Having problems updating vbios 5870m

Hello.

im trying to update/roll back my reciently purchased 5870dell to A00. im fallowing the rev's instructions and cant get the m15x to boot from usb. when i hit f12 usb dosnt even show up? i went into the mb bios and set usb to boot first and still nothing. im running MB bios A08. Please help

 

Did you try using a CD?

 

What's a cd? Jk I don't have any cd's and it would be nice to know why other people have the option to boot from USB and I don't.

 

Hahahaha for a moment you made me feel old (and I'm 25!). Well I honestly dont know why the USB option is not listed but I've always flashed BIOS with CDs.

 

The USB option will not show up in the F12 menu unless there is a USB device, i.e., a USB memory stick, connected or inserted. If it is inserted, but not recognized, then it is probably not formatted or the port is bad. Also check your BIOS settings (F2 at the boot screen) and verify that the USB Emulation setting is set to Enabled.

Edit: the USB ram stick should be recognized by the computer as present even if not formatted, but I'm not sure about the F12 menu.

 

Yeah USB emulation is on. And hpusb said it formatted successfully using the windows files you suggested.

 

All I can think of is try another USB port.

 

Did that too. Is there a certain size of USB I should be using. here's some more fun facts, when i start it up all the fans are on full blast and sometimes the whole thing just freezes up. ie: roaming around in the bios and the boot menu just becomes unresponcive. keep in mind it worked perfectly when i had the other (240m) card in.

 

It needs to be less than 2GB to boot true DOS.

 

johnnyFlash is right the older bios version need to be on a stick smaller than 2gb

for the new versions you need to make the usb stick bootable here are some methods http://www.bootdisk.com/pendrive.htm

 

Logan is not using true (old) DOS, he's using the Win 98 version with the FAT32 file system that does not suffer the 2GB limitation, so he can use the larger USB sticks.

 

try this

1. have your usb stick loaded
2. type in diskmgmt.msc in the start menu
3. right click the usb drive letter
4. click "mark partition as active"
5. reboot your machine

 

I partitioned the USB to be just under a gig. And it still didn't recognize it. For some reason this m15x USB ports are not active during boot at all, cuz I have a led on the USB Im using and it never lights up until windows is up.
Ps I just bricked the card trying to use rbe and atiwinflash. Putting a shout out to inap he can reflash it in the m17x right?

 

I used the same method to flash my card, and I needed to find a 1GB stick before it would work. Both the 4 and 8 gig drives I had wouldn't work.

 

There must be some other limiting reason. To confirm, I once again reformatted and created a bootable ram stick from an 8GB Sandisk USB stick using the HP USB Key Utility with the Win 98 system files. The entire stick (actually 7.79GB) is available for use. It boots, it flashes. You are not limited to 2GB USB sticks when creating a DOS-bootable device; just use the FAT32 file system.

 

Rev- that's almost exactly what I did excluding brand of 8gb USB. Any ways there is something wrong with the mb possibly since I can't boot and don't have the option to boot from USB. I even made a normal dos USB and still nope. I took the card to inap and it is officially dead due to me trying to flash it with rbe and atiwinflash. too bad so sad on th another one.

 

It should be possible to reprogramm the eeprom, that's what I have to do with my 6970m.

There are some online services which will do it for you, or you can send it to me in case I can successfully revive my card (once I have the programmer) and your eeprom is compatible with the programmer.
What's the flash chip on the card?

 

Terrible news, Logan. Sorry. Seems like we're having a rash of bad flashes and bricked cards lately. Svl7 is the only guy I know who can resuscitate his own bricked cards.

 

Well, I hope that I'll be successful....

 

not sure what flash chip? do you mean eeprom chip? i left it with inap he said he knew someone who might be getting a programmer.

 

Yeah, the eeprom chip. I just checked my 5850m, and it has a PM25LV010 on it, that's a chip I should be able to reprogramm as soon as I have the programmer.

 

Sweet if yours works will you flash mine back to a00 8-D

 

Yeah, sure, but first of all I need to get the equipment (already ordered) and test it.

 

Thanks man!!!

if anyone whats to take a stab at this feel free.

 

Have you tried it without any partition on the USB? Try a different doeload for the DOS files. I've had bad files before.

 

i tried it without the partition but didnt dl any other files. i did try to make a 3 file dos usb nothing worked.
as you can see the bios is set up fine but the boot menu shows no usb option

 

Try removeable devices. That might be it...

 

why does your boot menu show 1,3,4,5,6?

where is number 2? 0.o

 

2 is the USB since it's set as #1 in the bios
(#1 in the menu is diagnostics so 2 - 6 are user config i think)

usb will only show if a compatible device is inserted into the usb port.