Reprogramming bios

[Stu165]

I need to update the bios on an ASUS system in order to get the CPU to work cause it doesn't support it. Is it possible to take the bios out of the ASUS board put it in an MSI board and update the bios through there, then put it back in to the ASUS board. The bios' chips are both the same from what I can tell.

[BUFF]

If they are both the same chip then probably - Google for "hotflashing".
You need to start the MSI with its own BIOS chip & then swap chips whilst it is still running so be careful.

[StormPC]

No, it's not something you want to try. All motherboards have features specific to that particular model.

What boards do you have?

[John - MSI]

If is actually quite possible to do this by swapping. But the BIOS Chips MUST be identical. The Numbers underneath the stickers, and the SST / WinBond etc number be the same. If not this will not work.

As mentioned it is not reccomended as you could damage your board if done wrong, or worse give yourself a shock

There is a special tool for removing BIOS' which makes it much more simple, but I dont think they are widely available

[Stu165]

I need to rewrite a chip from an ASUS A8V deluxe. Another system I have is a KT3 Ultra2, few years difference, guess this won't work, just wanted to check before I sent the thing away to get rewritten.

[Rave]

AFAIK Agent and Kez are the folks to ask about this. I tried to flash my Epox 8RDA+ bios in an MSI KT4-VL and it didn't work. However, I only tried using the Epox and MSI flashing programs, I didn't try Uniflash.

In the end I used an 8RGA+ to flash the bios, so I know that the chips don't have to be absolutely identical, since the the 8RGA+ uses a 4mb chip and the 8RDA+ is 2mb. My hotflash technique was to loosen the chip a bit before booting up so that it was easier to take out once the computer was running. I used a corkscrew to lever it out, but it's not a tool I can really recommend since I think all my bios sockets are cracked now. I also made the fatal mistake, purely through incompetence, of putting one of the chips in backwards. It got very hot and then died!

[Stu165]

I found a place that will reprogram them for only $25 (AUS), might send it to them after I check with a few local places