History of a failed BIOS update

ATTENTION: THIS VIDEO IS NOT FAKE!!!
In this video, I actually programmed the BIOS chip with a homemade programmer and software
I am trying to recreate the project and I will upload it when I finally finish it (a new video will be uploaded)

--- History ---
For some reason I wanted to update the BIOS of my computer, which has an ASUS P4PE motherboard.
For that I used the windows update utility created by ASUS. This utility was included to the drivers CD of ASUS.
I tried the first time to update it and it failed. I tried again. It failed. I tried for the third time. Again it failed.

I reset my computer and that's it. No POST. No reboot. I ended up with a dead system

The motherboard has a CrashFree feature in order to recover from a bad BIOS update.
The problem was to reboot from floppy disk. But when you have no POST you have no reboot.
There is a way to reboot from floppy drive if you remove the AGP graphics card form the motherboard. You write the old BIOS to a diskette and a utility (aflash) and the system will be able to recover. The problem is that when you remove the AGP then you have nothing on the screen (you are blind). In order to see you must install a PCI graphics card. Thank you but I don't have one!
I tried to use another utility and modify the autoexec.bat in order to start the update automatically. The system did some reading from the floppy and then nothing. It stopped. It failed once again!
Also I managed to destroy the original memory chip in which the BIOS was saved. In my case this was 49LF004A (a 512 KB EEPROM).
No CrashFree feature could save me now.
I bought from the internet some 49LF004A memory chips in order to replace the faulty one. But I had to program it by myself.
So I created the circuit which it can be seen in the video. I also wrote a program in an old computer in order to write the appropriate bytes to the memory.
I could write the original BIOS (the one which come with the motherboard) but I preferred to write the updated one.

When the process completed I installed the chip on the motherboard and I started the computer. Success. The computer did the familiar noise and automatically entered to BIOS settings. At last!

Conclusion? NEVER UPDATE YOUR BIOS UNLESS IT IS NEEDED!



http://www.piperidis.co.nr

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• ASUS
• P4PE
• BIOS
• recover
• memory
• 49LF004A
• failed
• update
• CrashFree
• utility

[SirusVirusCS]

Please post somewhere step-by-step instructions for recovery. I and many many people will be very glad to you...

[arximidisxeno]

@SirusVirusCS Yes this is my intention, but things are little rough for me right now. I started recreating the project but I have stoped working with it for a while. When I solve my other issues I will continue.

Thank you

[Mprogramer15]

Hey , can you give me electrical scheme!!! Please!!!

[arximidisxeno]

@Mprogramer15 I can give you the schematic but it's useless without the firmware (It's based on an AVR microcontroller). Well the problem is that I don't have the code (I didn't save it)

I am recreating this project and I will publish it (for FREE). Unfortunately it will take some time :(

[jmccredden123]

dont update bios in windows environment, i just updated mine using ez flash and everything was quick and smooth

[arximidisxeno]

@jmccredden123 I agree!

[SirusVirusCS]

OMG, I have a same problem, updated BIOS on Asus P4PE from Windows... And it dead. Had to pay specialists for recovery, but they told me, that AGP video card not working after they have recovered BIOS... So it is very sadddd... ASUS DO YOU HEAR ME???? Thanks ASUS for laggy boards... :((((

[caenleve]

Last week I bought an ASUS K53TA-BBR6 laptop and the first thing I did once connected to Internet was the BIOS update through the Asus Software (same than yours), and it crash at 27%... I sent mails to ASUS regarding the problem and there was not answer... the solution was go to the store again to replace for another one (warranty still valid)... please, NEVER use the Asus updatre software, it sucks!

PS: Geek Squad though it was a problem with the screen, because not image at start... ups

[shadowk33]

dude when i updating my bios my brother has shut down my computer and i try to turn on the pc and the pc shows me a black screen nothing eles so what happen? pls pls help meeee!! i have motherboard asrock g41c-s and cpu intel core 2 quad q8400 and ram 4gb psu450watts so?

[OfficialKMAClub]

@jmccredden123 Lucky you, me and other people had BIOS update fail with EzFlash, now our ASUS laptops won't startup, and have to send them in for repairs.

[shadow444222]

i did mah bios update in windows and i must of got lucky if it failed like that for u.