Problem solved....KT7A: No more video signal after flashing to latest WZ-b04 BIOS

[Tako]

Hot d@mn! Ever since I saw the new WZb04 beta BIOS that showed up few days ago, I was itching to give it a try (I had the b01 BIOS). Well, the moment came last night and I flashed it after a CLEAN boot off the floppy. The message confirmed that the BIOS was successfully flashed, so I hit F10 to reboot.

It posted fine, so I immediately went to the BIOS screen to load default/ safe settings to initialize all the parameters. I hit F10 to save&exit, and waited for the screen to come up......waited and waited and waited....and well, it never came back. NO more video.

I figure WTF, so I cleared the CMOS (jumper) few times, no luck. I held 'INS key' while turning on power, but it still would not come up. I repeatedly tried the above but the video simply would not kick in. I will say physically, I have not touched a single thing, nor did I kick the case. After a simple BIOS flash, there's no more video signal. BTW, everything else is working (i.e., fans, HDD, etc.). I also have two fan headers occupied for my CPU. I have a modified VOS32 with twin fans on it, so headers 'FAN1' and 'FAN2' are utilized.

BTW, my chip is a 200FSB, week 03 1.2GHz that is factory unlocked (L1 closed). I didn't have to touch a thing on it.

I didn't have time last night (it was 2AM already!), but these are the things I will try:

1) Unplug the power cord, and clear the CMOS again.
2) Up the CPU default voltage to 1.85V by closing all the L7 bridges.

If these two do not work, well perhaps I need to replace my BIOS or get BIOS Saviour.


So....anybody else face this problem after a 'successful' BIOS flash?

See my other KT7A pet-project thread HERE.

Tako_chu

 

[Tako]

I guess I'm one of the unlucky mofo. Seriously, of those who've flashed, what are your experiences with WZ-b04 BIOS?

Tako_chu

 

[resinboy]

I flashed mine yesterday- I had no problems( don't you always like it when someone says that ) My memory scores went up very slightly, and I have seen no difference in stability.

 

[Tako]

You lucky bastard!! Don't you rub it in, resinboy!!

But yeah, If I can't get this sucker to work, I'll have to use my A7V133. I'll try to do the BIOS hot-swapping and see if that solves my problem.

Tako_chu

 

[RP]

I haven't tried the 04 bios, but I have however had the exact same problem...

Here's what did the trick:

Take the power from the comp. Clear CMOS. Press the power button to "clear" the PSU (don't know if this is necessary) and then unplug your harddrive. Plug the power back in, turn the comp on, and now it should post again. If yes, then just shutdown, reattach you HDD and you should be on the way...

I hope this works for ya

 

[resinboy]

Ok Tako: you must have put the evil voodoo curse on me last night: I awoke this morning to my computer showing the friggin dreaded " Press any key to reboot screen".( I unchecked the "boot from cd rom" option in both channels of the scsi card bios.) With absolutely no coffee, I started troubleshooting at 7 am( not a pretty sight). My hard disk set-up is as follows:2 IBM lzx 18 gig scsi on an Adaptec 39160 dual channel lvd160 card, and I added a Quantum 30 gig LS drive strictly for MP3 storage as IDE secondary master. Everything was working fine, other than the fact that the drive was only benching about 8900 w.Sandra. Since I am running Win 2K, I knew about the UDMA problem , and wasn't too concerned about the performance, ( how fast do you need to load an MP3 to Winamp), but being the kinda guy I am (Read- I can't leave well enough alone) I found a site with the Windows SP2 Beta. Mirrored my HD, just in case, and loaded her up. Voila', HD benched 28,000 and change - wee haaa!!! Been fine all week till this morning. Hooked up the old drive (w/o SP2), no boot. Went back to the WZb01 bios- no boot. Set optimum defaults in the bios- no boot. Now, I'm pissed. Since I am not running a raid array, I had the raid controller disabled in the bios. Enabled the controller, and hooked up my MP3 drive to channel 3, and now she boots again. HOWEVER, hd performance is back to crappy.( when I originally added the Quantum, I loaded the Via busmaster drivers, and the Highpoint raid drivers, but was unable to get things working, as Device Manager said I was out of free resources/ I have heard alot of people saying NOT to load the Via Busmaste drivers, as they cause problems.
So, do I live with it, as is (working fine, but slow hd times), or drive myself nuts figuring this out???
Resinboy

 

[Tako]

Good news! After getting home, I tried the "pull the power cord and drain power" and wholla! the thing booted!!

Whew, I almost had a heart attack when the thing started breathing again! Well, I looked at the POST screen and it defaulted at 1.2GHz (12 x 100). So, I went back into the BIOS and reset everything to 266FSB specs. It seems all is fine now.

Well, I got the A7V133 anyway (again, thanks for the speeiy deliv., Jimmygates!)and so I might try that again sometime this weekend if I have time.

RP: Yep, we were both facing same probs, and the powr cord trick did work!

Resinboy: Man, you sure find ways to cause troubles don't you! Well, I know that feeling....if ain't broke, tweak until it is. That's how I got into to trouble this time with the BIOS. Luckily, I got myself out of trouble this time, but I am thinking of getting that BIOS Saviour thing. I read the review, and it seems like a logical upgrade for us tweakers who mess around with BIOS all the time.

"So, do I live with it, as is (working fine, but slow hd times), or drive myself nuts figuring this out???"

Well, if I was in your boat, I'd probably take the latter option Tweak until it's perfect!! BTW, I have a similar set-up as you. 10K SCSI speed for OS and other apps, and 7200K IDE mass storage for MP3, etc.

Tako_chu