Uniflash or AMI for 430VX Biostar

Recommended by Wim's BIOS...

by **DanceMan** » Tue Oct 07, 2003 12:13 am

I'm trying to flash a new bios to an old i430VX chipset Biostar board, an 8500TVX-A. Biostar's website has the bios file but shows no flasher to use with it (AMI bios).
I tried Uniflash but got an error msg, "Bios file size does not match..."
Bios rom file size is 128kb
Flash rom chip size is 128kb
Backup.bin file size is 128kb (saved with Uniflash)

Does this mean I should try flashing including the boot block? I tried without the boot block.
Or how could I determine which AMI flash utility version to use?

by **Denniss** » Tue Oct 07, 2003 12:41 am

Make sure the files are really of the same size !!
File size has to be 131.072 bytes

Especially with older boards/chipset Uniflash works perfect - never had any problem with Uniflash

by **DanceMan** » Tue Oct 07, 2003 2:12 am

Win 98 is showing the file size on the floppy as "128KB" for both the file to be flashed and the backup file from the chip. How do I make it display the file size in bytes?

by **NickS** » Tue Oct 07, 2003 10:39 am

IIRC, right click on the file and look at "properties"

by **DanceMan** » Wed Oct 08, 2003 12:47 am

I redownloaded the file, and it's not compressed. It shows as 127kb but in properties the bytes are correct in "size on disk" and a little less on the other (file size?).
Should I just go ahead anyway? I mostly wanted to know if not flashing the boot block could be responsiblle for the difference.

by **NickS** » Wed Oct 08, 2003 10:11 am

They should each be exactly the same file size in bytes, as they are meant to fill the ROM exactly.
Both BIOSes at the site, UMC (tvx0619b.rom, 131071 bytes) and SMC (tvx1016b.rom, 131069 bytes) appear to be corrupt as I have downloaded them from the website....Zdnet archives have the same problem...which I/O chip do you have ? There are some old BIOSes around on the web but they don't say which I/O chip they are for.
Can you also save, zip and email me your present BIOS ?
The AMI flasher is linked to on the BIOS index page at www.Biostar.com.tw and also on the pop-up window which appears when you select Support/BIOS

by **NickS** » Wed Oct 08, 2003 10:46 am

The TVX0619b BIOS for the board with UMC I/O chip at http://sos-hardware.windowstothemax.com/biostar/8500/TVX/MB-8500TVXbios.htm appears intact but is very old...they say June 19th 1997, but that is the same date as the Biostar one and mentions fixing problems with large disks and FAT32.
Remember, it's for the board with UMC I/O chip

by **DanceMan** » Wed Oct 08, 2003 10:18 pm

I tried flashing it anyway last night and it gave me a "cannot read file" message. That was the corruupted file from Biostar's Taiwan website. When I got home I searched and found the file on other sites, half of them with an .EXE suffix instead of .ROM. And yes, the board has the UMC I/O.

by **edwin** » Thu Oct 09, 2003 2:11 am

Some old biostar bioses at Pantex:
http://www.pantexcom.com/svcpage/bios.htm

8500TVX is listed but no mentioning if it's the UMC or SMC bios...

by **DanceMan** » Thu Oct 09, 2003 8:04 am

Thank you both. The .exe files I found last night extract to a .rom file of the correct size. I think I found some of the same sites as you by Googling wilth the file name.
Alas, they returned an error message in Uniflash of "boot block in file does not match boot block," or similar words (in Uniflash). I didn't know whether I should proceed or not.
The tvx0619b file is for the UMC chipset. The SMC chipset file is tvx1016b.

by **NickS** » Thu Oct 09, 2003 11:23 am

Well, it's the BIOS for the board and it is not corrupt...in your shoes I would go for it - flash including bootblock (option in the Advanced menu, I believe) - see the sticky at the top of this forum. Take a backup of the old BIOS first.

by **DanceMan** » Thu Oct 09, 2003 9:54 pm

Thanks, Nick. I have two backups of the old bios already, and if I lost the board, I have other VX chipset boards. I'll give it a try.

by **DanceMan** » Fri Oct 10, 2003 12:26 am

Bios successfully flashed. Thanks Nick, edwin, and Denniss

by **edwin** » Fri Oct 10, 2003 7:52 am

Please check the brand name on your I/O chip, is it UMC or SMC?

by **DanceMan** » Fri Oct 10, 2003 9:14 am

DanceMan wrote: And yes, the board has the UMC I/O.

And just to make it clear, all the .rom files I found were corrupt. The .exe files, which self-extract to a .rom file, were correct, and flashed successfully using Uniflash in the Advanced mode flashing including the boot block.