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k8v-se-d crashfree bios2. HA!



 
 
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  #1  
Old July 21st 04, 07:32 AM
Charlie Root
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Default k8v-se-d crashfree bios2. HA!


I got a chance to try Asus's crashfree bios2 on my k8v-se-d. That
feature works as well as the Asus's EZFLASH for the board, meaning not
at all.

The EZFLASH program found the new bios on the floppy, correctly erased
the flash, and then griped that it couldn't burn the new bios onto
flash. It effectively stopped there. Hitting the reset didn't cause
the crashfree-bios to find that the old bios in flash was defective
and get a new one from floppy. As far as I could tell it did nothing.
Ditto for putting the distribution CD into the dvd drive as instructed
in the manual. It also didn't load the original distribution bios
back.

I'm just beside myself that some firmware engineer at Asus would write
a flash program that didn't check that everything was in order before
erasing vital information.

-wolfgang
  #2  
Old July 21st 04, 08:42 AM
Paul
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

In article , Charlie Root
wrote:

I got a chance to try Asus's crashfree bios2 on my k8v-se-d. That
feature works as well as the Asus's EZFLASH for the board, meaning not
at all.

The EZFLASH program found the new bios on the floppy, correctly erased
the flash, and then griped that it couldn't burn the new bios onto
flash. It effectively stopped there. Hitting the reset didn't cause
the crashfree-bios to find that the old bios in flash was defective
and get a new one from floppy. As far as I could tell it did nothing.
Ditto for putting the distribution CD into the dvd drive as instructed
in the manual. It also didn't load the original distribution bios
back.

I'm just beside myself that some firmware engineer at Asus would write
a flash program that didn't check that everything was in order before
erasing vital information.

-wolfgang


Have you tried the clear the cmos procedure
(with the computer unplugged) ?

What about pressing alt f2 at powerup, with a floppy or
CD in the drive with a file at the root level with the
right file name ? I think on my motherboard CD, there is
a P4C800ED.ROM file or something on it. You may need to
rename whatever file you are feeding it, to whatever
the default name is for your board (K8VSEDX.ROM). If you
examine your CD on another computer, you should be able to
see that file at the top (root) level.

The only reason I suggest that, is I've been searching on
"crashfree" and reading threads over on Abxzone. And there
are other boards that fail the crashfree test. The complicating
factor seems to involve the boot block. Either the boot block
programming was defective in the first place (the bad Asus
firmware engineer theory) or one of those "wrapper script"
flash programs was provided with the BIOS release, and it
includes the param to specify erasing the boot block as well.
You have no escape via crashfree, if the boot block is erased.

http://www.abxzone.com/forums/showth...74&postcount=5

Ah, now this is interesting...

http://www.ami.com/support/doc/AMIBI...epaper_v10.pdf

so it isn't purely an Asus engineer - the AMI guy had a hand in
it too :-)

That doc says to press ctrl and home down on the keyboard,
then switch on the power. Try that instead of alt f2. I've
also seen holding down insert mentioned, but maybe that was just
to enter the BIOS.

Paul
  #3  
Old July 21st 04, 08:52 AM
JBM
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default


"Charlie Root" wrote in message
...

I got a chance to try Asus's crashfree bios2 on my k8v-se-d. That
feature works as well as the Asus's EZFLASH for the board, meaning not
at all.

The EZFLASH program found the new bios on the floppy, correctly erased
the flash, and then griped that it couldn't burn the new bios onto
flash. It effectively stopped there. Hitting the reset didn't cause
the crashfree-bios to find that the old bios in flash was defective
and get a new one from floppy. As far as I could tell it did nothing.
Ditto for putting the distribution CD into the dvd drive as instructed
in the manual. It also didn't load the original distribution bios
back.

I'm just beside myself that some firmware engineer at Asus would write
a flash program that didn't check that everything was in order before
erasing vital information.

-wolfgang


Did you read the instructions for that BIOS upgrade?
Sometimes Asus releases a bios with instructions not
to use the built-in flash utility but to use the most
recent version of asusupdate or afudos or aflash
depending on the chip set.

Jim M


  #4  
Old July 21st 04, 08:59 AM
JBM
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default


"Charlie Root" wrote in message
...

I got a chance to try Asus's crashfree bios2 on my k8v-se-d. That
feature works as well as the Asus's EZFLASH for the board, meaning not
at all.

The EZFLASH program found the new bios on the floppy, correctly erased
the flash, and then griped that it couldn't burn the new bios onto
flash. It effectively stopped there. Hitting the reset didn't cause
the crashfree-bios to find that the old bios in flash was defective
and get a new one from floppy. As far as I could tell it did nothing.
Ditto for putting the distribution CD into the dvd drive as instructed
in the manual. It also didn't load the original distribution bios
back.

I'm just beside myself that some firmware engineer at Asus would write
a flash program that didn't check that everything was in order before
erasing vital information.

-wolfgang


I forgot to say I also ruined the BIOS when I tried to flash the bios on
my k8v-se dlx using ezflash. No matter what I tried to do to recover
it would not boot. Apparently because the boot block was munged.
Anyway I got a new BIOS chip from www.badflash.com they'll either
program your old chip or send you a new one. I also sent an e-mail to
asus asking then about a new bios chip, but I haven't heard from them
yet.

Jim M


  #5  
Old July 21st 04, 06:26 PM
Wolfgang S. Rupprecht
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default


(Paul) writes:
In article , Charlie Root
wrote:

I got a chance to try Asus's crashfree bios2 on my k8v-se-d. That
feature works as well as the Asus's EZFLASH for the board, meaning not
at all.

The EZFLASH program found the new bios on the floppy, correctly erased
the flash, and then griped that it couldn't burn the new bios onto
flash. It effectively stopped there. Hitting the reset didn't cause
the crashfree-bios to find that the old bios in flash was defective
and get a new one from floppy. As far as I could tell it did nothing.
Ditto for putting the distribution CD into the dvd drive as instructed
in the manual. It also didn't load the original distribution bios
back.

I'm just beside myself that some firmware engineer at Asus would write
a flash program that didn't check that everything was in order before
erasing vital information.

-wolfgang


Have you tried the clear the cmos procedure
(with the computer unplugged) ?


I haven't tried that. My flash is already trashed. I didn't want to
trash the CMOS too. ;-)

Do you really think that would help?

What about pressing alt f2 at powerup, with a floppy or
CD in the drive with a file at the root level with the
right file name ? I think on my motherboard CD, there is
a P4C800ED.ROM file or something on it. You may need to
rename whatever file you are feeding it, to whatever
the default name is for your board (K8VSEDX.ROM). If you
examine your CD on another computer, you should be able to
see that file at the top (root) level.


That was the first thing I tried. It didn't do anything. I even took
the original Asus CD to another computer to check when nothing
happened and the CD did indeed have the K8VSEDX.ROM file in the root
directory.

I also tried with a home-made cd with the new 1003 bios on it. Ditto
for a floppy containing a 1003 bios. (Well the cd was actually a dvd,
but the dvd player looks like a cd player to software.)

The only reason I suggest that, is I've been searching on
"crashfree" and reading threads over on Abxzone. And there
are other boards that fail the crashfree test. The complicating
factor seems to involve the boot block. Either the boot block
programming was defective in the first place (the bad Asus
firmware engineer theory) or one of those "wrapper script"
flash programs was provided with the BIOS release, and it
includes the param to specify erasing the boot block as well.
You have no escape via crashfree, if the boot block is erased.


Well, I tried upgrading from EZFLASH which is their code-word for
"update the bios from a mini-bios on the board". As far as I know
there wasn't any wrapper script involved unless the ROM image on the
disk has facilities for erasing/overwriting things it shouldn't.

In any case the ball is firmly in their court. The support call has
been in at
http://Helpdesk.asus.com/ for over 12hrs now. They should
be having their first coffee now.

http://www.abxzone.com/forums/showth...74&postcount=5

Ah, now this is interesting...

http://www.ami.com/support/doc/AMIBI...epaper_v10.pdf


Very interesting! Thanks for digging this up.

If some protected bios boot blocks got erased, I'm not sure it would
help me any more but it is interesting to see that they thought of the
issues. Too bad the testing was so spotty.

so it isn't purely an Asus engineer - the AMI guy had a hand in
it too :-)

That doc says to press ctrl and home down on the keyboard,
then switch on the power. Try that instead of alt f2. I've
also seen holding down insert mentioned, but maybe that was just
to enter the BIOS.


control-home pressed before and during power-up didn't do
anything.

As an aside, how do they expect you to hit control-home and the
case power switch at the same time??? Do these companies hire
octopuses?

-wolfgang
--
Wolfgang S. Rupprecht http://www.wsrcc.com/wolfgang/
New toy: Voice over ip phone. Sounds much better than an analog phone.
http://www.wsrcc.com/wolfgang/voip.html
  #6  
Old July 21st 04, 06:34 PM
Wolfgang S. Rupprecht
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default


"JBM" writes:
Did you read the instructions for that BIOS upgrade?
Sometimes Asus releases a bios with instructions not
to use the built-in flash utility but to use the most
recent version of asusupdate or afudos or aflash
depending on the chip set.


I didn't see anything that looked like per-bios rev instructions. The
zip file had, well, zip in it other than the ROM image itself. The so
called release notes said only something about new cpu's.

I forgot to say I also ruined the BIOS when I tried to flash the bios on
my k8v-se dlx using ezflash. No matter what I tried to do to recover
it would not boot. Apparently because the boot block was munged.
Anyway I got a new BIOS chip from www.badflash.com they'll either
program your old chip or send you a new one. I also sent an e-mail to
asus asking then about a new bios chip, but I haven't heard from them
yet.


Well, we have two data points that EZFLASH has some serious problems.

The part about Asus not getting back to you is disconcerting. Maybe I
should just drive down their. Their US address is only a few miles
down the road from me in Fremont. I was hoping I could just pick up a
working flash with current firmware (and a hopefully working version
of EZFLASH in that firmware!).

-wolfgang
--
Wolfgang S. Rupprecht http://www.wsrcc.com/wolfgang/
New toy: Voice over ip phone. Sounds much better than an analog phone.
http://www.wsrcc.com/wolfgang/voip.html
  #7  
Old July 21st 04, 08:25 PM
Wolfgang S. Rupprecht
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default


"JBM" writes:
Anyway I got a new BIOS chip from www.badflash.com they'll either
program your old chip or send you a new one.


Never got email back from them, but I did call their Fremont phone
number. They won't swap my flash for me at their Fremont location,
preferring instead to charge me $25 to fedex one from Kentucky.

What a racket.

Best line "We consider flashing an at-risk operation so it isn't
covered the same way a broken board is." Ahem. If their software
worked as advertised it wouldn't be such an "at-risk" operation. One
would only have to worry about power failures, which are pretty rare
around here.

-wolfgang
--
Wolfgang S. Rupprecht http://www.wsrcc.com/wolfgang/
New toy: Voice over ip phone. Sounds much better than an analog phone.
http://www.wsrcc.com/wolfgang/voip.html
  #8  
Old July 21st 04, 10:24 PM
JBM
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default


"Wolfgang S. Rupprecht"
.wsrcc.com wrote in
message ...

"JBM" writes:
Anyway I got a new BIOS chip from www.badflash.com they'll either
program your old chip or send you a new one.


Never got email back from them, but I did call their Fremont phone
number. They won't swap my flash for me at their Fremont location,
preferring instead to charge me $25 to fedex one from Kentucky.

What a racket.

Best line "We consider flashing an at-risk operation so it isn't
covered the same way a broken board is." Ahem. If their software
worked as advertised it wouldn't be such an "at-risk" operation. One
would only have to worry about power failures, which are pretty rare
around here.

-wolfgang
--
Wolfgang S. Rupprecht http://www.wsrcc.com/wolfgang/
New toy: Voice over ip phone. Sounds much better than an analog phone.
http://www.wsrcc.com/wolfgang/voip.html


I just checked on the German asus ftp site and this file was in the zipped
bios file. But it wasn't in the file I downloaded from the USA web site.
Asus needs to get their act together.

ACHTUNG:
Dieses BIOS darf NUR mit den folgenden Flashtoolversionen upgedated werden
(oder höhere Versionen) !
Keine älteren Versionen verwenden !

Warning:
This BIOS can only be flashed with the following flashtool versions (or
higher versions) !
Do NOT use older versions !

- ASUS LiveUpdate v5.28.01
- ASUS AFUDOS v2.07

Flashtools - ftp://ftp.asuscom.de/pub/ASUSCOM/BIOS/BIOS_FLASH_UTILS

AFUDOS usage: "afudos /ifilename /pc" (e.g "afudos /i1014.rom /pc")

Jim M



  #9  
Old July 21st 04, 11:18 PM
Wolfgang S. Rupprecht
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default


"JBM" writes:
I just checked on the German asus ftp site and this file was in the zipped
bios file. But it wasn't in the file I downloaded from the USA web site.
Asus needs to get their act together.


They really need to stuff some interlock code into their AFUDOS,
EZFLASH and UPDATE software. The versions below the critical version
needed to correctly burn a flash image could then refuse to run with
that flash image. Reserving 3 words in the flash image for the
minimum version numbers of each of the 3 programs and having their
burning software check these locations should do the trick.

The advantage to them is that this way the firmware is
self-documenting and they don't need to worry that some support guy
will screw up and cause 10,000 dead boards to show up for RMA.

-wolfgang
--
Wolfgang S. Rupprecht http://www.wsrcc.com/wolfgang/
New toy: Voice over ip phone. Sounds much better than an analog phone.
http://www.wsrcc.com/wolfgang/voip.html
 




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