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Bios firmware, bios flashing, flash motherboard.

BIOS firmware in detail - for beginners and experts.

For those who are too lazy to read, but want to quickly flash the BIOS and forget about it. Myths.

I will not focus on what a BIOS is, what they are like and why. If you are reading this, it means you already know something. Therefore, let's start from the opposite - we will dispel the most standard, for some reason unsinkable myths and misconceptions.

1. You need to flash Bios (better) only with your own flasher (example: Award - using AwdFlash, AMI - AMIFlash). Rave. However, it is difficult for some to understand and believe this - after all, on the motherboard manufacturer’s website there are many all sorts of threatening, incomprehensible warnings (and even in non-Russian). Why is this so? Interesting - then read this article.
2. Flashing the BIOS “hot” (Hot Swap) is necessary (possible) only on the exact same motherboard (the same chipset, with the exact same flash drive, etc.). The second most common misconception. It has roots in ignorance of the functioning of various types of flash microcircuits, which, indeed, can impose some restrictions on the mother used for hotswap. Although if you have another exactly the same (only working;) mother, this is a definite plus.

Program for flashing bios.

The most popular are AwdFlash, AMIFlash and UniFlash . The rest are specific to a particular company (for example, for “natural” mothers from Intel or Asus- yours, because others may not work).

I will not touch on decrypting the keys - this information is full on the Internet, I will focus on which of them to include.

ATTENTION: Running a program for flashing bios WITHOUT KEYS can lead to DAMAGE of the BIOS, even if you did not intend to flash it, but were just curious or wanted to save the current version. This is an extremely rare occurrence and mainly affects some versions of amiflash, but it definitely happens.

ADDITION: launching various utilities (for example, such as DMICFG) available on the CDs included with the motherboard (for “setting up” the BIOS) often leads to a situation similar to the previous paragraph - damage to the BIOS, even if you did not intend to do anything, but were just curious and did not change anything.

Bios flashing program AWDFLASH

The most popular, but not the best bios flasher. Launch with keys:

awdflash firmware_name /cc/cd/cp/py/sn/f/r

In this case, the BIOS is flashed without any questions.

/py - Program=Y;

/f - do not check whether this is a BIOS from the right board or whether it is a BIOS at all;

/r - Reset, after finishing the firmware the computer will immediately reboot;

/cd - Clear DMI;

/cp - Clear PNP;

/cc - Clear CMOS, automatically clears CMOS (default).

/nab - Work with not Award BIOS, if we are flashing non-award bios (for example, ami).

Bios flashing program AMIFLASH

Not as popular a flashing tool as awdflash, but unlike it, it is the best (even despite the above-mentioned problems with some versions when launched without keys). Launch with keys:

amiflash firmware_name /b /n /-o /-c /-d /-r /v /-i /-k /-e /-g

amiflash /b /n /-o /-c /-d /-r /v /-i /-k /-e /-g/s firmware_name

There should be no space after the /s key!
To avoid typing such a bunch of keys, don’t be lazy, make a .bat file once with content like:

c:\vc\utils\amf.exe %1 /b /n /-o /-c /-d /-r /v /-i /-k /-e /-g

Uniflash bios flashing program

I will not consider it in this part, because... Although it is really advanced, it does require some training/experience on the part of the user. However, it is worth noting that it can be used not only for programming BIOS of motherboards, but also BIOS of video cards, flash chips in network cards.

About how to flash Asus BIOS.

“Standard” flashers are not suitable for flashing Asus motherboards, because... ALL Asus bios (starting with the most ancient Pentium1) block the usual flashing methods. To flash firmware on such motherboards, you will have to use proprietary Asus utilities. For the oldest boards - this is pflash, for more modern ones - aflash (although in many cases aflash is suitable for very old ones), for completely new ones - you will have to use utilities for Windows. In the case of pflash/aflash, the expression “you will have to use” is not entirely correct, because, firstly, they are extremely convenient, understandable, quite universal and, most importantly, do not pester you with questions, flashing “everything that is sewn”. Secondly, amiflash can still be used, although it ends up with errors (more precisely, not it, but dos4gw). In any case, all happy owners of Asus motherboards need to approach re-flashing with special attention, because recovery in the event of an error is not easy, and sometimes very difficult. And even if you have experience, even considerable - I repeat, be vigilant, Asus engineers use extremely sophisticated measures in their creations to protect BIOSes, the flip side of which is sometimes serious problems with "revival" - the board can "pretend to be" dead (" 00" on the POST card), flash drive - similarly (when trying to flash on other boards), although in reality both of them will be completely alive, which can be confirmed by installation in others that are exactly the same, only serviceable. If you are struggling (have been struggling) with such glitches, carefully read the chapter on the LPC interface (Asus has been using it for a long time, while others began to use it only recently).

P.S. This to a certain extent (the desirability and/or obligatory nature of using “native” proprietary programs for bios firmware) also applies to some other manufacturers, usually well-known ones. For example, many boards from Abit also have subtleties when programming - the same Uniflash, in general, warns that it is not friends with this company.

Major Issues and Error Messages

The size of the bios firmware file does not match the size of the flash drive.

A common problem. As a rule, this is the result of the fact that the manufacturer used different flash drives (by volume) in different versions (motherboards). For example, the first boards of some model came with megabits, and all subsequent ones came with two megabits. In some cases, if the manufacturer does not admit that they produced boards with BIOS of different sizes, this may be evidence that the board is “left-handed” (i.e., for example, the fake uses a cheaper flash drive with a larger capacity - 4Mbit instead of 2Mbit).

For some reason, the bios flashing program “does not agree” to flash the BIOS, claiming that it is not from this board or is not a BIOS at all.

An even more common thing. However, with the above “secret” keys you will no longer be sent... to read the datasheets.

The bios flashing program cannot determine the type of flash drive and therefore does not flash it.

This is also a common occurrence. There may be several reasons for this: there is protection against overwriting (this is what swearing flashers usually suggest checking). On ancient boards, protection was set by jumpers, on modern ones, as a rule, it is selected in BIOS Setup (a fad like BIOS Flash Protection = En./Dis.).

This version of the bios flashing program does not know this type of flash drive

A rare occurrence - it usually occurs when trying to flash ancient flashes with new versions or vice versa.

The flash drive (type) inserted by hotswap is not supported by the mother itself.

see further on FWH/LPC interfaces. It's just a broken flash drive - make sure again that you inserted it correctly. A flash drive is not a flash drive at all, but a “write-once” one or even UV erasable (with a window). This is true, as a rule, only for the oldest boards (before Pentium1) and can be determined by the markings - it will start with the numbers 27xxx.

Everything went well, without visible problems and... silence.

How to flash the BIOS "as it was".

Taking into account the obvious fact that this article, as a rule, will be read not to flash a new version of the BIOS, but to restore functionality in general, we will dwell on the various flashing methods.

Bios firmware on the programmer.

It’s banal and uninteresting - you break a pig with change, rip out the flash drive and go with a floppy disk and beer to the nearest repairmen who know how to fight with a programmer. If the flash drive is sealed, you will have to break another pig and carry the entire board. I can advise you to strain them and solder the block - in the future, if you wish, you can save on a third pig.

Hotswap (hot).

Another WORK payment is taken. As already mentioned, it does not have to be “exactly the same”, “on the same chipset”, “from the same company”. The main thing you should focus on is the type/labeling of the flash drive. There are two main "compatible" groups:

1. “regular” (in particular, all “rectangular” flash drives - in DIP32 housing) - 28xxxx, 29xxxx, 39xxxx, some 49xxxx
2. "hub" (all of them are only "square" in the PLCC32 case) - most of the 49xxxx series and "native" Intel 82802xx

Accordingly, if there is a “compatible” flash drive of the same (or larger) capacity on the recovery board, everything should work.

How to make a “hook” for flashing the BIOS to “hot”.

Industrial grip option for DIP32

Use your imagination - the main thing “during the process” is not to drop foreign conductive parts on the working board (and not to spill liquids). For mini devices in a DIP32 package it’s simpler. It is usually recommended to tie them with threads to make them easier to pull out. I would recommend finding something like a cable from an old COM port and placing it under the microcircuit - it’s easier to grab and the width is just the right size for the microcircuit and the thickness of the cable will prevent the flash drive from getting too stuck in the connector.

For “square” ones (PLCC32) it’s a little more complicated. You can continue to struggle with threads. If you have good access and your hands are not shaking, you can simply pry it with a needle in the appropriate corners and carefully remove it. If you constantly do this (updating similar ones) or just want to “make sure” - glue some thing to the “back” of the flash drive so that you can easily remove/insert: a piece of plastic will do or even melt part of the rod for a glue gun... In general - this is already a matter of technology, as a last resort you can go and buy a special “extractor” for PLCC32.

"Grip" options for PLCC32

Bios firmware from media

From a floppy disk (for modern ones - including from a hard drive/CD-ROM). In the case when the computer is not completely dead and when loading the disk drive makes a disgusting crunch and/or displays the message “BIOS checksum error,” you can try to restore the BIOS without going to a friend.

ATTENTION: If you have an AGP/PCI video card, you may not see this message (BIOS checksum error). To do this, you will need an ISA card for P1-P3 computers, a PCI card for more modern ones that do not have ISA slots. Although in most modern boards the bootblock (namely, it is the one that reports this sad fact when trying to restore the BIOS from the drive) supports output to AGP cards.

ADDITION: If you have a POST card (for example, built into the motherboard), then the “BIOS checksum error” is simply tracked by error “41” at the very “beginning” of the POST (if you are not able to evaluate the “beginning”, then this is where - then 5-6 codes from those that you will have time to see :). Code "41" in Avard is a call to FDD (attempt to boot from a floppy disk); in the case of AMI, the "bottle block" codes for attempts to boot from a failed floppy disk are "F0-FE".

In most cases, to do this you need to make a clean system floppy disk (i.e., only the io.sys, msdos.sys and command.com files) and write the firmware file (bios.bin), the flasher itself (awdflash.exe) and autoexec.bat with the corresponding command line inside:

for Award:
awdflash bios.bin /cd/cp/py/sn/f/r

for AMI
amiflashamibios.rom /b /n /-o /-c /-d /-r /v /-i /-k /-e /-g

However, I do not recommend using your own firmware/firmware names (i.e., you should only use the above standard names) - some BIOSes (bootblocks) can simply ignore such a disk, giving the same message about a non-system floppy disk in the drive.

However, there is still no single “standard” for the recovery process from a disk drive. Most "branded" computers (ie branded Intel, HP/Compaq, Dell, IBM, Fujitsu etc) can be revived with a floppy disk, the contents of which can be downloaded from their own website (there should also be a detailed description there).

Depending on the modernity of a particular board/BIOS (Award/AMI), the floppy disk may require ONLY (i.e., it, on the contrary, should not be system) files of the flash driver and firmware, or even, in general, only the firmware itself (when the flash driver is built into bios).

In short, there are various variations, and if we add to them the possibility of a simple hardware failure of the bootblock and/or hardware itself, then restoring the firmware using this method becomes not the most reliable and “highly probable” method (this is also confirmed by statistics). However, it’s still better to start with him - maybe you’ll get lucky and the pig will survive.

Bios firmware - basics.

Well, if you’ve read this far, then let’s start from the very beginning. Which I missed due to the fact that so many people don’t read it, preferring the middle or even the end right away.

A little about the principles of operation.

PP-type FlashBIOS interface

A “regular” flash drive has the following signals:

8 data lines DQ0-DQ7
17-18 lines of address A00-A16/17 (depending on the volume: 1Mbit - 17, 2Mbit - 18)
CE# (ChipEnable) - “chipselect” (permission to work with the chip)
OE# (OutputEnable)
RE (ability to read data bytes)
WE# (WriteEnable)
WE (possibility to write data byte)
In short, it’s quite primitive and understandable, even if you don’t have any special knowledge of electronics. And from this it is already clear that just because of the 8-bit data bus (in modern Nforce2 it is 128-bit), the speed of retrieving data from a flash drive (which, moreover, deteriorates even more due to the large delays of the flash memory itself) would turn booting even the fastest computer into an agonizing wait. Therefore, the flash drive is connected in a special way to the south bridge, which allows it to “Shadow” its contents onto “real” memory, emulating ReadOnly memory (ROM in Russian) and removing the speed limit.

Again, from what has been said, there is one more conclusion: if you inserted a completely unhealthy flash drive or inserted it incorrectly, not only the microcircuit itself can suffer (which usually happens when inserted “backwards”), but also the directly_connected_south_bridge (from repeated personal experience). In the address space, the flash drive occupies the highest addresses E0000-FFFFF (true for 1Mbit, the same for others, so let’s look at 1Mbit/AwardBIOS as an example). After turning on the computer and ending the RESET# signal, the processor executes its first command at address F000:FFF0. After the initial initialization itself, various checksums are checked (there are many of them in the BIOS), the main one of which is the checksum E000:0-FFFF+F000:0-BFFC. If it is broken, a bootblock is launched located at the “very” top addresses (F000:C000/E000-FFFF - last 8/16kB), which initializes the drive and tries to read the system from it and/or run the flasher with the firmware.

This leads to another interesting conclusion: if you want to force a bootblock to run (for flashing), you can corrupt the CRC “manually” by short-circuiting the address lines “above” the bootblock lines. For example, I usually shorten adjacent A15 and A16 (pins 2 and 3). The volume of the bootblock = 16kB = 2^14, as a result of which it will not suffer in any way, and the checksum of the “rest”, of course, will be lost. If you don’t quite understand why this might be necessary, then when you come across a sealed flash drive into which you’ve loaded “similar” firmware, you’ll understand. And, by the way, for address lines this (shortening) is completely safe. After checking the CRC, the BIOS is “shaded” (Shadow operation), i.e. the contents of the flash drive are copied into the “real” memory, the flash drive itself is turned off (by the south bridge), and in order for programs to believe that they are accessing the ROM, ReadOnly attributes are attached to the BIOS address area by programming the SB registers (and/or MSR processor for AMD K7 /K8). All further work occurs only with the “shaded” image of the flash drive.

Conclusion: It is for these reasons that we can easily remove the flash drive as soon as we see the line “Starting Windows/DOS/linux”. If you need to work with the flash drive itself (for example, writing ESCD/DMI to it), then appropriate procedures specific to each chipset are used for this - you will need to connect the flash drive to the bus again and disconnect it again after the operation is completed. Conclusion: due to the different ways of programming connecting/disconnecting a flash drive (for different chipsets), the flash driver must be able to do this, i.e. "know" the chipset on which the flashing takes place.

Features of programming Intel 28Fxxx chips

If your board has a flash drive from Intel, be thrice careful when flashing the firmware. The fact is that intelligent chips use hardware bootblock protection. What does it mean? This means that they contain one more signal - RP# (pin 30) - permission to program the bootblock. In two megabits it is A17, 1Mbit is NC (NotConnected, not used). Those. In order for the entire_area_of the flash drive to be flashed correctly, +12V must be present on the RP# leg. This is exactly what is set by the jumpers common on many Socket7 mothers called Flash Type: Intel / Non-Intel.

Conclusion: If the board has “Intel 28Fxxx”, and the board layout did not provide for the correct switching for programming Intel flashes (which is a very common occurrence), the BIOS will die at the first attempt to flash it without much chance of recovery (on this board). For Intel flashing 28Fxxx on such boards (without RP# wiring) you need to manually apply +12V to pin30, but so that it does not go to the board itself (and this is A17) - for this you can simply bend this tab, i.e. so that it does not stick into the connector itself.

Software features of flash drive firmware

The main aspect that I would like to draw attention to is that the flash drive is not reprogrammed “at once” (in one block at once) and, conversely, it is impossible to overwrite one individual byte. The flash drive only supports “block” recording (sectorization). Different types of flash drives have different sector organizations. For example, the common 28F001BX has the following blocks:

1. The first block, at the beginning, is the largest, the “main” one - 112kB. It usually contains the entire “body” of the packaged BIOS (therefore the largest one).
2. Next are two identical 4kB blocks - these addresses usually store changeable data such as ESCD/DMI/CMOS/passwords, etc.
3. The last block is 8kB - bootblock.

Those. technically speaking, i28F001BX has an organization of 112+4x2+8. A fairly clear and logical organization: the largest block of 112kB, anyway, is rewritten only when updating the BIOS, then there is constantly changing data, so two small blocks are made (to make it easier and faster to rewrite these “pieces”) and at the end - usually unchangeable bootblock (specially separate from others - to protect the BIOS in the sense of the ability to launch emergency recovery from the drive) - it is always made separately so that it is not “touched” during normal overwriting of other blocks.
Some flash drives have very fine sectorization, for example, the same SST 29EE020 (2Mbit) has as many as 2048 identical sectors of 128 bytes. However, the majority still adheres to an organization similar to the above, because a small block also has its negative sides (for example, in terms of more complex overwrite protection).

"Hub" flashes.

How simple everything was in the good old days - address bus, data bus, CE/WE/OE... But progress (especially in a single company did not stand still and with the advent of i8xx chipsets, this terrible and obscure name for many people became widespread - "hubs" "flash drives.

LPC interface.

At the end of 1997, Intel decided that a powerful processor must have a “big” BIOS (4-8MBit or more, although most companies still use mostly only 2Mbit), and for this there are not enough legs (for lines addresses) on widely used “regular” PLCC32 flash drives. No sooner said than done, this is how the LPC standard appeared (LowPinCount - “low-quantity” connection, although the case, for obvious reasons, was left the same - PLCC32). In addition to the possibility of using large (up to 4Gb!) volumes of flash drives, one of the most important reasons was the imminent death of the ISA bus, the absence of which eliminated the need to route address/data lines and made it possible to limit ourselves to a smaller number of lines for communication, primarily “cartoons” ( SuperIO) and the south bridge (the obvious possibility of integrating SIO into the SB itself was modestly kept silent;). In LPC, only five wires are used for this: LAD0-LAD3 + LFRAME# (therefore "lowpin..."). In relation to flash drives (since different devices can use the LPC interface), this standard resulted in the following incarnation:

LPC/FWH interface

Below in parentheses is the value of the leg in LPC or FWH mode.
As you can see, such a flash drive can operate in two different modes at once - LPC-mode and PP-mode (Parallel-Programming). The operating mode is selected by the level on the IC leg (Interface Configuration Pin) during computer startup - “0” - LPC-mode, “1” - PP-mode. The PP mode is closest to “regular” flash drives and is compatible with them on many (but not all) legs, taking into account only the fact that there are only 11 address lines (0-10), but they are multiplexed, i.e. The value A00-A10 is output/read first, and then A11-A21. Taking into account this (multiplexing of addresses) and the “loss” of the CE signal, everything else is completely similar to “regular” flash drives. In LPC mode, communication between the bridge and the flash drive occurs only over a four-bit bus, and the fifth LFRAME# serves as a starting one (to begin the data exchange operation). Plus LRESET# and LCLK#, which are completely similar to their counterparts on the motherboard - that’s the whole set of necessary wires (the rest are optional). In general, this is an attempt to simplify the interface as much as possible, but not to slide down to the “absolutely serial” I2C type, leaving the possibility of using even DMA and BusMastering modes (which can be used, for example, in devices like DiskOnChip/LPC). The PP mode is used when flashing a flash drive with “factory” firmware (it is, of course, faster, which is important in mass production), and LPC mode is used when working as part of boards. But to work with such flash drives, the south bridge needs to be able to do this - as a result, such a standard became really popular only with the advent of the popular nForce2 (because he had never heard of the ISA bus...

FWH interface

As a result of the achieved heights in the field of standardization, Intel, with the release of i8xx chipsets, continued to carry the banner of the parent of new standards. This is how another operating mode appeared - FWH (FirmWareHub, from which, in fact, the name “hubs” came). It was completely similar to LPC electrically (in terms of legs/connector), but (you’ll guess later;) - absolutely _incompatible_ in terms of the data transfer protocol. As you can read in some documents, this was done to be able to install in the system, in addition to the LPC device, also FWH, hanging them on the same bus (after all, they are electrically compatible, but when transmitting data packets, each will take its own due to different protocols), and up to sixteen “hub” flashes could be attached, because additional ID0-ID3 signals appeared in them. (author's note: please take all my jabs at the x86 parent as a joke, although as you know, every joke has a grain of humor... see the figure above. As you can see, the picture is completely similar to LPC, only the names are LAD0-3 + LFRAME# replaced by FWH0-3 + FWH4. PP mode is exactly the same. FWH differs from LPC in the protocol, i.e. all commands for operations have completely different code values ​​in the data exchange fields. Plus the ability to use several (up to 16) FWH devices, thanks to the introduction of new "identification" signals ID0-3. By default, to work as a flash drive on a motherboard, ID = 0000 is accepted (which can easily be checked by ringing the corresponding pins (9-12) on your Intel board (they are all “on the ground” In general, a universal way to distinguish a flash drive of the hub/regular type can be simply by ringing the pin28 pin - in the hub it will be strictly on the ground, while in the “regular” one there will be something in the kilo-ohm region (you need to “ring” in the pin itself motherboards, although some flash drives also “ring” - use pin16/28 for this).

Own complex for flashing bios

If you constantly deal with the need for alterations at work, I can give you some recommendations. Someone might recommend using a programmer in this case, although I don’t think so and don’t even recommend it. There are two simple and compelling reasons for this - firstly, the programmer does not know all types of microchips (more correctly, of course, there are those that know, but their price is calculated by three zeros without exaggeration), secondly, not even the coolest programmer is simply expensive.

To flash 99.9% of flash drives (for motherboards, of course), you will need three boards:

1. Something older, for Pentium1 - for flashing very common 1Mbit Intel flash drives.
2. Something for P2 with a 2Mbit BIOS - for flashing other “regular” 1- and 2Mbit flash drives.
3. Something for P3 from the i8xx series - for flashing hub flash drives.
4. (Added in the latest version of the article - editor's note) Something on nForce (1/2/3).

As point 1, I use Asus on i430HX (specifically P55T2P4). For such cases (1Mbit and/or Intel flash drives), Asus is recommended due to the ability to use an extremely convenient Asus flash driver - old pflash or newer aflash - easy to use, they don’t pester you with stupid questions and show the address of the damaged area of ​​the chip in case of an error.

For step 2, I use an i440BX board (specifically, PCPartner-928). It is 2Mbit, which allows you to flash both 1- and 2Mbit “regular” flash drives. The connector type on it is DIP32; to convert PLCC32, a PLCC32->DIP32 adapter is used, made from an old faulty board with a PLCC32 connector (see photo).

Homemade adapter PLCC32->DIP32.

Made by curly carving with a jigsaw on faulty motherboards;) plus manually soldered legs) Homemade PLCC32->DIP32 adapter - bottom view
As point 3, I use an i820 board (specifically, Chaintech 6CTA2). It has an i82802AB (4Mbit), which allows you to sew both Intel “hubs” themselves and “hub” 2- and 4Mbit flash drives.

As point 4, I use an nForce board (the first one, but not important) - Abit NV7-133R. It is intended for the most difficult cases - for flashing “purely” LPC flash drives. /It’s just that many (even, apparently, the majority) manufacturers of motherboards based on nForce1/2/3 (and LPC began to be used on them) usually use flash drives with support for both LPC and FWH, which allows them to be sewn on step 3)/.

In general, there are no special conditions for choosing a specific model or company (except in the case of Asus for Intel flash drives). There is no need to try to buy “cool” and “sophisticated” boards for this purpose. It is strictly the other way around - the more “obscure” and primitive the board, the better the “programmer” it will turn out to be. Those. For this, all sorts of Akorps and PCPartners are simply ideal, but any boards, even with minimal “pretensions,” always worsen their “versatility.” Plus, of course, another important condition is good and convenient access to the flash drive slot.

Amiflash is used as the main software (specifically version 8.37, only with keys). It knows most chipsets/flashes and is very easy to use thanks to its convenient command line (the batfile for it is attached above).

For rare cases when amiflash cannot cope (some types of flash drives and/or exotic chipsets), awdflash is used (required with the /f key).

For severe cases (usually very exotic flashes/bios/chipsets, very old, or, conversely, the newest motherboards), Uniflash is used. It can also be used to visually check the location of problems in a flash drive. Plus, it is especially worth paying attention to the lucky owners of modern nForce2 boards that use PMC-type LPC flash drives (usually Epox/Gigabyte).

PMCs support two modes (LPC/FWH) and, perhaps because of this, “standard” flashers often flash them incorrectly (or even freeze during the flashing process) - uniflash does this extremely correctly.

p.s. The latest versions of uniflash have become so correct and convenient that now I mostly use it only...

Extreme methods of flashing/restoring bios

In some difficult cases, you have to resort to using two flashers at once. Usually this is uniflash + awdflash (but not necessarily). For example, you flash it first using amiflash, and then immediately using uniflash. After the first attempt, amiflash will complain that it was flashed incorrectly, but uniflash will flash it correctly.

1. We launch awdflash with the “native” flash drive (the one with which the computer started) and exit without the firmware. For example, you can run it (awdflash) with the keys "/pn/sy 111.bin" - writing down the unnecessary BIOS (just to check).
2. We install (hotswap) the flash drive needed for flashing, launch uniflash and rejoice (it should flash normally).
3. If, after all, we are not happy (it is not flashed correctly), we “simply” run awdflash again (without firmware and already on a “flashable” flash drive) and try uniflash again - it should certainly help (adjusted for the fact that uniflash “knows” "this type of flash drive).

The “hidden meaning” of using this method is as follows. When you start awdflash (as well as any other flash driver), the chipset is “unmapped” to determine the type of flash drive and subsequent flashing. When exiting, usually, as it were, there should be a “plumping”, but in practice it turns out that “it doesn’t owe anyone.” This is what we can do with uniflash, which for various reasons (usually lack of knowledge of modern hardware) itself cannot “unmap” the chipset correctly and completely. In addition, in addition to razmapping the chipset for physical access to the memory area of ​​​​the flash drive, awdflash can (in the case of Award BIOS) remove various “write protections”, which uniflash is not aware of due to its, so to speak, “classicism” - its authors ("out of ignorance") used in its engine in the overwhelming majority exclusively "classical" methods of working with hardware (chipset board/flash bios). In general, in a “primitive” description of the effectiveness of this method, we can say the following. awdflash, being more “smart”, knowing all sorts of “specifics” for all kinds of (especially new) boards, starts working (firmware). However, due to “excess of intelligence”, he manages to stumble on simple things. And for “simple things” - there is no better than uniflash. As a result, their symbiosis becomes a successful (sometimes the only) solution for flashing certain types of flash drives on some chipsets (for example, Winbond W39V040AP (LPC) on nForce2 - works perfectly with the described method).

When you only have a “one-megabit” board at hand, but you need to flash a two-megabit board (“regular”), you can first flash the first half (1Mbit), and then “separately” the second half. To do this, split the BIOS file into two parts (1Mbit=128kB each) using any hex editor and flash the last part first. After this, shorten leg 30 (A17 to 2Mbit and NC to 1Mbit) to ground and fill the “initial” half.

(ps. A limitation of this method may arise if the flash drive does not support the recording sectorization necessary for such a case)

Another development (option) of the previous situation could be to fill only the “final” part (in fact, we only need a bootblock). After this, the “unfinished” microcircuit is inserted into the native board, where automatically, due to a CRC mismatch, the bootblock will begin to load, with the help of which everything on the native board can be simply restored “from a floppy disk.”

Firmware flash drives with different reprogramming voltages.
Different types of flash drives are designed for different programming voltages. The most common are 12V/5V for old boards, for modern ones it is 3.3V/3V/2.7V and less. Theoretically, for each type you need to set the voltage required for a specific flash drive using jumpers on the motherboard (if there are any, of course). In practice, it turns out that flash drives with a lower programming voltage are completely safe to flash with a higher voltage.

Those. if the mother has a 5V flash drive (for example, most of the 29xxxx series), then flash drives with a lower level of flashing will also be flashed on it with a bang without any complaints about its inflated value. And without any possibility of damage to lower voltage customers.

In the case of the opposite relationship, rewiring 12V flash drives on 5V motherboards (or with jumpers set to 5V) also often has a successful outcome. Although here it is no longer a rule - therefore, when programming microcircuits of the 28xxxx series (most of which are 12V) - be vigilant about the correctly set jumpers and do not try to hotswap them on modern boards (since 12V ones were only P1 -P2), i.e. The older it is, the greater the chance of correct re-stitching.

If the jumpers on the board are not labeled, you can simply measure the voltage on pin32 (immediately to the right of the key, if you look with the key up). As a last resort, if there are no jumpers on the board, you can bend this leg out of the socket and apply 12V to it “manually” (for example, directly from the power supply connector).

First, let's figure out why we need to reflash the BIOS at all. I personally first encountered this need about 10 years ago and the situation was that I purchased a 40 GB hard drive, but the operating system only saw 20. Since at that time hard drives of this size were only went on sale, the BIOS did not support disks of this size. And after flashing everything fell into place and the operating system saw all 40 GB. At the moment they say that a similar situation can happen with hard drives larger than 2TB, I have not encountered this situation, but this is quite possible. In general, there can be various problems with the BIOS, for example, it is not possible to boot from a USB flash drive, the computer does not turn on over the network, and so on. Therefore, in this lesson we will figure out how to flash the BIOS to the latest version.

And the first thing you need to do is download the firmware; it can be found on the official website of the manufacturer of the motherboard that is installed in the computer. But to do this, you need to find out what the motherboard is called and what BIOS version is currently installed. Therefore, we restart the computer and go into the BIOS.

Immediately when I start the BIOS, information about the components of the computer appears in the BIOS Version line: M3A770DE (motherboard model) P1.10 (BIOS version). It is not always possible to find this information in the BIOS itself, so when starting the computer we can also find the line M3A770DE BIOS P1.10, and in order to have time to rewrite this data, press the Pause Break button, this button pauses the boot process so that we have time to study the output information on the screen.

And so, now we know the motherboard model and BIOS version, so we go to the manufacturer’s official website, but in my case the motherboard manufacturer is not indicated, but only its model, so we enter this model in the search engine and see that the manufacturer is a company ASRock. But now we go to the manufacturer’s official website, by the way, you need to install versions downloaded only from the official source \ Download \ M3A770DE \ BIOS download \ in my case, the latest version of BIOS P1.80, and since it is newer than the installed one, I used it I will install it. Also study the information for this firmware, it indicates what corrections were made in this version. Again, I do not recommend installing versions marked Alfa or Beta, since such firmware is still being tested.

I have 3 firmware to choose from, or rather not 3 firmware, but 3 ways to install the firmware:

1) Instant Flash - through a special ASRock utility, which can be launched from the BIOS itself and is called ASRock Instant Flash. With this method, we simply copy the firmware to a flash drive, run this utility and specify the path to the firmware in it, and then the program itself installs the new firmware version. To be honest, it is rare that any BIOS has a built-in utility for updating the firmware, so we will not consider this method.

2) Installation via Windows, I did not use this method, since I don’t really trust it, you never know at some point the application may freeze and the firmware will crash altogether. And again, rarely does any manufacturer have the option of flashing from Windows.

3) Flashing from DOS, this is the option we will use, since this method is standard for any manufacturer.

Therefore, download the firmware under DOS, and be sure to make sure that the motherboard model is indicated correctly, otherwise you can kill the computer and you will no longer be able to do without a service center.

Previously, flashing was carried out from a floppy disk, but since at the moment floppy disks and floppy drives are a thing of the past, you will need to flash from a flash drive, and the first thing you need to do is make a bootable flash drive with DOS on board. If earlier, a boot floppy could be made easily and simply (RMB\Format\Create a bootable MS-DOS disk), then this method will not work with a flash drive. Therefore, the RUFUS program will help for our task, go to the official website rufus.akeo.ie.

Download the utility and run \ specify the USB device that we will make bootable \ leave the rest as default, although you can change FreeDOS to MS-DOS, but this will not change the essence \ Start, as you guessed, the flash drive will be formatted and all data on it will be deleted, This is what the next window says: OK.

Now copy the firmware file from the archive with the firmware to the USB flash drive.

We start the computer and go to BIOS\Boot\Specify the USB flash drive as the first device when booting. In this version there is a separate USB device item, but if it is not there, then the flash drive can be in the Hard Disk Device menu, so in this menu we indicate the flash drive as the first device when booting. Save the settings and exit the BIOS.

Now it starts from the bootable USB flash drive and we find ourselves in DOS. So, here we may need three commands:

Dir – display the contents of the current folder

Cd – change directory if the firmware is not in the root of the flash drive

Cd... – move one level up

We enter the name of the file with the firmware, but before that we enter the dir command, since in DOS file names cannot be long, some of the text is replaced with the tilde ~. Therefore, we enter the name of the file as it appears in DOS \ Enter and the firmware process begins. It is advisable that the computer be connected through an uninterruptible power supply, in case during the flashing process there is a power surge and the computer turns off without completing the flashing.

My flashing looked like this, with OK and Done next to all the items, which means everything went well. We reboot and see that the firmware version P1.80 appeared in the boot information, as well as in the BIOS itself.

It was impossible to launch the new Sempron series processors. The problem was solved in one minute by updating the BIOS. After this, the board recognized the “stone” without any problems and reported its real frequency and performance rating when loading. For overclockers

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Attention! The information provided in this article is for informational purposes only. The editors of the magazine "Gaming" are not responsible in the event of irreversible consequences and equipment failure after repeating the steps described below.

This turned out to be a harsh introduction. In fact, today we will just talk about the motherboard BIOS and how it can be updated. You will learn all the nuances of this sacrament, become familiar with possible mistakes (it is better to learn from others) and find out why you need to change the firmware.

What is BIOS and what does it come with?

Motherboard firmware BIOS(Basic Input/Output System) is stored in ROM (new boards use flash memory) and makes it possible to change and save computer settings.

BIOS is needed for the computer to interact with the operating system. The settings of individual PC components (mostly devices integrated into the motherboard) are changed in the BIOS. This program is found not only on the motherboard, but also on the video card, hard drive, optical drive, etc. The BIOS of different devices perform different tasks. For example, the BIOS of a video card specifies the clock speeds of the memory, graphics core, number of active pipelines, and so on.

Why change the firmware

What can cause a forced BIOS change on a motherboard? There are not many reasons. Owners of old motherboards are often faced with a situation where the firmware simply does not contain certain settings or does not support new processors and other devices. Older motherboards may often not be compatible with high-capacity hard drives or may not support booting from an optical drive.

In the case of the Socket A platform, the situation is as follows. Many motherboards were unable to run the new Sempron series processors. The problem was solved in one minute by updating the BIOS. After this, the board recognized the “stone” without any problems and reported its real frequency and performance rating when loading. Overclockers will love the firmware, which opens up new opportunities for overclocking the processor and memory.

There are also more exotic reasons for updating the BIOS. It is known that some viruses can corrupt the current firmware version, which will lead to problems with the motherboard. If the motherboard fails, the only way to fix the situation is by changing the BIOS.

Ways to change firmware

Motherboard developers have provided many ways to rewrite the BIOS of motherboards. The firmware of almost any board can be replaced by loading it from a floppy disk with MS-DOS, and often via Windows XP. This method is less common because Windows XP does not have “direct” access to the hardware.

Some manufacturers offer alternative methods. For example, the firmware of many motherboard models from EPoX, ASUS And GIGABYTE can be done before booting the system. In this case, you only need a floppy disk with the new BIOS version.

In case of problems with the new firmware version and to combat viruses, two BIOS chips are sometimes installed on the board. This approach allows you to return the old firmware version in the event of an unsuccessful update or virus attack.

The BIOS contains all system settings.

Let's get down to business

For some reason, you decided to change/update the current firmware to a more recent and/or more stable version. You can perform this operation in one of several available ways. Their number depends on the specific motherboard model. Let's look at the most common of them.

Updating BIOS via DOS

The most reliable and time-tested method is flashing via DOS. For this you will need:

File with the required BIOS firmware version. We recommend choosing the latest version. It is better to look for it on the website of the motherboard manufacturer or through a search engine (you need to enter the board model or its code displayed at the bottom of the screen when you turn on the PC). If attempts are unsuccessful, you can use specialized resources such as www.bios.ru or www.hardw.com.ua .

Special software for updating BIOS. If such utilities were not included with the motherboard, you will have to download them from the manufacturer’s website. Typically this is awdflash.exe.

A floppy disk formatted in the FAT file system, or a CD (if you have the skills to create multiboot disks).

An uninterruptible power supply is desirable. It happens that during a firmware update, a voltage drop in the network may occur (the reason for this could be anything: repairs at a neighbor’s house, electrical problems, etc.) - no one is immune from this. In this case, the computer will reboot and after that it will be very difficult to revive the motherboard.

Example of updating BIOS via DOS

First, let's prepare a boot floppy disk. There should be system files on it, autoexec.bat, awdflash.exe and a new BIOS version. awdflash.exe is a firmware update program. The autoexec.bat boot file must contain the following lines:

AWDFLASH

where filename1 and filename2 are the name of the new firmware (file name) and the old one (must not be the same as the file name with the new firmware), respectively. There are other options for working with awdflash.exe. To view them, you should run the program with the “/?” key.

An image of a boot disk with an MS-DOS shell can be found on the website www.bootdisk.com or created using Windows OS.

After booting from a prepared floppy disk or bootable CD, all you have to do is type the word autoexec.bat. That's it, it's done.

Updating BIOS via Windows

Each program from motherboard manufacturers for updating the BIOS via Windows has a unique interface with its own features and nuances. Therefore, we will not be able to tell you in detail about flashing this method - there are many options. We recommend that you carefully study the user manual; if it is not saved, download the electronic version from the manufacturer’s website.

Reboot your computer into crash protection mode (during boot, press F8 and select “Safe Mode” or Safe Mode);

Unload all unnecessary programs from memory and tray (keep only system processes);

If possible, use an uninterruptible power supply.

Now we can begin. In most cases, the program interface for flashing BIOS is intuitive, so there should be no problems.

Possible problems during the update

The most serious (and most common) problem you may encounter is your PC freezing or losing power during a BIOS update. Especially for these cases, we suggested making a backup copy of the old firmware version (file filename2). Subsequently, you can use it and restore the BIOS. Problems may also arise if you used a BIOS from another board or an unstable/unsuccessful version. And here again the old firmware is very useful. But if the computer does not turn on after the update, then no one except the service center will help you.

Another, less common problem, even exotic, is possible. Some BIOS versions automatically set their own password and thus block access to the settings. To fix this, use one of the standard passwords.

* * *

Finally, we will say once again that it is advisable to use a UPS when updating the BIOS. And yet, if you have no complaints about the current firmware version, think twice: is it worth updating?

How to flash a computer?

BIOS is an important component of any computer. This is a program recorded in a ROM chip. It contains information about all the settings of your computer; you can make changes to it if necessary.

Do you need to flash the BIOS yourself? There is no clear answer. On the one hand, many manufacturers themselves recommend doing this immediately after purchasing a computer: this measure will help avoid errors in the operation of the device and expand its functionality. However, flashing the BIOS yourself can lead to errors that will disrupt the operation of the computer. And sometimes the motherboard fails after an unsuccessful update - you will have to contact a service center, where they may refuse free repairs under warranty if an updated BIOS version is detected.

It may be worth contacting advanced friends or a service to have your software updated correctly. If you decide to act on your own, study this issue as deeply as possible so that unpleasant consequences do not arise.

When should you flash your computer's BIOS?

It is worth flashing your computer in a number of cases. First of all, correct firmware of the program will increase the overall performance of the computer. This is never superfluous, especially if you constantly use it at work.

An update is necessary if there are noticeable problems - for example, the computer starts to slow down, the operating speed drops, or the sound disappears. Then it might be worth flashing the BIOS. Another kind of problem may also arise. Let's say you bought new equipment - a processor or hard drive. But the motherboard does not support it - the computer simply does not “see” the device.

In this case, you can reflash the BIOS to an improved version - then the board will be able to recognize the processor, hard drive or other equipment. And you don't have to buy a new motherboard.

Where can I find the firmware?

The simplest thing is to go to the website of your motherboard manufacturer and download the latest version of the program. You also need to know the BIOS version that is installed on the computer. To do this, restart the computer, and when loading data, the BIOS version number will be displayed, among others. To have time to record it, press the Pause Break key: it will slow down the download.

Use the search engine and find the version number of the desired manufacturer. Go to the official website and download the latest BIOS.

Flashing BIOS: step by step

The update itself can be done in several ways. Let's consider the most common of them - through DOS mode.

In some cases this is available through a special utility, but not every board manufacturer provides this function. It is not recommended to reflash in Windows, since the OS may freeze while loading the file - then nothing will work, and only contacting a service center or buying a new board will help.

1. Download the firmware - for example, AmiFlash, and a program for formatting a flash drive - HP USB Tool. The program will format the flash drive, making it bootable.
2. Also download the MS-DOS image, when starting HP USB Tool, specify the path to it on your computer.
3. Drop the file with the firmware into the root of the flash drive, renaming it to flash.bin. Move the flash driver there, writing it as amiflash.exe.
4. Now all that remains is to register the text document. You create it on your flash drive. Call it amiflash.bat - this file will help start the flashing process. The file contains the following data: amiflash flash.bin /b /d /e /g. These launch options work in most cases.
5. The main work is completed. Now restart your computer, open the BIOS, and there is the Boot tab. There, specify your bootable media first to boot. In the console, issue the command amiflash.bat.
6. During the BIOS update process, do not overboot or turn off your computer, otherwise you will simply lose the board.
7. After the firmware is completed, you can restart.

This is how you can flash your computer yourself without spending a penny. But be prepared for failure, since firmware is still a serious and risky business.

Many people wonder how to flash the BIOS, but after reading forums and abstruse articles, they think that it’s so difficult – it’s not even worth trying. Is it really? Oddly enough, updating or reinstalling the BIOS firmware is quite simple, provided that it starts for you. Otherwise, only go to the service and there are no options.

First, let's look at why we need to flash the BIOS? And to ensure that the BIOS firmware, like any software, is periodically updated by the developers, corrections and additions are made, and improvements in operation. For example, when I bought the GIGABYTE GA-B75-D3H motherboard, it had the F3 BIOS version installed, but now F15 is already available.

I should immediately note that these methods are available for motherboards from other manufacturers, be it Asus or something else. Both on laptops and desktop computers. I’ll give an example using the popular GIGABYTE.

When firmware may be needed:

1. BIOS does not always see the USB flash drive. If everything is fine with the flash drive and you tried inserting it into different ports, then 90% of the time it’s the BIOS that’s buggy.
2. Every other time he goes into the Bios settings. When you press the settings key, the download continues.
3. There is a long list of available bootloaders, but in reality there are none. During installation, many systems create an entry in the BIOS, which can be easily removed using third-party programs from Windows, but in other systems, you cannot do without special knowledge and tambourines. Reflashing is the easiest way. By the way, this fact entails the next point...
4. When you turn on the computer after BIOS, the screen is illuminated in black and gray, the operating system does not automatically load. Loads only when you force the drive to be selected from the BOOT MENU.
5. Every other time the BOOT MENU is called. When you press the hotkey, the BOOT MENU does not enter, the download continues. If everything is fine with the keyboard, then 99% of the time the BIOS is stuck.
6. Easy firmware update to a newer version.

Methods for flashing BIOS GIGABYTE

There are two ways to update and flash the GIGABYTE BIOS:

1. Via Windows. Using the free @Bios utility that comes with the motherboard on disk. If there is no disk, then go to the official GIGABYTE website, look for our motherboard model, go to SUPPORT, and download the utility. It is important to choose the version that suits your system so that it can be installed on Windows. If the version is not compatible you will receive an error.
2. Using a USB flash drive. This method is suitable for computers that do not have Windows installed. And incompatible systems are installed, for example Mac OS X (Hackintosh) - this trend has been gaining popularity lately, or Linux, and maybe other operating systems. In this method, we still need Windows, but only to unpack the self-extracting archive with the .EXE extension.

Firmware using @Bios utility

This is what the @BIOS GIGABYTE utility for Windows looks like, the interface may be slightly different, but it’s not the interface that’s important to us, but the menu items on the right.

Save Current BIOS to File– Save the current BIOS firmware to a file. It was not for nothing that I started from this point. Before making changes to the BIOS, be sure to save the current firmware to a USB flash drive, so that in the event of a failure, you can restore the data. You never know what might happen: the light will blink, Windows will go dark, and the like.

Update BIOS from GIGABYTE Server- the easiest way to flash and update the firmware, but you definitely need access to the Internet from this computer. In this case, the firmware will be downloaded and installed automatically from Gigabyte servers, you will only need to select a region from the list of Asia, China, America, Europe, Europe (Russia) - I think there will be no difficulties with this. After selecting, confirm the action and wait for completion. After which, for the changes to take effect, we reboot, and do not forget to reconfigure the BIOS, because all settings after the firmware are reset to default.

Update BIOS from File. Completing this step does not require constant computer access to the Internet, but we will still need it, no matter what device, in order to download the firmware file. So, let's go to the website http://www.gigabyte.com/Support/Motherboard, so as not to spend too much time searching - we enter the motherboard model into the search at the top.

We choose our version. press ENTER. On the page with various modifications, select ours and on the right in the menu, immediately click BIOS.
We select the operating system, but for our method this is not important, since we already have the utility running. If it weren’t for this, we would have chosen the appropriate version of Windows and downloaded it with it. In any case, they are downloaded with the utility, whatever one may say.

Click on the region we need and download the .EXE file. We launch it, it unpacks and 3 files are available.

Click Update BIOS from File and specify the file with the firmware, in my case it is B75MD3H.F15, in yours it will correspond to your model and BIOS version. We confirm the action and reboot after completion. Setting up an updated BIOS.

Firmware via BIOS using Q - Flash

For this method, the operating system on the computer is not important to us; it is important to us that the BIOS starts and enters the settings. Let's move on to execution.

Just like in the previous method, go to the manufacturer’s website and download the firmware. We unpack it in Windows, on any available computer or laptop, the firmware file B75MD3H.F15 in my case, in yours it will correspond to your model and BIOS version - we transfer it to a USB flash drive.

When loading, press DEL to get into the settings. Perhaps, depending on the motherboard model, the keys for entering settings and calling Q-Flash will be slightly different, but the essence does not change.

In my BIOS, the Q-Flash is called by F8, on the Z chipset, if I’m not mistaken, F12, but you will see this yourself in the right menu in Bios. Confirm your login to Q-Flash. And then everything is the same as in the previous method.

1. Click Save Current BIOS to File, choose where to save it, to a flash drive or hard drive. Enter the name and save.
2. Click Update BIOS from File, select our flash drive from the list. We specify the firmware file and confirm the action. Once finished, the computer will reboot. In some cases, after a reboot, it starts and turns off almost immediately. But after a couple of seconds it starts in full. We are not afraid of this moment, this is how it should be - this is not a glitch.
3. Setting up an updated BIOS.

As you can understand, BIOS firmware is not such a complicated thing and anyone can handle it. But you shouldn’t rewrite the firmware very often. Frequent repetition of this procedure can lead to failure of the BIOS chip, since it is essentially the same flash drive, which has a limited rewriting resource.