Feature

2000 Approaches: Test your computer   (Y2K)

   If you've been paying attention, then you' ve probably heard a little about the havoc and chaos that will occur when the Year 2000 (a.k.a. 'Y2K') arrives. This is a serious problem for individuals, companies and governments, who rely on time and date sensitive software applications to conduct their affairs. Banks are worried silly (check any of your credit cards for expiry dates past 1999...you'll have few of them, if any!)

Will traffic lights work? How about utilities? Will your pay cheque get deposited on time (at all!)? Will your mortgage get paid on time (do you care)? Virtually anything that uses an RTC could potentially fail. What is an RTC and how or will it affect your PC?

RTC stands for Real Time Clock. It is a clock that resides in your hardware and affects time and date reliant software, such as billing, shipping, accounting and scheduling software. The RTC is running all the time, even when you computer is off.

Newer PCs have been designed to handle the date roll-over when Y2K arrives. Older PCs could run into some problems though. What will likely happen in older PCs, is that their clocks will reset to 1900 or 1980. For your peace of mind, here's how to check if you have a 'doomsday' system:

  1. Power on your PC and get to DOS.
  2. Type DATE and press ENTER.
  3. Change the current date to 12-31-1999 and press ENTER.
  4. Type TIME and press ENTER
  5. Change the current time to 11:59:00 PM (one minute before the roll-over) and press ENTER .
  6. Immediately, power off your computer. Wait approximately 2 minutes or at least enough time for the roll-over to occur (Happy New Year!).
  7. Power on your computer. Get to the DOS prompt and type DATE and press ENTER.
  8. If your current date now displays 01-01-2000 then your PC is year 2000 compatible. If the current date is 01-01-1980, 01-03-1980, 01-01-1900, or something else, then your PC is not year 2000 compatible (oh-oh!)
  9. Go back through steps 2, 3 and 4 to set the date and time back to current. Just substitute the current date and time when prompted.
If you've gone 'back to the future', don't worry! You have four courses of action. First, you can do nothing and pray (not recommended)! Second, you can buy a new computer (yikes!). And three, you can contact your OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) for a BIOS upgrade or patch (it's simpler than it sounds). This last option will cost around $100. Alternatively you can purchase a Y2K utility program for about 15 bucks, that will fix the problem.

If you want more information and solutions on the Year 2000 problem, check out the sites below. You should find everything you need to know.

Y2K RESOURCES

Intel
(Intel's very helpful site...and it should be!)

Leads to various links
(dozens of links here!)

University of Regina
(Article and resources from University of Regina's Computer Science experts. Also offers other 'tests' that can be performed)