Solution 12003: Troubleshooting a TI-83 Plus and TI-84 Plus Family of Graphing Calculators that Displays Garbage Collecting... for More Than 20 Minutes.
What can be done if a TI-83 Plus and TI-84 Plus family of graphing calculators displays Garbage Collecting... for more than 20 minutes?
The garbage collection allows the cleanup of unused archive memory. It deletes unarchived variables from the user data archive and it rearranges the remaining variables into consecutive blocks. When a variable is unarchived, the Archive free memory amount increases immediately, but the space is not actually available until after the next garbage collection.
If garbage collecting is more than 20 minutes, the calculator has possibly locked up and will need to be reset.
The reset procedure will delete all the items that are in the memory of the graphing calculator.
Use the reset procedure below:
1) Remove 1 AAA battery.
2) Press and hold down the [DEL] key.
3)
While holding down the [DEL] key, replace the AAA battery, and press the [ON]
Key.
The message Waiting... Please install calculator software
should appear. At this point, it will be necessary to reinstall the calculator's operating system using the method for your calculator below:
TI-84 Plus Family of Graphing Calculators:
1) Reinstall using TI-Connect CE.
TI-83 Plus Family of Graphing Calculators:
1) Reinstall using TI-Connect for Windows or TI-Connect for macOS.