BIOS troubles with ASUS motherboard

sanderh

Junior Member
Jan 4, 2008
1
0
0
Hi,

Hi all, first of all my apologise for my bad English.



I own the Asus P5B-V motherboard and the processor Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 2,67GHz 4Mb.

I had everything working fine but the stupid me went for an BIOS upgrade this morning (wish I never did this but this is too late now smile.gif). So, I ve downloaded the AsusUpdate Tool (I now also know that you should NEVER upgrade your bios from within XP itself but this is too late now too) for windows and downloaded the lastest bios file, version 1205. After this my pc did NOTHING after restart. He hanged in the screen: 'press DEL to enter setup' but I could not get into the BIOS. So I plugged out all my cables and tried again. NOTHING! So...... I ve pulled out my processor and put it back. After this I DID get a restart of windows but also some notification when turing my system on (something about my processor not beeing compatible and that the speed would be reduced). But after a few restarts my PC hanged AGAIN. But this time at some entire other moment (in the XP boot screen). So I again plugged out all my cables and put them back in and now I m in windows again. Now my pc works fine and after random times I get a total hangup of my system and have to boot it again at moments like this with my POWERbutton.

So......... in the end......... I want to downgrade to a previous version of the BIOS where my pc worked fine and that was version 1102. So I checked the option BIOS DOWNGRADABLE in the options of the AsusUpdate program and tried a previous version of the bios where my PC used to work ok. But I get some kind of message that it is not possible. Also the flash option in the bios menu gives the same message that the bios cannot be downgraded to a previous version. So here I m am stucked with the latest bios version and cannot downgrade to the previous BIOS.

Stupid enough I did make the change to 1205 and now there no way back to 1102......

O yes, one more thing:

this is the message I get when trying to flash from 1205 to 1102 with the AsusUpdate utility in Windows XP (with bios Downgradable ENABLED in the option menu of the update utility):

Warning! the BIOS image can't use in this motherboard (the EEPRPOM Type incompatible)



I eventually found this post ( Neowin Forums ) and hoped this would be the solution for my problem.

So I began:

I went to Bootdisk.Com and downloaded the flashcd.zip file there and unpacked it and first read the manual 2 times.
After this I grabbed the Afudos 2.11 file from the asus site. Also downloaden the 1102.ROM from the asus site.

I did everything like the manual from bootdisk.com said but after a restart with the bootable cd in my drive I get the following information:

CDROM device driver for IDE (Four Channels Supported)
© Copyright Oak Technology Inc. 1993-1996

Driver version : V340
Device Name : TOMATO

No drivers found, aborting installation


Caldera DR-DOS 7.03
Copyright © 1976, 1998 Caldera, INC.

Device driver not found: 'TOMATO'.
No valid CDROM device drivers selected

The bootfiles are in drive letter A:
You bios utilities are in driver letter R:

Strike a key when ready . . .


(I now pressed a key)

Bootdisk.Com
A:\>





And that s it!! What am I doing wrong and how can I change my bios?

thanks for all help!

Greetings from the Netherlands from Sander Heijnen
 

Linflas

Lifer
Jan 30, 2001
15,395
78
91
I would delete all vestiges of that ASUSUpdate program from your disk once you get your machine bootable and never use it again. If that board has the ASUS EZ Flash 2 feature I would just use that. It should be able to see the file on a floppy or FAT32 USB key. The problem with trying to use a boot cd the way you are doing it is that it is trying to load drivers to support the CD in DOS and generally when doing a flash update you want nothing at all loaded at boot time. BIOS updates are the only reason I still have floppies in my machines but with this new P5K board I have the BIOS file all by itself is too big for a floppy :confused:
 

WoodButcher

Platinum Member
Mar 10, 2001
2,158
0
76
Welcome to the forums sanderh!
Wish I had good news or a solution to offer but I'm in the same boat as you, maybe I've sunk a little deeper. My board died last night when I attempted to flash in windows.
Good luck, I'm calling for a RMA.
 

krigla

Junior Member
Jan 5, 2008
3
0
0
Guys, I had a similar problem few days ago here is the solution:

download: http://dlsvr01.asus.com/pub/AS...lash/AsusUpdt61002.zip

It's an older version of Asus update and it alows you to realy downgrade the bios, just in options enable downgrade and you can revert to older version of bios, it worked in my case for Asus P5Kpro (Ami bios) I managed to downgreade from 0601 to initial (the best one) 0201 version of bios.

hope this will help
 

Cutthroat

Golden Member
Apr 13, 2002
1,104
0
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I once killed an Asus P5N32E-SLI with a BIOS flash with Asus Update, I'll never use it again, now I use Asus EZ Flash (press F2 at POST).

WoodButcher, try the Asus "Crash Free Bios" feature, put your motherboard CD in your drive and try to boot, when the mobo can't find a BIOS it is supposed to check the CD for a BIOS and if it finds one it is supposed to flash automatically. This didn't work for me with my P5N32E-SLI though.

sanderh, before you attempt to downgrade your BIOS go into the setup screens and reset optimized defaults, then tweak it as you need to.
 

The-Noid

Diamond Member
Nov 16, 2005
3,117
4
76
Originally posted by: Cutthroat
I once killed an Asus P5N32E-SLI with a BIOS flash with Asus Update, I'll never use it again, now I use Asus EZ Flash (press F2 at POST).

WoodButcher, try the Asus "Crash Free Bios" feature, put your motherboard CD in your drive and try to boot, when the mobo can't find a BIOS it is supposed to check the CD for a BIOS and if it finds one it is supposed to flash automatically. This didn't work for me with my P5N32E-SLI though.

sanderh, before you attempt to downgrade your BIOS go into the setup screens and reset optimized defaults, then tweak it as you need to.

I crashed in bios with the same board and cd worked for me...
 

WoodButcher

Platinum Member
Mar 10, 2001
2,158
0
76
Originally posted by: Cutthroat

WoodButcher, try the Asus "Crash Free Bios" feature, put your motherboard CD in your drive and try to boot, when the mobo can't find a BIOS it is supposed to check the CD for a BIOS and if it finds one it is supposed to flash automatically. This didn't work for me with my P5N32E-SLI though.

Thanks, no soap though. Got the RMA, no questions asked other than "what is the problem" They didn't even ask if I contacted tech support.
 

skydog2008

Junior Member
Jan 16, 2008
1
0
0
Originally posted by: krigla
Guys, I had a similar problem few days ago here is the solution:

download: http://dlsvr01.asus.com/pub/AS...lash/AsusUpdt61002.zip

It's an older version of Asus update and it alows you to realy downgrade the bios, just in options enable downgrade and you can revert to older version of bios, it worked in my case for Asus P5Kpro (Ami bios) I managed to downgreade from 0601 to initial (the best one) 0201 version of bios.

hope this will help

Thank you so much for this! Worked a treat for my maximus extreme.

I couldn't revert back to my original 0501 bios from the latest 0904 release
. Kept getting the eeprom type incompatible when I tried to downgrade.

Unfortunately no floppy is gonna get you out of this one either since the bios file is 2048KB.

Asus forums were absolutely useless for help. I really thought I was screwed....

Thanks again man, your a life saver!
 

chrispycritter

Junior Member
Mar 16, 2008
1
0
0
I'll second the thank-you to krigla, many times over. (in fact, I joined this forum just to thank you)

I have a P5N32E-SLI. I "upgraded" to the latest 1403 BIOS and it gimpified my motherboard (Q6600 no longer stable @ 3.0Ghz, bios would override my memory divider choices, etc...). I unsuccessfully tried to revert back to 1203 with:

EZflash
Phoenix Award BIOS flash tool version v.1.18
Phoenix Award BIOS flash tool version v.1.19
Phoenix Award BIOS flash tool version v.1.31
Asus Update V.7.08.02 (from the mobo cd)
Asus Update V7.13.05 (latest version from the Asus site)



I would get errors like "Downgraded ROM file not suitable for the system." or "Warning! The BIOS image can't use in this motherboard. (The EEPROM Type incompatible)".

Asus told me I would have to RMA my motherboard. I thought I was SOL, but then I found your solution and it worked.

Asus Update V.6.10.02 gave me the message: "BIOS image format is correct, you can press [Flash] button to update the BIOS ROM", on the same file that Asus Update V.7.xx.xx gave the error : "Warning! The BIOS image can't use in this motherboard. (The EEPROM Type incompatible)".

How can that be? Whatever the case, I'm happy to be running on 1203 again. Thanks!





 

WoodButcher

Platinum Member
Mar 10, 2001
2,158
0
76
Welcome to the forum! I did the RMA and I got it back in about 2 weeks, new board, old bios though. Turkeys!
 

pcunite

Senior member
Nov 15, 2007
336
1
76
I once updated a Asus P5K-E and it would never work again! Watch out for those untesed Asus updates...
 

rgallant

Golden Member
Apr 14, 2007
1,361
11
81
Originally posted by: WoodButcher
Welcome to the forum! I did the RMA and I got it back in about 2 weeks, new board, old bios though. Turkeys!

-in the asus p5w-dh forums last year there was something about using the insert key for a failed bios flash, I did not follow it up, but I will mention it anyways, for people to google ,if needed.