BIOS Updates forum

I basically know what advice I'll get, but I will ask anyway

I have an ECS L7VMM3 Motherboard(pro2800+ cpu onboard)...I flashed with wrong mobo revision(just had one BAD BAD day haha).

Strange, but there doesnot seem to be a bootblock recovery routine(although AMIBIOS should have one with this generation of ROM...)..no floppy light comes on at all

Bios chip is soldered onboard and I really prefer not to unsolder it and would like to salvage this board...

I had a couple thoughts, just want to see if anyone has tried or heard of them working...

(1) Piggy-back BIOS chips; place a chip with the proper bios ontop of the first one making all the connections and post from this chip.

(2) Post from a bios image on a isa/pci card or usb or serial port (I remember reading that it was possible to do, but don't know where I read it as it was soooo long ago)

(3) Sledge hammer it until it posts

Thanks.

ECS used to have a thing called top-hat flash. But I'm afraid it only works with FWH/LPC type chips and/or the board has to support it.

Interesting...I would assume the bottom is empty so it can cover and connect to the soldered chip...the board between the top/bottom probably wires a connection so that the top bios will be connected while the bottom disconnects from the circuit. Very neat

Maybe I could find a few old boards, gut their sockets and rig up such a device...interesting project Thanks!

First try to find the original device and examine it a bit.

Some motherboards have footprint for a second bios-flashROM. If this is the case in your motherboard, you can try to solder a second bioschip (with right bios version in it) with short wires. It doesn't have to be surface mounted chip but it needs to of compatible type. You need to disconnect the OutputEnable or ChipSelect pin from the original bios chip so it won't interfere during boot. Then you need to reflash with the original chip enabled and remove the second bios chip.

Soldering wires is hard work and propably not worth the effort.

I have tried it once but did not manage to salvage the board (problem was somewhere else)

verbob wrote:Interesting...I would assume the bottom is empty so it can cover and connect to the soldered chip...the board between the top/bottom probably wires a connection so that the top bios will be connected while the bottom disconnects from the circuit. Very neat

As it only works with FWH/LPC chips I wonder whether it may force the high bit on the lower chip's ID input so that it does not think that it is being addressed, leaving the upper chip able to respond.