BIOS Updates forum

To make a long story short an error occoured which fubared by BIOS upgrade (the first I've ever attempted).

But the instructions I was following were very detailed: I made a copy of my old BIOS, just incase. I tried booting up with it but it won't read my floppy, even when I press CTRL & HOME.

I have tried connecting the floppy to two different ISA I/O cards, as well as the connector on the motherboard, but the computer is totally dead. When I start it up, I can heard the HD and CD-ROM booting up (or atleast spinning), but not the floppy.

I'm thinking of putting the backup BIOS on a CD-R to see if my PC will pick it up, instead of off a floppy - would this work?

Could anyone please tell me what my options would be, and if anything can be done at all at this present state?

Thanks in advance.

Just a couple of questions:
Did you clear the CMOS after flashing ? A major BIOS change can cause a dead-looking board of you don't clear the CMOS.
What flash utility did you use, and what messages did it give you ?
What is your motherboard ? and what BIOS did you flash into it ?

NickS wrote:Just a couple of questions:
Did you clear the CMOS after flashing ? A major BIOS change can cause a dead-looking board of you don't clear the CMOS.
What flash utility did you use, and what messages did it give you ?
What is your motherboard ? and what BIOS did you flash into it ?

I tried flashing the CMOS afterwards. My motherboard has no actual CMOS jumper pins, but little soldered areas on the mobo -where- the pins would be. I crossed them with a paperclip both when the computer was off, and on, trying to get it to work.

I used the AMIFLASH, and when it was almost done it said something like "Error 20: USB Device detected, disable!", which is strange because I have no USB hub mounted directly on my mobo, but I did have a PCI USB card.

My mobo is a PcChips M560 v3.1, and I flashed the last beta version of the BIOS directly from the mobo manufacturer. All the information I garnered I got from this website: http://mick3048.tripod.com/m560/instruct.htm

*sigh*

OK, sounds as though your best bet is hot-swap flashing in another motherboard, if you have the nerve for it. See http://www.pppr.sk/rainbow/hardware/hotflash.html.

I think I may have an idea... just wondering if this would work:

I have another board whose BIOS is messed up, but it will still want to boot from a floppy. If I take that BIOS ROM chip and put it on my PC, would it still want to boot from the floppy, giving me the chance to restore the old BIOS?

Is the other board also an M560? If it's the same type of BIOS ROM (29F010xx?) it should not hurt to try anyway.