BIOS Savior for A8N-SLI

[FG]

True. But a floppy is easy to make.
Page 4 - 2 of your motherboard manual.

By the way, I have a Bios savior. It is much
safer in that even if there is a ^pwer failure during the
flashing process.

 

[milleron]

Thanks for the detailed run-down. I'm going to get one of these for my
A8N-SLI Deluxe. I think the price is a bargain for the peace of mind that
you get. What other boot device would support this procedure? I'm one of
those guys with a relatively new rig, and they just don't put floppies in
them any more.
Thanks,
Jim

1 -- It would theoretically work with any device from which you can
run AWDFLASH.EXE under DOS -- floppy, optical, hard drive. If you can
boot a USB key drive to DOS, it could work from that.
2 -- HOWEVER, remember that in my experience, AWDFLASH refused to
write to the BIOS Savior (the "checksum-error" problem). With
EZFlash, my method, it might require a floppy. I'm not really sure
whether EZFlash can look anywhere other than the floppy drive for the
..BIN file. Maybe someone here knows. If not, I'll run it and report
back.
3 -- It would theoretically work using the Windows GUI BIOS flasher.
Of course, that might give the checksum error, too. I've no idea why
AWDFLASH did that and EZFlash did not, but the Windows flasher might
go either way.

It's true that some manufacturers don't include a floppy these days.
For the rare occasion when you're flashing a BIOS, IF there's no way
to use EZFlash with an optical drive AND neither of the other two
methods work, I think it would be easy enough to connect a $9.95
floppy drive. No need for a mechanical installation -- just put a
shoe box beside the open case, put the floppy on it, and run the data
and power cables to it for the few minutes it takes to do this little
job.

Lastly, I'll give the time-honored caveat, "YMMV." For me, AWDFLASH
wouldn't work, but EZFlash worked beautifully. There's no guarantee
that in another machine the computer gremlins wouldn't prevent both
those methods from working. If it was the version of AWDFLASH that
caused it not to work and the particular version of EZFlash that did
allow it to work, then the situation could change with new releases of
either. But what do you have to lose by trying. If it doesn't fly,
RMA the thing to the e-tailer.
Ron

 

[milleron]

True. But a floppy is easy to make.
Page 4 - 2 of your motherboard manual.

By the way, I have a Bios savior. It is much
safer in that even if there is a ^pwer failure during the
flashing process.

What motherboard do you have it installed in?

Ron

 

[FG]

The reference was to A8N-SLI Deluxe's manual -
but that page number also applies to A7N8X-E Deluxe.

 

[milleron]

The reference was to A8N-SLI Deluxe's manual -
but that page number also applies to A7N8X-E Deluxe.

So I take it you have it installed in an A7N8X-E?
Ron

 

[FG]

On both types.

So I take it you have it installed in an A7N8X-E?

Ron

 

[milleron]

On both types.

Great!! Please fill us in on your use of awdflash.exe on the these
two boards. Any problems completing the flash using it? Did you have
to employ a workaround?
Ron

 

[FG]

Read your manual and detailed instructions below.

 

[Robert Hancock]

In any case, it looks like the user has no control any more with this
program. Either this means Asus is not updating the boot block, or
they are paying lip service to the concept of CrashFree (i.e. it is
updated every time).

Paul

If you use the EZ-Flash utility built into the BIOS to flash, you can
see that some of the flash blocks are shown as "No Update". Presumably
this is the boot block area..

 

[milleron]

Read your manual and detailed instructions below.

There's nothing in any manual about this, and the only "detailed
instructions below" are the ones I wrote myself. I'm asking if you
had any trouble using AWDFLASH to program your BIOS Savior. I did,
and I'm wanting to know if my experience was the exception or the
rule.
Ron

 

[Paul]

There's nothing in any manual about this, and the only "detailed
instructions below" are the ones I wrote myself. I'm asking if you
had any trouble using AWDFLASH to program your BIOS Savior. I did,
and I'm wanting to know if my experience was the exception or the
rule.

Ron

I wonder if AWDFLASH has special case code working in it, so you
get different responses depending on the motherboard ? Did you
try /wb to force writing the boot block of the BIOS Savior chip ?
Would it be complaining about the checksum of the boot block
on the new chip, or the checksum of the main code area ?

Now, I just did an experiment, of no particular value. You mention
how EZFLASH was able to flash the chip, and yet AWDFLASH could not.
Using a hex edit, I took a look through an A8N-SLI Deluxe BIOS file.
(I happened to have one from a previous experiment.) Files within
an Award BIOS are delimited by the string "-lh5-". I take two
characters before -lh5-, on the suspicion they could be a checksum,
then copy all the code until the next -lh5- string. (I used to do
this without a hex editor, using "splitawd", but the new BIOS files
befuddle that program.)

In the following example, the file name is declared soon after the
the -lh5-

%K-lh5-`VØ&@ awdflash.exe

If I decompress that LHA file (chunk of code delimited by -lh5-
header), the resulting file left in the folder is "awdflash.exe"
(no surprise), and it has exactly the same size and checksum,
as the AWDFLASH that comes with the BIOS file I downloaded (my
downloaded ZIP file had a BIOS file, a text file, and AWDFLASH
in it). In other words, in this case AWDFLASH and EZFLASH are
one in the same animal, and the execution environment must be
causing different behaviors (such as tolerating checksum errors
or the like).

A version string inside the program reads "AwardBIOS Flash Utility
for ASUS V1.11", so that is not the same program as 8.24b. It
is 44886 bytes in length.

So, I think AWDFLASH has capabilities that remain to be tapped...

It seems the A8N-SLI_deluxe_1009sd02.zip containing its own copy
of AWDFLASH is no longer available. The flash.txt file included
in the ZIP file says (and this tells you it was cooked up at
Asus Germany):

"ACHTUNG:

Dieses BIOS darf NUR mit den folgenden Flashtoolversionen
upgedated werden (oder h–here Versionen) !

Keine ”lteren Versionen verwenden !

Warning:

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

- ASUS LiveUpdate v6.05.01
- ASUS AWDFLASH v1.11

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

and if you go here, this is the same version of awdflash included
in the 1009sd02 download, as well as being the same file as
you get when extracting it from inside a BIOS file. This is
version 1.11 ...

ftp://ftp.asuscom.de/pub/ASUSCOM/BIOS/BIOS_FLASH_UTILS/DOS/AWDFLASH/awdflash.exe

Since you have the BIOS Savior, try experimenting with that
version of awdflash (1.11), and see how it behaves.

Paul

 

[milleron]

I wonder if AWDFLASH has special case code working in it, so you
get different responses depending on the motherboard ? Did you
try /wb to force writing the boot block of the BIOS Savior chip ?
Would it be complaining about the checksum of the boot block
on the new chip, or the checksum of the main code area ?

Now, I just did an experiment, of no particular value. You mention
how EZFLASH was able to flash the chip, and yet AWDFLASH could not.
Using a hex edit, I took a look through an A8N-SLI Deluxe BIOS file.
(I happened to have one from a previous experiment.) Files within
an Award BIOS are delimited by the string "-lh5-". I take two
characters before -lh5-, on the suspicion they could be a checksum,
then copy all the code until the next -lh5- string. (I used to do
this without a hex editor, using "splitawd", but the new BIOS files
befuddle that program.)

In the following example, the file name is declared soon after the
the -lh5-

%K-lh5-`VØ&@ awdflash.exe

If I decompress that LHA file (chunk of code delimited by -lh5-
header), the resulting file left in the folder is "awdflash.exe"
(no surprise), and it has exactly the same size and checksum,
as the AWDFLASH that comes with the BIOS file I downloaded (my
downloaded ZIP file had a BIOS file, a text file, and AWDFLASH
in it). In other words, in this case AWDFLASH and EZFLASH are
one in the same animal, and the execution environment must be
causing different behaviors (such as tolerating checksum errors
or the like).

A version string inside the program reads "AwardBIOS Flash Utility
for ASUS V1.11", so that is not the same program as 8.24b. It
is 44886 bytes in length.

So, I think AWDFLASH has capabilities that remain to be tapped...

It seems the A8N-SLI_deluxe_1009sd02.zip containing its own copy
of AWDFLASH is no longer available. The flash.txt file included
in the ZIP file says (and this tells you it was cooked up at
Asus Germany):

"ACHTUNG:

Dieses BIOS darf NUR mit den folgenden Flashtoolversionen
upgedated werden (oder h–here Versionen) !

Keine ”lteren Versionen verwenden !

Warning:

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

- ASUS LiveUpdate v6.05.01
- ASUS AWDFLASH v1.11

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

and if you go here, this is the same version of awdflash included
in the 1009sd02 download, as well as being the same file as
you get when extracting it from inside a BIOS file. This is
version 1.11 ...

ftp://ftp.asuscom.de/pub/ASUSCOM/BIOS/BIOS_FLASH_UTILS/DOS/AWDFLASH/awdflash.exe

Since you have the BIOS Savior, try experimenting with that
version of awdflash (1.11), and see how it behaves.

Paul

Wow, what a huge effort!
I downloaded the 1.11 AWDFLASH, and I'll try flashing the BIOS Savior
with it.
More later.

Ron

 

[milleron]

I just ran across a new low-price leader for the RD1-PCM4 at Paragon
Computer Accessories:
http://www.paragonca.com/rd1.html

There are complete kits here:
http://www.frozencpu.com/scan/se=Electronics/se=IOSS BIOS Savior/mp=menu_search.html
for about $25 but again, it's difficult to know which, if any, is compatible
with the A8N-SLI or A8N-SLI Deluxe.

Ron