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re: Random Haswell BSOD Problems
Here is an update (copied from my post on the Microsoft Community Forum), enjoy
.
Good news and bad news on my end.
I ran memtest for 18hrs (8 passes) and found no errors. Did a checkdisk on my HDD and found no errors and no repairs needed. Ran SeaTools and passed everything successfully. Then I found it and my god I wished I hadn't. After hours of trying to figure out just what is wrong and how it happened I remembered reading something on another forum. I recently used LiveUpdate 5.0 (MSI's official update utility) to flash my BIOS to the newest available version. Although within windows it seemed to report a successful flash, after looking throughly through my BIOS it became clearly apparent that it was faulty. I was going to attempt to restore it back the first BIOS version that it came with, but that's when $h*t hit the fan. Before we get to that I'd like to give you some info on what happened before I figured out my BIOS is faulty and how it got to that point. I was unable to run memtest from a USB drive directly and I am use to formatting EVERYTHING I possibly can to flash-drive (eliminated my need to keep dvd's around), I was stumbled as to why it wouldn't work but thought nothing of it and just decided to format it to a CD and it ran fine. So after some time I decided to say forget the possibility of software issues and decide to just bite the bullet make a backup of my files and reinstall windows with some fresh drivers. I formatted my USB with my dvd's ISO using WInToFlash as I usually for a clean install from a flash drive. When I restarted I got the same result as the memtest flash-drive, it begins the POST process as usual then hangs at "A2" and then wouldn't go any further. If I would unplug I could pass through POST just fine. So I decided to inspect my BIOS settings and found something worse than just an incorrect setting, In the UEFI click bios if I wen't up to the devices area at the top right all my devices load as "??", not a good sign I thought. So I went to go check if there was something wrong in my advanced setting (unlikely as I was running Optimized Defaults other than having XMP enabled), then I noticed where all my options for categories are suppose to be all I could see was "[ ]". I was about to attempt to take some screen shot to upload when I thought I'd try a few more things. Restore the default BIOS ROM was my first thought. So I backed up the original BIOS ROM to my flash drive and wanted to use M-FLASH to attempt to restore it. To no avail when I loaded up into the BIOS and chose the ROM from the M-FLASH area the system would just freeze and lockup. So I thought I'd try the MSI HQ USB BIOS Flash Tool, just as with the other bootable flash drives it would freeze at "A2" during POST if I tried to start the system with a flash drive plugged in. So with my hope of just returning BIOS to normal via flash gone I chose yet another alternative. I wanted to see if I could fix it by doing a simple clear CMOS before taking any screen shots of the weirdness within my BIOS. So after clearing the CMOS with nothing but a PS/2 keyboard plugged (figured I may as well see if unplugging all other devices would help) and now the system hangs no matter what at "A2" even if everything else is unplugged. So what I learned is MSI has a trash update software that ultimately will brick or corrupt your BIOS even if it report that it flash just fine. This is the last time I will ever buy an MSI product seeing as the board is only 4-5 months old, I really don't want to wait for an RMA for a product that I really don't care for at this point. If anyone knows how to fix this awful board let me know, keep in mind anything involving a USB is probably not going to work.
Here is an update (copied from my post on the Microsoft Community Forum), enjoy
. Good news and bad news on my end.
I ran memtest for 18hrs (8 passes) and found no errors. Did a checkdisk on my HDD and found no errors and no repairs needed. Ran SeaTools and passed everything successfully. Then I found it and my god I wished I hadn't. After hours of trying to figure out just what is wrong and how it happened I remembered reading something on another forum. I recently used LiveUpdate 5.0 (MSI's official update utility) to flash my BIOS to the newest available version. Although within windows it seemed to report a successful flash, after looking throughly through my BIOS it became clearly apparent that it was faulty. I was going to attempt to restore it back the first BIOS version that it came with, but that's when $h*t hit the fan. Before we get to that I'd like to give you some info on what happened before I figured out my BIOS is faulty and how it got to that point. I was unable to run memtest from a USB drive directly and I am use to formatting EVERYTHING I possibly can to flash-drive (eliminated my need to keep dvd's around), I was stumbled as to why it wouldn't work but thought nothing of it and just decided to format it to a CD and it ran fine. So after some time I decided to say forget the possibility of software issues and decide to just bite the bullet make a backup of my files and reinstall windows with some fresh drivers. I formatted my USB with my dvd's ISO using WInToFlash as I usually for a clean install from a flash drive. When I restarted I got the same result as the memtest flash-drive, it begins the POST process as usual then hangs at "A2" and then wouldn't go any further. If I would unplug I could pass through POST just fine. So I decided to inspect my BIOS settings and found something worse than just an incorrect setting, In the UEFI click bios if I wen't up to the devices area at the top right all my devices load as "??", not a good sign I thought. So I went to go check if there was something wrong in my advanced setting (unlikely as I was running Optimized Defaults other than having XMP enabled), then I noticed where all my options for categories are suppose to be all I could see was "[ ]". I was about to attempt to take some screen shot to upload when I thought I'd try a few more things. Restore the default BIOS ROM was my first thought. So I backed up the original BIOS ROM to my flash drive and wanted to use M-FLASH to attempt to restore it. To no avail when I loaded up into the BIOS and chose the ROM from the M-FLASH area the system would just freeze and lockup. So I thought I'd try the MSI HQ USB BIOS Flash Tool, just as with the other bootable flash drives it would freeze at "A2" during POST if I tried to start the system with a flash drive plugged in. So with my hope of just returning BIOS to normal via flash gone I chose yet another alternative. I wanted to see if I could fix it by doing a simple clear CMOS before taking any screen shots of the weirdness within my BIOS. So after clearing the CMOS with nothing but a PS/2 keyboard plugged (figured I may as well see if unplugging all other devices would help) and now the system hangs no matter what at "A2" even if everything else is unplugged. So what I learned is MSI has a trash update software that ultimately will brick or corrupt your BIOS even if it report that it flash just fine. This is the last time I will ever buy an MSI product seeing as the board is only 4-5 months old, I really don't want to wait for an RMA for a product that I really don't care for at this point. If anyone knows how to fix this awful board let me know, keep in mind anything involving a USB is probably not going to work.
. Never again will I trust LiveUpdate 5 or any other in-windows software to update my BIOS, first time I trusted it being as it is an official software from my manufacture and I am not happy with the results.
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