Be Excellent To Each Other

The BIOS isn't vital?

Edit: Hi5!

Editit: Oh, and while it's minor - trivial - fraud, it's still fraud. I'm not waiting in the Scan phone queue to report it or anything (but no, I wouldn't RMA it if I'd done it).

Hi5

Right, but it's hardly irreversible damage, and by the sounds of it, even if John hadn't fucked it up he'd have needed it to be sent back to be re-flashed by them anyway.

As Nemmie says, it's not the crime of the century and it's barely registering on the morally-wrongometer.

It breaches some insurance fine-print? The same fine-print that uses bad weather as an excuse to avoid paying out? Big deal, frankly.

I was referring to the part of the bios that contains the logo, I am aware of the importance of the bios, so much so that I never screw with mine unless I have a major issue that can only be fixed by doing so. I just don't think someone should be lynched for being madly obsessed with Alienware.

Nah, you'd do it yourself. It's not rare, especially when you start getting to high-end boards. I had one (which I'm struggling to remember the model of) that needed a different bios for every processor that fitted

Near on every manufacturer of motherboards supply tools to do exactly what I did. Infact, DFI are pretty much the only company who do not. To prove that statement here is a page from the manual for my new motherboard.



Note how I have circled the part about file needing to be less than 150k in red? that's an ammendum. Before adding that something like 15,000 motherboards were bricked because if the logo is over 150k it goes into the data area of the bios and fucks it. So you get your logo and nothing else.

Now. To make sure that it was going to be feesible to flash a logo onto my DFI I went to their forum, joined and searched for Bios Logo. At which point I find the owner/admin of the forum reccomending google links to flash their boards. I fail to see how that is neglect having spent 2 days searching all over the internet.

So as I say



Is quite funny as you so elegantly put it because every other board manu these days other than DFI tells you to do just that.

It's an opaque binary blob, it can't be broken down into sub-components - as JC found, it's an all or nothing affair.

I think you should have circled the first bullet point.


Nothing to do with that, man. As has been said, my PC has lights in it, too.

[edit]Oh, my main one doesn't. But two other's do!

Is ASUS the same company as DFI? No. So an ASUS manual for an ASUS product is irrelevant.

Your DFIclub stuff, maybe not so much. It's not entirely clear to me that it's actually an official DFI forum, but if you've seen convincing proof, fair enough (I still wouldn't trust a forum admin's word, but I'm hugely distrustful).

S/he said

Six months ago. That's not recommending anything.


There's a clue in there, somewhere.

There is a port on the bottom of the board that was put there for just that. It basically connects to some sort of device DFI have that can reflash the chip without even having it powered up. TBH that is why so many bios updates fuck your board because you really should take the chip out, insert it into a EPROM reader/writer and do it that way. Not whilst the motherboard is in use. Sadly that isn't possible for 90% of people and you have to run the gauntlett. Flashing bios is a ness evil, sometimes you have no choice and it's always super risky.

Did I say they were the same company? What I said was



And used Asus as a reference. DFI? Follow the link and watch their stance. It's basically to go go google and find a tool and do it that way.

Hence why after fucking my board I basically admitted it to DFI, and said I had sent it back, and asked that maybe they write a tool like every other manu.

[edit]No, that's enough. Christ in Heaven.

I'll always fondly remember the QDI bios flash that would kill your IDE channels if you flashed with any ide drives plugged in.

So they clearly don't officially support doing it. You did it. You broke it. It's pretty clear. You're getting a replacement board anyway. Great.

Maybe - and I mean this as genuine advice, no piss-taking or condescending or anything - don't do it again, just stick to the official BIOS files.

Surely your machine will be well into the Windows boot sequence by the time the monitor's figured out someone's throwing video at it anyway?

I don't need to. The Asus supports Phenom 2 and comes with a proper app for doing the logo.

I've already admitted to it being my fault/a mistake I made. So unless people missed that then they're being deliberately anal and annoying to drag it all up again. I already talked about it with Doc. However, calling me a fraud is fucking ridiculous. Yes, it was my fault. However there are many mitigating circs especially the one about the board not even being fit for purpose (see me calling Scan frauds or accusing them of false advertising?) and I would have had to flash the bios any way. I mean shit, what had I not tried to insert the logo, flashed it and it fucked up? Would have been a shame for the Anal gang eh? Wouldn't have been able to hurl around accusations then.

Either way I have very reasonably put my hands up to it and admitted it. Carrying on about it is pointless.

After what I know now? well firstly I know now that DFI reccomending Winflash is a recipe bound for disaster. Quite simply I should have either done it with a floppy drive with a disc in or built a bootable cdrom. Doing anything that risky within something as shit as windows is bound for disaster. And, who even knows if it was the logo that caused the fuck up any way? Noone. Noone can prove that my logo insertion caused the problem. The problem could have been an incomplete flash that Winflash OKed and let reboot (and that has been known to happen a lot).

So no, after this whole experience I would never use winflash, never listen to DFI and, like, never buy a DFI (which is why I have changed boards completely).

So are we at the point where we're all just telling JC off now then?

You naughty boy John!!

No-one called you a fraud. People called what you did fraud. Which it gives of the impression of being. And like quoting an ASUS manual, asking what "the Anal gang" would've said if a stock BIOS file had bricked it isn't relevant.

Dunno about anyone else, but I (presuming I'm in the Anal gang) would've said it was a bag of shit and you'd be totally entitled to a replacement.

Incidentally, once you're in Windows, the BIOS is pretty much unused. It should be perfectly "safe" to flash from Windows, if it's designed properly. I've never had a problem doing so, motherboard BIOS or even weird stuff like DVD firmware. Equally as risky whichever you go about it really, if it's not truly failsafe (eg mains goes off mid-write). Obviously, DFI haven't done enough failsafe testing.

Being accused of comitting fraud/being called a fraud are the same thing. They both imply that I knowingly killed that motherboard (on purpose if you will) and then sent it back for my own gains.

I don't agree with you on the flashing from windows thing, nothing is really safe in windows.. Mind you, flashing bios has always been a dodgy business since the dawn of flashing your bios. I did absolutely everything I could to make sure it worked. Including running the bios through three checksum checks and they all came back OK. The file I ended up with was the same filesize as before and all of the internal headers/info and layout/s were identical. I used AWD bios tool to inject the logo and it displayed the logo perfectly. As I said before, had DFI not been so frivelous about doing it (by pointing people to google) then I would not have done it. I mean tbh? I could not have done it because nowhere else on the internet could I find any other info about DFI and changing a logo.

So at the end of the day the bios I used could well be perfectly fine and it could have just been a bad flash. That cannot be proven by anyone really. Well, unless you wanted to read off the bios I put onto the board (assuming it's complete as it was when I flashed it to the board) and read it and found out the exact reason why it caused the machine to fail post.

None of the manus really do enough testing. They get handed the technology (north and southbridge) from other larger companies like Nvidia and AMD and build boards. I asked on DFI's forum if the board I had supported the Opteron AM2 (as I couldn't find the info anywhere) and I got no answer. Now you would think that they would like, buy an Opteron and stick it in the board? nope, obviously can't be assed. Same way they can't be assed to write a bios logo app and so on. Poor, especially considering the full price for the board I had was £190 (I got mine on clearance) and you can get a brand new foxconn board for £26 that comes with a bios logo app

/
Indeed I can!

whoops number 2. Second board killed by bios flash and this time I didnt do fuck all. The Asus app did it all.

So I phoned Scan and asked them why they are selling AM2+ boards that are not AM2+ boards until you update the bios. They said "It's the customer's responsibility to flash the bios".

But that means they are selling AM2 boards as AM2+ boards on thier site.

So now I have another 8 days without a fucking board and this time they say they're actually going to flash the bios like they were twice before.

Overall conclusion? don't buy from fucking scan. They sell things that are not compatible with each other even though listed and then make you wait fucking ages.


EDIT. Just incase that's confusing.

I went to Scan to buy a new motherboard and CPU. I specifically brought an AM2+ Phenom 2 CPU and an AM2+ motherboard. Neither board work with the CPU, even though they are said to be compatible on scan's website. This shit has now been going on for three fucking weeks because Scan lists parts that are apparently compatible with each other that are not, and make you wait 8 fucking days every time you have a problem.

Their advice to me? "If you want to speed it up order another board" so I told them I had already done that and couldn't keep spending money on boards.

Their response was "oh well you'll have to wait"

I'm seriously fucking tempted to get ahold of the fair trading malarkey this is BS.

943 Bananas.

Would have been more if you'd got the version where June's lounger collapses.

Just buy a fucking dell.

Functional and sexually gratifying!

CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! Went the trolley!

Are you convinced the CPU is working and is what you think it is, John? (Just a suggestion!)

Is that an old shot from Liverpool? Only someone seems to have had the wheels away.


I'm allowed to, I live here with one.

Note to self:

Sue Caterham for supplying a car in kit form.

I've got a feeling that to flash the bios to support the new cpus you need an older supported cpu in there.

It just fucks me off. Mainly because of this -



Note how the board and CPU I ordered are both listed as SAM2+ (socket AM2+) and thus should work with one another.

In reality however the board is actually a Socket AM2 board (no plus) but can be turned into a SAM2+ board with a bios flash. A bios flash that doesn't work

When I questioned him about this he basically said "It's the customer's responsibility to flash the bios and update the board" in which case why are they fucking selling it as something it isn't until you perform an incredibly risky proceedure?

The only thing I can really put the flash failures down to is not being able to flash the board with the new CPU in. So basically flash with an old cpu that's fully supported then replace with new one. But I don't have an old one..

To top it all off I have broken the rails on one of my hard drives so it won't come out and slashed my hand on something sharp and it won't stop bleeding. And as if it wasn't bad enough completely reinstalling and removing a water cooling system on the same day, running out of thermal paste so I now have to buy more I then have to build the old shit back in here or go without a computer.

Never again. Never ever again. Buying shit these days is so fucking risky with it all being so incompatible that I can't be fucking arsed any more.

In fairness, everyone else gave up that shit about a decade ago so I'm impressed you've continued to hack it! So don't feel too bad, and take the evening off

Well a decade ago as long as you ordered the right board and cpu they would either work or if you buggered up the order they wouldn't physically fit lol.

haha this fucker has had all my luck

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/21/20091009/tu ... 23e80.html

I sure as Hell did.

I mean, who the fuck uses AMD chips any more?

Any one who would like a nice fast chip at about 35% less than the Intel equiv.

Did you not use the Athlon XP/64FX chips then?

If not can I have your bank balance please, thx m8 gr8.

So scutters then?

That's the guy who tried to give me a shocker!

JC you thought about getting another hobby?

Juggling chainsaws? Stopping fans with your tongue?

Er, me?

"Any more" doesn't mean "still got a chip from six years ago".

'Anyone with an ATI GPU'

I've nothing against AMD, though Intel have been beating them senseless since they went back to the Pentium III and re-focussed on efficiency instead of clock rate.

I'm still using it. Read the question.

And when I replace it I'm going to get another AMD. Just to spite you.

And cut my nose off.

Then everyone you meet or pass on the streets will go "There goes Mr Chris. The scutter." and hold their noses.

Oh scutter. I wondered what they were saying. That's been bugging me for years.

I remember being naive enough to think any socket 7 processor would work in my pentium board...

I feel your pain though. A couple of years ago I was in the unexpected position of having a fair bit of cash to spare. I thought it would be nice to build a new PC, so bought all the parts to make something that was fairly powerful for the time. It's never been stable though, and after a couple of years of weird freezes and blue screens, I realised it wasn't a driver problem, and begain swapping memory about. After that didn't fix things, I figured the motherboard was knackered and replaced it. Unfortunately the replacement (although nice and stable when it's running) doesn't like waking up from S3 sleep (which I use loads, being impatient when it comes to booting up). For further fun and games, I made the mistake of buying it from an arsehole (hello http://www.aiop.co.uk/ !) who ignores my emails, phone calls and letters, so getting that replaced is going to be fun.

Anyway, no more PC building for me. The fun's gone out of it, as has the advantage of customisability and cost. I want a professional to do all that for me and give me a warranty that all the bits will work together for a pre-determined length of time.

(Having said that, I'll probably never have the money to buy a whole PC at once, so it will become another Trigger's PC.)

JC, have you thought about getting a 360?

The 360 returns/repair process is, from what I've heard, rather good.

Of course, I heard that some DESPICABLE CHARACTERS went out of their way to EVILLY DEFRAUD Microsoft by abusing their 360 until they get the "right" fault code for an RROD extended warranty repair