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Optiplex 3080, CMOS battery, power light flashes white 1, amber 3 times
No video signal / general power response on Dell Optiplex 3080 Small Form Factor. Power button light was flashing once white and three times amber.
The top search results pointed at the PSU, motherboard, bad cables, etc... Except for...
I had to go to youtube to discover that the issue is:
This model does not boot if the CMOS BATTERY IS OLD.
Yes you read that correctly.
I have to know -- is this on purpose? That the computer won't boot up if the cmos battery is old? This seems like such a colossal step backward.
Why would they downgrade the behavior where the bios screen would APPEAR and simply warn you that the battery was old, then give you the option to go into bios or just boot normally?
Chino de Oro
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May 9th, 2024 08:36
Sorry to say this but you are totally incorrect. I see that your system worked as design. When your system did not boot, it did self diagnostic and alerted you of the error, issue.
The diagnostic code of 1 white 3 amber or in reverse order 3 amber 1 white was an indication of CMOS battery failure. See the last error code in screenshot of partial diagnostic light codes below.
When a coin cell battery failed or when AC power was disconnected for a long period of time, the BIOS lose its settings. It's nothing new, many experience users knew that when a CMOS battery failed, it caused all kind of bizarre issues.
In minor cases, if the system detected no hardware conflicted, it would just alerted users to correct date and time, then allowed users to move forward with boot. In serious cases, when BIOS settings became conflicted with hardware setup and/or the boot processes, it could not allow you to bypass the error and system failed at POST.
https://www.dell.com/support/manuals/en-us/optiplex-3080-sff/3080_sff_sm/system-diagnostic-lights?guid=guid-07853ede-4844-43b1-8f55-6d1a070dd898&lang=en-us
dgrrr
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May 13th, 2024 00:20
Thanks for confirming that this is the intended behavior. Which is worse than if it were a bug.
Chino de Oro
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May 13th, 2024 03:25
Glad to help out. I know it's difficult to accept it. But it's not shocking when you understand how thing works.
As mentioned, the computer did simply warned users that CMOS battery was depleted by provided the blink codes. Once the battery is replaced and BIOS settings are adjusted, business is back to usual. So, that was a good design.
The reason your computer could not boot because of the users setup was conflicted with the default settings. For other computers that used default settings, they would/could boot with CMOS battery error after a bypass selection.
For example, a Windows boot drive installed with AHCI storage driver can not boot with BIOS set to RAID mode and users can't bypass it.
dgrrr
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May 13th, 2024 09:52
Most PCs I've used would at least generate a video signal of a black screen with white text, saying "there is a problem with your cmos battery" -- and some even generated some type of GUI. By contrast, blinking lights seems like a blast from the past.
bradthetechnut
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May 14th, 2024 00:55
Bad batteries affect BIOS and therefore PC operation. While it can look like a big deal if the PC misbehaves, but replacing the battery is not a big deal. In your case, the PC did exactly what it's suppose and alerted you to the bad battery even if you didn't like that it did so via error code.
Last year, when I tried skipping last changing the battery for a while, Windows wouldn't boot. When I thought it needed a reload, it wouldn't do that either. I would've saved myself much trouble by simply replacing the battery when the refurb PC arrived.
(edited)