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#1
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After flashing my BIOS to 1011, my MB is dead
I used the ASUSUpdate windows tool to update my A7V8X-X's BIOS and it failed
during Checksum verification after it flashed my BIOS. Now the computer is totally DEAD. I can't even boot to floppy to re-flash my BIOS. What can I do other than buy a new motherboard? Any help would be appreciated. Also, why doesn't the CrashFree BIOS kicking in? It's suppose to allow me to recover from BAD bios flashes. Thanx in advance. |
#2
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"Hello" wrote in message news:zGKKc.55717$Mr4.17026@pd7tw1no... I used the ASUSUpdate windows tool to update my A7V8X-X's BIOS and it failed during Checksum verification after it flashed my BIOS. Now the computer is totally DEAD. I can't even boot to floppy to re-flash my BIOS. What can I do other than buy a new motherboard? Any help would be appreciated. Also, why doesn't the CrashFree BIOS kicking in? It's suppose to allow me to recover from BAD bios flashes. Thanx in advance. You need to read about upgrading your bios.. If it fail'd checksum verification then that means you needed to reflash either the old bios or try the new one again (but I think you restarted your pc to just see if it would be okay) The CrashFree Bios doesnt just "kick in".. Go Read about it.. It's Just as easy to do but you need to read how to do it. |
#3
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In article zGKKc.55717$Mr4.17026@pd7tw1no, "Hello" wrote:
I used the ASUSUpdate windows tool to update my A7V8X-X's BIOS and it failed during Checksum verification after it flashed my BIOS. Now the computer is totally DEAD. I can't even boot to floppy to re-flash my BIOS. What can I do other than buy a new motherboard? Any help would be appreciated. Also, why doesn't the CrashFree BIOS kicking in? It's suppose to allow me to recover from BAD bios flashes. Thanx in advance. First of all, the flash isn't monolithic and made with just one piece of code in it. It stores a number of pieces of information, but I'll concentrate on the code portion. There are two chunks of code. One chunk is called the Boot Block, the other chunk is the Main BIOS Code. The Boot Block is the home of the Crashfree routine, plus enough code to boot from a floppy, but perhaps without the ability to drive an AGP video card. There are several flashing methods for flashing a BIOS chip, and all of them probably have some option to flash the Boot Block or the Main BIOS code. However, if you say "Yes" to updating the Boot Block, then if the Boot Block gets corrupted, then Crashfree won't work any more. So, Crashfree is only available if you are flashing the Main BIOS code (yes, this is stupid - Gigabyte fixes this with their Dual BIOS chip solution). In some of their updates, Asus gives special instructions for flashing the BIOS, and what the special instructions or special tool (wrapper script) are doing, is causing the Boot Block to get flashed. Any time Asus does this, they are removing your "Crashfree" safety net, for that one flash update. I presume in your case, that you attempted to update both, and the update failed. The safest way to flash, is by booting a DOS floppy, and using the version of DOS flasher provided on the Asus download site. When booted in DOS, there isn't going to be a lot of pesky multitasking going on, to upset the flash process, as there could be with a Windows flasher. A second consideration, is overclocking. If you are overclocking, you would be well advised to return to stock settings. The reason for this is, an overclocked board may be overclocking the LPC clock to the flash chip, and violating the timing on the flash chip could cause the flash process to fail. Before using any flash method, always visit the Asus download page for your motherboard. Frequently, there are various warnings, about certain versions of the BIOS, not being flashable with certain of the methods. You should always read the BIOS history link, or the "More" links next to the various BIOS releases, for these warnings. While I don't see any warnings for your board, you should check there for yourself. Finally, you don't have to RMA the board to get it running again. There are a number of providers of BIOS flash chips. You pull out the old one and install a new chip. The BIOS is usually socketed and removable (the exception being the odd OEM board that has the chip soldered to the motherboard, to save the small cost of the socket). You can visit www.badflash.com for example, and see what they charge. You can even contact Asus Tech Support (toll call) and ask them for a phone number of an Asus person in your country or area, who sells replacement chips. I think Asus sends the chip by mail, so the transit time could be quite long. One of the other services might use a courier to ship, reducing the wait and increasing the price. There are some other methods for flashing, such as "hot flashing", but this requires finding a board that uses a similar flash interface, removing that boards BIOS chip while the computer is running, then inserting the dead flash chip and reflashing it. There is some danger to this procedure (like if the LPC flash chip gets rotated in the socket and shorts to the wrong pins), and I don't recommend this for the average user. (Hell, I wouldn't do that myself!) Buying a replacement BIOS chip is more likely to yield a working motherboard and a reasonably cheap lesson about what flash tools are good and what ones are bad. If you feel particularly accident prone, buying a BIOS Savior (ioss.com.tw) is one way to guarantee this doesn't happen again. To use the BIOS Savior, you need at least one good BIOS image, and unless you live near a vendor like Eksit, who are willing to program the BIOS Savior before sending it to you, you will need the services of badflash.com and the purchase of the BIOS Savior as well. Before removing the current flash chip. make a diagram of the orientation of the chip. The chip will have a "dot" on it, and that may be lined up with a triangle marking on the socket. Make sure the dot on the replacement chip is aligned the same way. If the replacement flash chip doesn't come with a chip puller, a nimble person can pull the flash chip, using a pointed tool, like an awl. Be careful to lift the chip equally on all sides as it is extracted. Similarly, press equally on all sides when inserting the new chip. If the chip is inserted/extracted crooked, pins can get bent. You can also get a very nice tool from Radio Shack, for pulling PLCC chips, that should work as well. It costs $10. HTH, Paul |
#4
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"Paul" wrote in message ... In article zGKKc.55717$Mr4.17026@pd7tw1no, "Hello" wrote: I used the ASUSUpdate windows tool to update my A7V8X-X's BIOS and it failed during Checksum verification after it flashed my BIOS. Now the computer is totally DEAD. I can't even boot to floppy to re-flash my BIOS. What can I do other than buy a new motherboard? Any help would be appreciated. Also, why doesn't the CrashFree BIOS kicking in? It's suppose to allow me to recover from BAD bios flashes. Thanx in advance. First of all, the flash isn't monolithic and made with just one piece of code in it. It stores a number of pieces of information, but I'll concentrate on the code portion. There are two chunks of code. One chunk is called the Boot Block, the other chunk is the Main BIOS Code. The Boot Block is the home of the Crashfree routine, plus enough code to boot from a floppy, but perhaps without the ability to drive an AGP video card. There are several flashing methods for flashing a BIOS chip, and all of them probably have some option to flash the Boot Block or the Main BIOS code. However, if you say "Yes" to updating the Boot Block, then if the Boot Block gets corrupted, then Crashfree won't work any more. So, Crashfree is only available if you are flashing the Main BIOS code (yes, this is stupid - Gigabyte fixes this with their Dual BIOS chip solution). In some of their updates, Asus gives special instructions for flashing the BIOS, and what the special instructions or special tool (wrapper script) are doing, is causing the Boot Block to get flashed. Any time Asus does this, they are removing your "Crashfree" safety net, for that one flash update. I presume in your case, that you attempted to update both, and the update failed. The safest way to flash, is by booting a DOS floppy, and using the version of DOS flasher provided on the Asus download site. When booted in DOS, there isn't going to be a lot of pesky multitasking going on, to upset the flash process, as there could be with a Windows flasher. A second consideration, is overclocking. If you are overclocking, you would be well advised to return to stock settings. The reason for this is, an overclocked board may be overclocking the LPC clock to the flash chip, and violating the timing on the flash chip could cause the flash process to fail. Before using any flash method, always visit the Asus download page for your motherboard. Frequently, there are various warnings, about certain versions of the BIOS, not being flashable with certain of the methods. You should always read the BIOS history link, or the "More" links next to the various BIOS releases, for these warnings. While I don't see any warnings for your board, you should check there for yourself. Finally, you don't have to RMA the board to get it running again. There are a number of providers of BIOS flash chips. You pull out the old one and install a new chip. The BIOS is usually socketed and removable (the exception being the odd OEM board that has the chip soldered to the motherboard, to save the small cost of the socket). You can visit www.badflash.com for example, and see what they charge. You can even contact Asus Tech Support (toll call) and ask them for a phone number of an Asus person in your country or area, who sells replacement chips. I think Asus sends the chip by mail, so the transit time could be quite long. One of the other services might use a courier to ship, reducing the wait and increasing the price. There are some other methods for flashing, such as "hot flashing", but this requires finding a board that uses a similar flash interface, removing that boards BIOS chip while the computer is running, then inserting the dead flash chip and reflashing it. There is some danger to this procedure (like if the LPC flash chip gets rotated in the socket and shorts to the wrong pins), and I don't recommend this for the average user. (Hell, I wouldn't do that myself!) Buying a replacement BIOS chip is more likely to yield a working motherboard and a reasonably cheap lesson about what flash tools are good and what ones are bad. If you feel particularly accident prone, buying a BIOS Savior (ioss.com.tw) is one way to guarantee this doesn't happen again. To use the BIOS Savior, you need at least one good BIOS image, and unless you live near a vendor like Eksit, who are willing to program the BIOS Savior before sending it to you, you will need the services of badflash.com and the purchase of the BIOS Savior as well. Before removing the current flash chip. make a diagram of the orientation of the chip. The chip will have a "dot" on it, and that may be lined up with a triangle marking on the socket. Make sure the dot on the replacement chip is aligned the same way. If the replacement flash chip doesn't come with a chip puller, a nimble person can pull the flash chip, using a pointed tool, like an awl. Be careful to lift the chip equally on all sides as it is extracted. Similarly, press equally on all sides when inserting the new chip. If the chip is inserted/extracted crooked, pins can get bent. You can also get a very nice tool from Radio Shack, for pulling PLCC chips, that should work as well. It costs $10. HTH, Paul I was under the impression (as wrong as I might be) that the bootblock area for the crash free bios could only be updated via special triggers with the update utility (so morons wouldnt just write over it).. If this guy had read the instructions then he would know his flash attempt was faulty and he would have tried again. Being that I dont belive he read the instructions then I dont belive he would have overwritten the boot block.. Plus he doesnt like reading so he'll not read all that **** you said |
#5
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Fascinating read paul thanks!
"Paul" wrote in message ... In article zGKKc.55717$Mr4.17026@pd7tw1no, "Hello" wrote: I used the ASUSUpdate windows tool to update my A7V8X-X's BIOS and it failed during Checksum verification after it flashed my BIOS. Now the computer is totally DEAD. I can't even boot to floppy to re-flash my BIOS. What can I do other than buy a new motherboard? Any help would be appreciated. Also, why doesn't the CrashFree BIOS kicking in? It's suppose to allow me to recover from BAD bios flashes. Thanx in advance. First of all, the flash isn't monolithic and made with just one piece of code in it. It stores a number of pieces of information, but I'll concentrate on the code portion. There are two chunks of code. One chunk is called the Boot Block, the other chunk is the Main BIOS Code. The Boot Block is the home of the Crashfree routine, plus enough code to boot from a floppy, but perhaps without the ability to drive an AGP video card. There are several flashing methods for flashing a BIOS chip, and all of them probably have some option to flash the Boot Block or the Main BIOS code. However, if you say "Yes" to updating the Boot Block, then if the Boot Block gets corrupted, then Crashfree won't work any more. So, Crashfree is only available if you are flashing the Main BIOS code (yes, this is stupid - Gigabyte fixes this with their Dual BIOS chip solution). In some of their updates, Asus gives special instructions for flashing the BIOS, and what the special instructions or special tool (wrapper script) are doing, is causing the Boot Block to get flashed. Any time Asus does this, they are removing your "Crashfree" safety net, for that one flash update. I presume in your case, that you attempted to update both, and the update failed. The safest way to flash, is by booting a DOS floppy, and using the version of DOS flasher provided on the Asus download site. When booted in DOS, there isn't going to be a lot of pesky multitasking going on, to upset the flash process, as there could be with a Windows flasher. A second consideration, is overclocking. If you are overclocking, you would be well advised to return to stock settings. The reason for this is, an overclocked board may be overclocking the LPC clock to the flash chip, and violating the timing on the flash chip could cause the flash process to fail. Before using any flash method, always visit the Asus download page for your motherboard. Frequently, there are various warnings, about certain versions of the BIOS, not being flashable with certain of the methods. You should always read the BIOS history link, or the "More" links next to the various BIOS releases, for these warnings. While I don't see any warnings for your board, you should check there for yourself. Finally, you don't have to RMA the board to get it running again. There are a number of providers of BIOS flash chips. You pull out the old one and install a new chip. The BIOS is usually socketed and removable (the exception being the odd OEM board that has the chip soldered to the motherboard, to save the small cost of the socket). You can visit www.badflash.com for example, and see what they charge. You can even contact Asus Tech Support (toll call) and ask them for a phone number of an Asus person in your country or area, who sells replacement chips. I think Asus sends the chip by mail, so the transit time could be quite long. One of the other services might use a courier to ship, reducing the wait and increasing the price. There are some other methods for flashing, such as "hot flashing", but this requires finding a board that uses a similar flash interface, removing that boards BIOS chip while the computer is running, then inserting the dead flash chip and reflashing it. There is some danger to this procedure (like if the LPC flash chip gets rotated in the socket and shorts to the wrong pins), and I don't recommend this for the average user. (Hell, I wouldn't do that myself!) Buying a replacement BIOS chip is more likely to yield a working motherboard and a reasonably cheap lesson about what flash tools are good and what ones are bad. If you feel particularly accident prone, buying a BIOS Savior (ioss.com.tw) is one way to guarantee this doesn't happen again. To use the BIOS Savior, you need at least one good BIOS image, and unless you live near a vendor like Eksit, who are willing to program the BIOS Savior before sending it to you, you will need the services of badflash.com and the purchase of the BIOS Savior as well. Before removing the current flash chip. make a diagram of the orientation of the chip. The chip will have a "dot" on it, and that may be lined up with a triangle marking on the socket. Make sure the dot on the replacement chip is aligned the same way. If the replacement flash chip doesn't come with a chip puller, a nimble person can pull the flash chip, using a pointed tool, like an awl. Be careful to lift the chip equally on all sides as it is extracted. Similarly, press equally on all sides when inserting the new chip. If the chip is inserted/extracted crooked, pins can get bent. You can also get a very nice tool from Radio Shack, for pulling PLCC chips, that should work as well. It costs $10. HTH, Paul |
#6
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Flashing the BIOS is an iffy thing; as you unfortunately found out.
-- DaveW "Hello" wrote in message news:zGKKc.55717$Mr4.17026@pd7tw1no... I used the ASUSUpdate windows tool to update my A7V8X-X's BIOS and it failed during Checksum verification after it flashed my BIOS. Now the computer is totally DEAD. I can't even boot to floppy to re-flash my BIOS. What can I do other than buy a new motherboard? Any help would be appreciated. Also, why doesn't the CrashFree BIOS kicking in? It's suppose to allow me to recover from BAD bios flashes. Thanx in advance. |
#7
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wow...thanx Paul....that's alot of detaisl. Yes I know I shouldn't have
flashed it even though I've done the same thing many other times and had no problems. I used ASUSUpdae (in Windows) and there might have been a check mark that says to also flash the BOOT BLOCK but I didn't pay too much attention. Why have something that could kill your MB be the default setting? Atleast ASUS should have it unchecked and let the user decide. I'm hooped and I know it.....have to spend some $$ to take out the BIOS chip and get it flashed or buy a new MB. "Paul" wrote in message ... In article zGKKc.55717$Mr4.17026@pd7tw1no, "Hello" wrote: I used the ASUSUpdate windows tool to update my A7V8X-X's BIOS and it failed during Checksum verification after it flashed my BIOS. Now the computer is totally DEAD. I can't even boot to floppy to re-flash my BIOS. What can I do other than buy a new motherboard? Any help would be appreciated. Also, why doesn't the CrashFree BIOS kicking in? It's suppose to allow me to recover from BAD bios flashes. Thanx in advance. First of all, the flash isn't monolithic and made with just one piece of code in it. It stores a number of pieces of information, but I'll concentrate on the code portion. There are two chunks of code. One chunk is called the Boot Block, the other chunk is the Main BIOS Code. The Boot Block is the home of the Crashfree routine, plus enough code to boot from a floppy, but perhaps without the ability to drive an AGP video card. There are several flashing methods for flashing a BIOS chip, and all of them probably have some option to flash the Boot Block or the Main BIOS code. However, if you say "Yes" to updating the Boot Block, then if the Boot Block gets corrupted, then Crashfree won't work any more. So, Crashfree is only available if you are flashing the Main BIOS code (yes, this is stupid - Gigabyte fixes this with their Dual BIOS chip solution). In some of their updates, Asus gives special instructions for flashing the BIOS, and what the special instructions or special tool (wrapper script) are doing, is causing the Boot Block to get flashed. Any time Asus does this, they are removing your "Crashfree" safety net, for that one flash update. I presume in your case, that you attempted to update both, and the update failed. The safest way to flash, is by booting a DOS floppy, and using the version of DOS flasher provided on the Asus download site. When booted in DOS, there isn't going to be a lot of pesky multitasking going on, to upset the flash process, as there could be with a Windows flasher. A second consideration, is overclocking. If you are overclocking, you would be well advised to return to stock settings. The reason for this is, an overclocked board may be overclocking the LPC clock to the flash chip, and violating the timing on the flash chip could cause the flash process to fail. Before using any flash method, always visit the Asus download page for your motherboard. Frequently, there are various warnings, about certain versions of the BIOS, not being flashable with certain of the methods. You should always read the BIOS history link, or the "More" links next to the various BIOS releases, for these warnings. While I don't see any warnings for your board, you should check there for yourself. Finally, you don't have to RMA the board to get it running again. There are a number of providers of BIOS flash chips. You pull out the old one and install a new chip. The BIOS is usually socketed and removable (the exception being the odd OEM board that has the chip soldered to the motherboard, to save the small cost of the socket). You can visit www.badflash.com for example, and see what they charge. You can even contact Asus Tech Support (toll call) and ask them for a phone number of an Asus person in your country or area, who sells replacement chips. I think Asus sends the chip by mail, so the transit time could be quite long. One of the other services might use a courier to ship, reducing the wait and increasing the price. There are some other methods for flashing, such as "hot flashing", but this requires finding a board that uses a similar flash interface, removing that boards BIOS chip while the computer is running, then inserting the dead flash chip and reflashing it. There is some danger to this procedure (like if the LPC flash chip gets rotated in the socket and shorts to the wrong pins), and I don't recommend this for the average user. (Hell, I wouldn't do that myself!) Buying a replacement BIOS chip is more likely to yield a working motherboard and a reasonably cheap lesson about what flash tools are good and what ones are bad. If you feel particularly accident prone, buying a BIOS Savior (ioss.com.tw) is one way to guarantee this doesn't happen again. To use the BIOS Savior, you need at least one good BIOS image, and unless you live near a vendor like Eksit, who are willing to program the BIOS Savior before sending it to you, you will need the services of badflash.com and the purchase of the BIOS Savior as well. Before removing the current flash chip. make a diagram of the orientation of the chip. The chip will have a "dot" on it, and that may be lined up with a triangle marking on the socket. Make sure the dot on the replacement chip is aligned the same way. If the replacement flash chip doesn't come with a chip puller, a nimble person can pull the flash chip, using a pointed tool, like an awl. Be careful to lift the chip equally on all sides as it is extracted. Similarly, press equally on all sides when inserting the new chip. If the chip is inserted/extracted crooked, pins can get bent. You can also get a very nice tool from Radio Shack, for pulling PLCC chips, that should work as well. It costs $10. HTH, Paul |
#8
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NEVER flash a bios under Windows. Either do it under DOS, or do it from
the BIOS update feature built into the most recent BIOS'. But NEVER do it under Windows. Hello wrote: I used the ASUSUpdate windows tool to update my A7V8X-X's BIOS and it failed during Checksum verification after it flashed my BIOS. Now the computer is totally DEAD. I can't even boot to floppy to re-flash my BIOS. What can I do other than buy a new motherboard? Any help would be appreciated. Also, why doesn't the CrashFree BIOS kicking in? It's suppose to allow me to recover from BAD bios flashes. Thanx in advance. |
#9
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Asus will send you another Bios chip via Fedex for under $20, at least that
was cost for me a year or so back. lol "Barry Watzman" wrote in message ... NEVER flash a bios under Windows. Either do it under DOS, or do it from the BIOS update feature built into the most recent BIOS'. But NEVER do it under Windows. Hello wrote: I used the ASUSUpdate windows tool to update my A7V8X-X's BIOS and it failed during Checksum verification after it flashed my BIOS. Now the computer is totally DEAD. I can't even boot to floppy to re-flash my BIOS. What can I do other than buy a new motherboard? Any help would be appreciated. Also, why doesn't the CrashFree BIOS kicking in? It's suppose to allow me to recover from BAD bios flashes. Thanx in advance. |
#10
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"DaveW" wrote in message news:lzYKc.134839$Oq2.99457@attbi_s52... Flashing the BIOS is an iffy thing; as you unfortunately found out. -- DaveW It's only iffy if your doing it wrong or using someone elses bogus code.. |
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