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No BIOS video chip?

Posted: Wed Jan 22, 2003 11:29 am
by olexy
Strange to say, but my new VideoCard "Radeon 9000" has no BIOS chip at all! The place for it is free with 2x(7+9)=32 pins. The same problem is for the following videocards:
GigaByte (Maya series): Radeon9000Pro/i
PowerColour: RV25XT, RV250, RV25A-B3, RV25A-C3.
Is it true? Where is the video BIOS is saved?

PS: ATI utility atiiprxx.exe shows the nesessary info about graphic chip.
Furthermore, RV250 & RV300 videocard are working well without BIOS chip.

Posted: Wed Jan 22, 2003 2:55 pm
by NickS
That empty space is not for BIOS. Most likely the BIOS is in a small 8-pin serial EEPROM device, interfaced through the GPU

Posted: Wed Jan 22, 2003 4:14 pm
by olexy
I saw only ATI site:
http://www.ati.com/support/identify/vis ... umber.html
where BIOS chipsets are presented (32 pins).

Posted: Wed Jan 22, 2003 7:12 pm
by NickS
Yes, they used to be like that. It depends on the chipset.

Posted: Thu Jan 23, 2003 7:41 am
by olexy
I downloaded ATMEL's pdf with ERROM list and find chips about 5x8 mm with 8 pins (128K- 1M). Furthermore, I saw similar size chip on my v-card, but I couldn't decifer it label.
So, the problem is solved. Thanks for reply.
My interest in that theme is due to the NONAME v-card, produced on RV250 VGU.