some 10 years ago, it has run flawlessly, it is my main machine to this day. I use it daily for everything, spreadsheets, photo editing, programming etc. Works great with two large landscape monitors.

3 years ago I bought a used D54250WYKH "as a spare" just in case.

A couple of weeks ago the D34010WYKH started to boot up with the wrong date. I suspected the CMOS battery. And one day I got the "CMOS msg" that battery might be bad.

On the Intel website I learned that the typical life of the battery was 3 years maybe a bit longer under some conditions. So I did really well.

Because I did not want to mess up the D34010WYKH , I decided to practice on the D54250WYKH because that was at least 5 years old.

Incidentally, I had a hard time finding a battery because on the Intel website the spec was a CR2023 with Molex connector which had a suffix. JAMECO has a CR2032 with Molex but with a different suffix. I reached out to Molex and the said they only have one CR2032 with Molex connector and they do not put a suffix on it.

So I until I open either NUC, I will not know if the JAMECO batteries I bought will fit. The web had many stories of batteries that did not fit.

Thanks again. I gave you a Kudos.

S

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SM4
Novice
9,155 Views

While I much appreciated the above detailed response, I have been unable to access the CMOS battery on any of my NUCs: one a D54250WYKH and the other a D34010WYKH. The above responses suggested that there were many engineering variations in the NUCs and a suggestion that the side of the box could be bent to remove the board with the CMOS battery. Unfortunately there is absolutely no possibility of bending either of my box walls to give the audio interface any clearance. Indeed it is a mystery to me how these could be assembled.

So for now I give up and when I boot up I just have to set the system time manually.

I will try to buy a 3rd NUC so I can literally tear it to pieces to try to figure this out. I am on the verge of using my Dremel to just cut the box but fear of filings getting in the electronics has so far stopped me.

Why am I so hung up and not just tossed it away? Well I have spent 10 years using it and have it setup with a lot of customized software. 10 years is about 3 or 4x longer than Intel predicted for the battery so I guess I cant complain.

Also I really do not want to be beaten by this.

SM4

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SM4
Novice
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Correction to above.

I rewatched the video that Scott Pearson suggested right at the beginning. 

This time when I did the suggested, pry under ethernet port, the motherboard popped out so fast I did not see how it happened.

(I think previously I had not removed the audio connector plastic cover).

So finally I got to see the CMOS battery.

But no good deed goes unpunished.

1) When I looked inside the case there are two copper strips taped down with clear tape, on opposite sides of the chassis bottom. One has a black wire, the other a grey wire. They meet on one side of the chassis, taped together with black tape, and end in gold connectors, each completely encased in a short clear plastic tubing.

I cannot find any connectors or pins that they might have come off. And I cannot find on the web any explanation of what they might be for.

2) The old CMOS battery and the new CMAS battery have the black and red leads interchanged. Found one video on the web that referred to this issue.  The solution was to swap the leads on the new battery and accept INTEL's design, for whatever reason.

So thanks again to Scott for actually showing me the solution to removing the motherboard. Anyone know what the copper strips are for?

 

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n_scott_pearson
Super User
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Regarding your issues/questions,

  1. Those black and grey wires are the internal antennas for a Wireless solution. Those (electrically isolated) copper strips are the head ends of these internal antennas. You connect these wires to the Wireless card, which you would add via the PCIe Half Mini Wireless (HMW, a.k.a. M.1) connector on the motherboard. I am surprised that neither of your NUCs came with a Wireless card installed.
  2. Yea, Intel's NUCs went one way and Dell went the other. Considering that NUC sales volumes were insignificant in comparison with that of Dell, Dell's version of the connector has become the more-prevalent in the marketplace. No worries, just swap the pins in the connector shell and you are good to go.

My Wife's PC is (also) a D54250WYKH NUC and I can guarantee that it's been running longer than yours. It's never had any problems at all. It does everything that she needs, as fast as she needs, and she won't let me replace it, despite the fact that I have many (*way* too many) newer, more advanced models that she could choose from.

...S

SM4
Novice
7,681 Views

Scott, After much trying with both my NUCs to replace the batteries, I believe I have failed. Every few days, not every day, I get the message on boot with both that the time/date is wrong. The batteries were new, I checked as well as I could that the battery leads were correctly connected. I do not know what else I can do.

1) I do no more, just set the CMOS time and date when necessary. Can I do this "forever" or will this make something else go bad?

2) The problem was not the battery but something else. The "CMOS": can that go bad? What would the fix be if there is one?

3) It could be bad battery initially which caused something else to go bad.

Frankly I am surprised that both NUCs (win10 and win7) are now showing the same problem. Initially it was only the one but now both. I want to keep using my Win7 machine, with all my 20 years of software. I do not need that one to ever connect to the web. I am now afraid that my hoped for strategy to keep going, NUC+win7, will not work because if I buy a replacement same model NUC it will necessarily be many years old and I will at the least be facing a battery change.

Thanks

 

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n_scott_pearson
Super User
7,672 Views

Ok, let's start at the beginning...

If there is an issue where the battery is not providing backup power and no other power is available (i.e., power supply is unplugged or disconnected from A/C), the first time you power on after re-providing power, you are going to see the CMOS error. While power remains (i.e., you are still connected to the supply and A/C), any subsequent POSTs (i.e., reboot or shutdown-power on cycle) should NOT result in a CMOS error. If you are seeing a CMOS error on every POST, then there is definitely something physically going wrong with the NUC.

To answer your questions,

  1. Having a CMOS error is not the end of the world - and yes, you should be able to continue to use the machine (presuming nothing else wrong). Understand, however, that, when a CMOS error is detected, the system is going to boot in a conservative state (i.e., DDR3-based NUCs at 1333MHz, DDR4-based NUCs at 2133MHz, etc.). If this is ok then, by all means, continue. Note that Windows (Win10 for sure, I don't remember for Win7) can be configured to automatically set the clock for you, syncing from the Internet, if you do not set it yourself. However, by going into BIOS Setup and setting the clock, you are reinitializing the CMOS and clearing the error for the POST that runs when you exit BIOS Setup.
  2. I believe that the CMOS is encompassed within the chipset. This being the case, there is no replacing it.
  3. Possibly, but I doubt it. I know of no way for the battery to generate a surge like this.

Hope this helps,

...S

 

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SM4
Novice
7,180 Views

Thanks for the above detialed inputs.

FYI, I have been unable to fix the CMOS time/date error even with newly bought batteries.
But now a couple of new issues:
1) After the system has been shut down and the power supply has been turned off for a while, when the power is turned on, the nuc autostarts. I checked the CMOS power setting and "Restart after power failure" is off. This happens about 60% of the time now.
2) This is completely new. The USB keyboard is not recognized when the boot is complete. I discovered that unplugging the USB keboard lead and plugging it back in "solves" the problem.
Any thoughts appeciated. I am getting the feeling that my NUC is on the way out.
Thanks.
SM4

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SM4
Novice
7,165 Views

Regarding the "New isues (2) above":

I had a Seagate 8TB external USB pugged in at boot time. This disk has started taking many minutes to mount. It is possible that the "NUC USB system" was taking time with the keyboard because of this and therefore completely unrelated to my CMOS issues.

(Its possible my Seagate disk has also come to it end of life).

SM4

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n_scott_pearson
Super User
7,150 Views

Not wanting to sound like a broken record, but I would first verify whether the replacement battery connector is wired correctly. Compare against the original battery. The pins may need to be removed from the connector, swapped, and put back in.

Following that, I agree that there is the possibility of a failure in the USB subsystem. I have seen this before - and I think it was also with a 4th gen NUC.

Grasping at straws, one thing you could try is to reinstall the final BIOS using the jumper-based BIOS recovery process. Once this is complete, use F2 to go into BIOS Setup, set date and time, use F9 to reset the BIOS configuration and then F10 to save this configuration and exit. When POST starts again, use F2 to again enter BIOS Setup, set the configuration parameters you need to change and then F10 to save and exit.

Hope this helps,

...S

SM4
Novice
6,947 Views

You are definitely NOT a broken record. I have checked but my checks may be missing something. Also if there is more than one issue, what I see may vary with time.

One thing seems to have changed ddefinitley in the last couple of weeks is the AutoStart when power is tuned on. In my CMOS setting, that is definitely shown to be OFF.

Before I try to reinstall BIOS (something I have never done (or hoped to do)), I am in the process of acquiring a 3rd NUC to "play with". Despite all the boot problems on the current NUC, when the boot is finally clean, everything behaves normally.

Thanks for your inpurs, Very Much Appreciated.

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SM4
Novice
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An update on the situation with my NUC D54250WYKH.
Recap: On boot, the CMOS/BioS displayed an error saying date/time are wrong.
After much help I was able to dismantle the NUC and get at the CMOS/BioS battery.
A new battery, with the leads "reversed" as was necessary, was installed but that did not help.

After much trial and error, I was unable to determine what the reason for this problem.

Then I left my UPS on overnight with the NUC power supply plugged in. Next day the NUC booted without errors and the date/time was correct.

I was able to determine that if the UPS was turned off, then turned back on a few hours later, the date/time problem reappeared.

When I bought my UPS some 10 years ago, I asked the manufacturer "should I turn off the UPS when I am not using anything connected to it". The answer was "it does not matter, some do some don't". So for the last 10 years I have been turning it off when the NUC was not in use.

Now I am leaving it on all the time and am not seeing any boot errors. If there is an explanation, I am happy to learn.

Seems your previous suggestion is correct, that the battery is not providing power. (even though I thought it was  "new" and "correctly wired").

And the 8TB Seagate disk which started taking some 5 mins to boot up (after the NUC date/time problem appeared), has settled down and now "behaves". This may be totally unrelated to the NUC problems but again, I am always happy to learn.

Thanks Again

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