How to fix "dead" dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

[tonus]

Re: How to fix "dead" dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

It is possible to make the BIOS Auto-Recovery kick in (Dual BIOS) and re-flash the MAIN BIOS with the contents of the BACKUP BIOS.

This is a simple and easy method for anyone to try before having to resort to other more difficult methods, or a RMA.

1. Shut off the power supply using the switch on the back of the PSU, wait 10-15 seconds.
2. Press and hold the case Power On swtich, then while still holding turn on the power supply from the switch on the rear.
3. Still holding the case power on switch, the board will start, once it does release the case power on switch and shut off the power supply via the switch on the read of the unit. (Do the latter two parts as quickly as you can once the board starts)
4. The board will shut down.
5. Turn the power supply back on using the switch on the rear of the unit.
6. Turn on the motherboard by pressing the case power on button.

Once the board starts this time you should see the Gigabyte splash screen, or POST page, then the Auto-Recovery from Dual BIOS will kick in. You will see a checksum error, and then recovery from BACKUP BIOS will begin. Once it is done reboot your machine and enter the BIOS and load optimized defaults then save/apply/reboot back to BIOS.

Now you are done, and will be using whatever BIOS was in your BACKUP BIOS, From there you can attempt whatever you were previously trying, or update your BIOS to the latest version.

[arjana]

Re: BIOS flashing: A "How to fix dead dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed".

you're awesome... great job man!!
it's works on my mobo GA31m-sl2
many thanks

[knilch2000]

Re: How to fix "dead" dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

Just wanted to give a short feedback, I have a Gigabyte GA-EG45M-UD2H, on which I updated a wrong BIOS file. After that I had my MB rebooting every 5 seconds without anything showing up on screen.

I read through the first few posts and then went with tgun's variant from the opening post.

I took a paper clip, connected pins 4 and 7 with a steady hand ;) and had my wife plug in the computer and switch it on. And voila, the GigaByte logo showed up, so it worked like charm, and took me about 10 minutes, after searching the web for about 2 hours to come to this thread :)

So thanks guys and especially tgun for the info!

greetings, Knilch

[Lsdmeasap]

Re: How to fix "dead" dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

Awesome to hear you were able to save your board!!!

To anyone reading this, anytime later, please try your best not to bump this thread. For those who are happy about recovering that's cool, but hold back if you can

Be warned, if you don't hold your hand steady you can fry your board! I just borked my P67A-UD7!! I let my short slip from 4+7 to 4+8 = Magic smoke and toasted unbootable board, even with a proper short on reboot!!

So be warned, and be VERY careful when holding that short!

Took some images this morning of the damage, it's hard to see in most of them, but you can clearly see the trace break in the second image.

This is what happens if you short Vcc+Ground / 4+8, so be VERY Careful!!

http://imgur.com/a/Wq2I9

[adriasansa]

Re: How to fix "dead" dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

Hello everybody. This morning I updated my BIOS with a wrong file (I suppose It because althought the installation "succeded" my screen haven't output anything since I rebooted.), I readed a lot of the tips in this thread, the tip of the power suppy and the power button haven't worked, I also think I connected succesfully the pins 4 and 7, and the boot, and I also have been trying some time with the 5 and 6 mehtod. I am not sure if this two methods work with my BIOS because It's a 18 Bit. Sometimes using the 5 and 6 method I hear a beep, sometimes before I connected the pins but I haven't seen anything at the screen. I think the problem why I can't see anything might be that my processor is maybe unrecognized(I think I updated to an older BIOS) and the non-backup BIOS can't be accessed, and as a result of that no signal arrives to the backup BIOS. I would be very happy to have help. Thank you !

[profJim]

Re: How to fix "dead" dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

GIGABYTE TECHNOLOGY Socket AM3+ - AMD 870 - GA-870A-USB3 (rev. 3.1) says that you need the F5g bios or newer for any of the FX processors. If you flashed your board with an older bios you probably need to buy or borrow a cpu for flashing your board back to F5g. A local shop might be able to flash your motherboard, but I think that it will cost less for you to buy a low end cpu for flashing and then sell the cpu. There's no guarantee that this approach will work.

artdrivers is our resident AMD guru, send him a private message and include a link to your post in the PM.
Good luck!!

[adriasansa]

Re: How to fix "dead" dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

Thank you I supposed the problem was my CPU, but If I buy I new one for reflashing I think it would be hard to sell it... I will try to go to the shop where I bought the computer and ask if the guarantee involbes my problem.
Thank you for your time.

[profJim]

Re: How to fix "dead" dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

You're welcome.
There is always a market for good clean used computer parts.
Obviously you won't get all your money back, but it might be cheaper than having the shop flash it for you.
artdrivers might be able to help you, it won't hurt to ask him to look at your post.
Let us know how things work out.

[adriasansa]

Re: How to fix "dead" dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

Finally I lead the computer to the shop and told them the problem... They reflashed my bios for 25 e in 3 days. Thank you again :)

[tomxx]

Re: How to fix "dead" dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

Hi,
i have mobo gigabyte GA-945GCMX-S2 LGA 775(P4 dual core) and probably who(i don't know) was flashing failed bios.This is singel bios - mx 126 8 pin
i try instruction for dual bios, but doesn't work and i try recovery flash award bios, but doesn't work too.

This mobo on the start black display and work cooling [on the procesor](? sory my grammar) and no post code and dosen't work floppy drive , usb [i don't know]

is instruction to recovery or flash (not hot) bios on this mobo?

Thank you:)

[profJim]

Re: How to fix "dead" dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

The procedure in this thread is for a motherboard with 2 bios chips only.
Do you have a case speaker connected to your motherboard? If yes, do you hear any beeps when you turn on your system?
Does the floppy drive light turn on when trying to boot?
It sounds like the cpu cooling fan is working when you start your system.

The only technique that might work is to try using a blind flash from the floppy drive.
The bios file would need to be on a bootable dos drive where the AUTOEXEC.bat file would have a command to automatically run the bios flashing program, such as flashspi 945GCM.F3. I think that AWDFLASH is the program that is included in the downloaded bios file.

[tomxx]

Re: How to fix "dead" dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

Hi,
speaker on the star is silent (o_0) - lack beep

Floppy on the start too is silent -no light, no work, only are heard power supply and the end

"It sounds like the cpu cooling fan is working when you start your system." <-cooling fan is full speed, yes as for dos

keyboard -off light and zero reaction


ok, recover disk (floopy) to contain :
autoexec.bat :
@Echo off
awdflash bios.bin

and two files :
awdflash.exe
bios.bin

how recoever to award bios?


(I think that probably dead norh/south brige or something else)

[profJim]

Re: How to fix &quot;dead&quot; dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

Using a floppy for a blind flash is useful if the floppy drive is already set to be the first boot device and the keyboard is not responding.
From your description it sounds like the bios is damaged and can't begin the post process.
With some motherboards, it is sometimes possible for the bios to search for a bios in the HPA (hidden partition area) in a hard drive or in the root directory of a FAT partition on a floppy drive or hard drive.

I think that your motherboard is dead.
The only possible option might be if you could buy a good bios chip and have someone with experience desolder the bios chip and replace it with a working bios chip designed to work in your motherboard.

[thankyouthankyouthankyou]

Re: How to fix &quot;dead&quot; dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

Just wanted to take the time to register and say thank you! You have just helped fix my PC. I had flashed the server recommended download bios using @bios which turned out to be the wrong one. This meant the fans just kept cycling and nothing happened. Unfortunately the backup bios wouldn't kick in (prob because it did boot so it looked like it was working to the back up). Anyway I followed your guide (it took 6 turns of trying it for it to work so anyone else giving it a go keep it up and keep trying it will work eventually) and it worked and the backup wrote over the main and i'm up and running again. THANK YOU!!!!!!!!


God bless,

Dave

You may also just manually short pins 5-6 on the MAIN BIOS, this way no solder is needed

Info posted here, I have sent this to many users and it has saved their boards. Also tested personally a few times.

XtremeSystems Forums - View Single Post - Official Gigabyte X48T-DQ6 Info Thread - UnBricked It

Direct Pic from PDF I made and use to give to others >>



PDF in case anyone needs sometime. This is for the 8Mbit BIOS Dual chip boards ONLY, if you only have one chip you CANNOT use these methods and will need to try other fixes, and if you have no luck you will have to RMA. This WILL NOT Work for boards with a Single BIOS chip

BIOS CHIP mx25l8005.pdf

I am posting this more for you personally than anything, as I often only send info such as this via PM as a last resort because there is many ways to fix things before taking anything this far. And most users do not want to try those things first, or have not fully/properly tried. So I always tend to PM this kind of info so people don't jump the gun and make things worse.

Anyhow, if you posted your guide anywhere else you may also want to add this info as well. Thanks for your guide, I am sure people will look it up down the road, those that use search anyway :)

[Cybertron7]

Re: How to fix &quot;dead&quot; dual BIOS motherboard if flashing failed

Hello,

I seem to have bricked my GA-990FXA-UD3 rev. 1.0 Motherboard. I was wondering if this method will work with my board. The M_BIOS chip has these numbers on the top:

MXIC MX
25L320BE
M2I-128.
2$$788400
L122576

$$ is two numbers that I can't quite make out, and the B on line 2 might be an 8.

See attached photo, it might help.


The pin configuration is the same as what I'm seeing in this thread.

Can anyone tell me if this will work and also that if I try it, there shouldn't be a chance of me frying my Motherboard?