My Mobo Sleeps With the Fishes...

[Kilmatead]

Owing to a most unfortunate encounter with ASUS Update and Vista 64-bit, I managed to completely wipe the BIOS from a Commando motherboard (cleared EPROM quite happily, but it refused to install/verify new BIOS [1501], then reset the machine of its own free will), thus rendering it quite useless. I learned very quickly that machines without a BIOS treat you much like the pretty girls in school did. That is, they ignore your existence.

So, is this recoverable without the aid of major surgery or what? (Yes, the mobo, not the other thing.) Board worked great up until I messed around with it, so I assume all the components could live again.

Thanks...

[Clunk]

You can try the crash free bios thing, but with it being a commando, its probably done a pavarotti.

To use the crash free bios thing, put the Asus CD in the cd drive and switch it on, it should fanny around for a few seconds and then try and load the shipping bios from the CD.

I cant remember if it restarts itself, or you have to do it.

[iranu]

A note to all those wishing to flash their BIOS.

DON'T DO IT IN WINDOWS - USE A FLOPPY AND USE THE RECOMMENDED BIOS FLASH UTILITY!

It's the safest way.

Good luck with the asus cd. If it doesn't work you can always buy a preflashed bios chip.

[EtheAv8r]

Alt / F2 during initial POST may help it load BIOS drom CD / Floppy / USB

[explicitlyrics]

If there is no BIOS on the chip then unless it is a top range board, it cant do anything by itself. I'm pretty sure you will have to RMA the board, though if you can find a shop with the facilities it isn't a hard problem to fix.

[alsenior]

why have bios chips died a silent death anyway? almost no boards have an identifiable chip nowadays thus making recovery from farked up flashes almost impossible without sending it back to the vendor

[BUFF]

why have bios chips died a silent death anyway? almost no boards have an identifiable chip nowadays

It's cheaper for the mobo mfrs to fit soldered chips rather than socketed (although the rash of returned Asus mobos due to failed flashes hopefully is making them rethink this).
abit still use socketed BIOS chips - vote with your £s.

[alsenior]

i might just do that. the abit boards already look good value for money

[Giraffe]

A note to all those wishing to flash their BIOS.

DON'T DO IT IN WINDOWS - USE A FLOPPY AND USE THE RECOMMENDED BIOS FLASH UTILITY!

It's the safest way.

Good luck with the asus cd. If it doesn't work you can always buy a preflashed bios chip.

Ouch! I didn't know that, so was I just lucky to get away with updating in Windows? (Asus M2A-VM HDMI). It went well and no problems since, but should I risk it again?

[Thorsson]

My ASUS board refuses to update in Windows any more. Can't work out why. No problems doing it with a floppy though. This was the first board I've ever used the Windows utility - thought that they must have sorted this stuff by now. Probably be the last.

[iranu]

Ouch! I didn't know that, so was I just lucky to get away with updating in Windows? (Asus M2A-VM HDMI). It went well and no problems since, but should I risk it again?

There is simply alot more chances for things to go wrong whilst flashing in windows (ooh err) so it's best to minimise the chances of anything going wrong during the flashing process. I think the KISS principle applies here.

I'm not always convinced by motherboard manufacturers programs for flashing in windows either. I did it once with an MSI KT4 board and held my breath as it took quite some time. As others have posted that mobo manufacturers are now moving to non-removable bios chips then the flashing process becomes even more critical and unrecoverable if borked.

As for doing it again then it's upto you. If you have a floppy in teh system then it makes more sense to do it that way and that's what I recommend. If I was forced to do it in windows then I'd ensure that I was running the minimal number of processes.

[Voodle]

You know with Asus boards you can usually update the bios from inside the bios and using a USB flash? That's what I always do now anyway, havent used windows to do that for a while since the asus update software is fairly rubbish.

[iranu]

You know with Asus boards you can usually update the bios from inside the bios and using a USB flash?

I wondered when manufacturers would get round to this. My next mobo will definitely have this feature.