BIOS Update ?

Mainboard: GA-M55plus-S3G

When I boot my computer, the first screen of the BIOS
claims: "Award v6.00PG".

On the website for this board, I see BIOS revisions up thru
F15B. I assume the "B" is for beta, but there is no mention
of this on the page.

I've been trying to update to the F14 version using @BIOS,
but it seems to be looking for a .bin file, not a .exe or a
..F14.

I made a boot floppy and put flash895.exe, autoexec.bat, and
m55s3g10.f14 on it and rebooted. A screen came up that
seemed to have the .f14 file pre-entered. I hit enter a
couple of times, and it appeared that the floppy was being
read. I exited out and rebooted the machine, but the Award
page still reads v6.00PG.

Can somebody point me to good instructions on how to update
this BIOS?

 

On Sat, 23 Mar 2013 11:30:43 -0700, croy <>
wrote:

Hello Croy,

When I look at the web site for your board I see there are 3 revision
levels:

GA-M55plus-S3G
GA-M55plus-S3G (rev. 2.1)
GA-M55plus-S3G (rev. 3.0)

The labels above are from the cover page of the user's manual.

If you don't have a user's manual handy then you can determine the
revision level of the mainboard by looking immediately to the left of
the HDD connector in the bottom corner.

It will be "blank" for rev 1.0 boards, else "2.1" or "3.0".

The reason for mentioning this is that the numbering system for the
bios is not quite as clear as we might hope. For example:

Rev 1.0 bios range is F1 - F14 (F15B is beta)
Rev 2.1 bios range is FA - FH (FIB is beta)
Rev 3.0 bios range is F1 - F7 (F9A I presume is beta).

The F1 - F7 bioses for Rev 3.0 are not the same as the Rev 1.0 bioses.

So firstly, we need to know the revision level of your motherboard.

CHeers,

 

Thanks for the reply.

This is a rev 1.0 mainboard.

 

The following description is not comprehensive but it attempts to
provide a guide to how a BIOS module is created.

Think of the BIOS as a set of routines that support the variety of
features which are installed/included on your motherboard. These
routines are written by Phoenix and supplied to motherboard
manufacturers. The manufacturer then selects the routines which are
appropriate for a given motherboard and compiles these into a BIOS
module using "Award v6.00PG".

If one or more routines are rewritten, for whatever reason, this may
trigger a new BIOS revision being released by the motherboard
manufacturer. These are typically labelled ga-p35-ds4_f1.exe thru
ga-p35-ds4_f14.exe or similar. The names used here are applicable for
my spare PC.

(Croy, It is getting late for me and I will continue tomorrow.)

 

Thanks for the lessons!

One problem has been solved--failure to keep the hard drive
boot order after a power-off. I put a fresh CMOS battery
in, and that seems to have fixed it. The old one measured
about 2.6v, whereas the new one was about 3.3v. Maybe more
due to contacts than battery strength--the spring in the
contacts seems very light.

But still curious about BIOS versions, and how to update. It
seems like the methods I tried should have worked. But
maybe the version isn't reported in the bootup screen (?).

 

The "Award v6.00PG" is the development stream of the Award software.
You would hope, that all the BIOS created for a particular motherboard,
are developed using the same tool flow. Changing BIOS tools mid-stream
is not a good idea, as it can introduce more bugs.

Award is a BIOS company. They provide core code, to make motherboards
work. The motherboard manufacturer writes less of the code as a result.

In fact, a large number of companies contribute code. So it's not
like a single developer sits in the basement at Gigabyte, and cranks
out custom code from nothing. To a large extent, it's like conducting
a symphony - the BIOS developer is a "conductor", assembling the parts,
and tuning stuff.

The "Award v6.00PG" then, isn't a revision.

You will see a BIOS string printed on the screen

05/19/2004-VT8623-8235-CLE26I01C-00

and the date there might be indicative of the release.

Since the BIOS image is a small file system, you can
also take the BIOS all apart, into its constituent parts,
uncompress it, then view the results as a series of
plaintext strings. And figure out stuff from that.
With older Award BIOS, the internal compression method
is LHA. This package can help with the disassembly, and if
you look for posts discussing this package, you'll find worked examples
of how to do the disassembly of it.

ftp://ftp.heise.de/pub/ct/ctsi/ctmc10.zip

If you use your BIOS flashing tools, to make a "backup copy" of
the current BIOS contents, you can analyse that and decide what is
resident inside the machine right now. Or, take a photo of the
first BIOS screen, and figure it out using the "BIOS string" printed
on the screen.

A "legal" BIOS, should have a unique BIOS string value, so
no two motherboards should use the same BIOS string. There were cases
in the past, where counterfeit motherboards just copied the BIOS
file from another machine. If you see reference on a motherboard
manufacturer site to "legal" BIOS, they're trying to claim they
didn't steal the code they're providing

Paul

 

Thanks Paul.

From the first screen of the BIOS, I see:

09/04/2006-C51-MCP51-6A61HG0LC-00

That's at the very bottom line on the screen.

Is that the "BIOS string" you were referring to?

 

Yes, that's the BIOS string.

If I Google that, I can sometimes find a reference to it.

http://www.wimsbios.com/biosupdates/gigabyte.jsp

Gigabyte GA-M55PLUS-S3G Athlon 1100 rev 0 FIB GA-M55PLUS-S3GV2 09/04/2006-C51-MCP51-6A61HG0LC-00

So even without looking up the date of the BIOS, on the Gigabyte web site,
I can guess at what release it might be (F1B).

One reason for using BIOS strings, is for tracing down
motherboards which have no labels on the motherboard
surface. Some of the PCChips branded motherboards, they
have no label on the motherboard. For those motherboards,
you use the BIOS string to try to figure out the
motherboard information. Every little bit of information
helps.

Paul

 

Croy, firstly an apology for a typo; When I told you where to find the
motherboard revision number, I said next to the HDD connector. I meant
to type FDD connector.

I have uploaded a drawing of the motherboard (from the user manual)
and highlighted the location of the revision number. You can see this
drawing at http://preview.tinyurl.com/d7qn4vf

I have also uploaded a photo of the first page of my Gigabyte BIOS
which shows the BIOS revision - F14. On Sunday, I upgraded my BIOS
from F12 - using Q-Flash. This photo may be viewed at
http://preview.tinyurl.com/cl7gy7n

If you want to view the BIOS revision on your PC as it flashes past,
just note where the F14 is on the screen on the photo mentioned above
and try to watch that spot on your monitor. Failing that, you can
always install Belarc Advisor, which will tell you the BIOS revision
level.

At the moment, I don't think you can update your BIOS to a later
level. If my guess is correct, it is already at the latest level for
your motherboard which current evidence (the BIOS rev FIB mentioned by
Paul) suggests that your motherboard is rev 2.1.

I still haven't spelt out the steps that I used to upgrade my bios
level from F12 to F14. It basically involves using Q-Flash, a flash
drive to hold at least 2MB (1MB for a backup file, 1MB for the update
file) and about 5-10 minutes of your time. This writeup will not
happen for a couple of days.


Cheers for now,

 

That wasn't a problem until I read your correction. I
hadn't actually looked for the revision because I "knew" it
was a rev 1.0 board. But your note, above, prompted me to
get down and look, just to verify, and what do I see? 1.2!
I have always thought this was a 1.0 board--but now I can't
remember why I thought that. This poses a new problem, as
the Gigabyte pages don't even mention a rev 1.2. Only 1.0,
2.1, and 3.0.

I bought this board myself, and have the manual. The manual
is rev. 1001, which I vaguely remember being told is not the
same as the board rev.

That link didn't work for me. When I click on the "proceed
to this site", I get a message stating, "Invalid or Deleted
File". I'm assuming that in that file, you were indicating
the very corner of the board, very close to a mounting or
tooling hole.

That page came up fine, but I in the photo I took of that
screen on my machine the other day, it shows:

"GA-M55plus-S3G FA"

I looked at that page that Paul referenced, and just get
more confused. The first GA-M55plus-S3G listed, carries no
revision, and has a Athlon 1100 chipset, and has the same
date referenced in the BIOS string, but what's that "V2" on
the end of the BIOS Id?

My board has the nVidia GE-Foce 6100 chipset, which matches
the "rev. 1.x" version, 3 lines down, but the BIOS date
doesn't match.

It appears that it might be time to send a query to
Gigabyte. But I now see they only list phone numbers on
their page--no email address. Something to think about when
I'm on the hunt for another MB!

I've watched a you-tube video that shows what looks like the
process, and it looked pretty straight-forward.

Last night I actually used Q-Flash to make a backup, and
saved it to a floppy. I copied it over to a HDD after that,
and used CTMC to tear it apart and examine all the pieces,
but couldn't find anything the looked like a BIOS rev. Maybe
the current rev actually is "FA", but I don't see that on
the list for rev. 1.0 boards.

Fortunately, this box is now running well enough that I can
take my time with updating the BIOS.

Thanks for the help and the time you've put in on this.

 

Confusing. Everything on that line looks right, except for
the BIOS revision and the chipset. My board has the nVidia
GeForce 6100 chipset. And if what I see near the top of the
first BIOS screen is indicitive, the current BIOS revision
is "FA". Maybe the list on that site is just not
correct--but there is other confusion as well:

On the corner of the board, I see "Rev. 1.2"

But on the Gigabyte pages for BIOS updates, I see updates
for boards of Revision 1.0, 2.1, and 3.0. No 1.2.

not "FIB"?

I have the manual! It is definitely a Gigabyte
GA-M55plus-S3G. What rev? The board says 1.2, but the
Gigabyte page doesn't seem to know of a 1.2.

Thank for your replies and suggestions.

 

A possible explanation for the revision 1.2 is that,
when a motherboard is designed, there is a prototype (1.0),
a revision after that (1.1) and a final revision (1.2). The
final revision is the one that goes into production. (That
is apparently what Asus does. The other companies might
do something similar.) The final revision must be cosmetically
perfect, and no cuts and straps are allowed. That means, that
any electrical changes, have to be perfected on the 1.1 board.
They only make a few 1.0 and 1.1 boards, for usage in the
laboratory. (Where I used to work, our minimum quantity
was five boards of each. Even if we didn't use them all, we
still made five of them.) For the 1.2, they might make 100,000
of those.

Referring to the board as 1.0, is for marketing reasons. If the
first board in a series was documented as 1.2, it would confuse
the customers.

When they make a revision 2 stream or revision 3 stream, the
board may not go through as much development work. In some cases,
all that has changed, is the silicon revision of the chipset
might be different.

The information on the wimsbios page would be volunteered by
owners of the motherboard. Anything is possible with regard to
the authenticity of the information.

Paul

 

Looks like I can forget about writing up a procedure for updating
bios. You probably noticed that the upgrade step is almost identical
to the backup process.

Maybe this is a suitable occasion to speculate !!!

Let us say that there was a typo made when typing "REV.2.1" to add to
the nomenclature for the motherboard and someone typed "REV.1.2".

This could then let us believe that we really do have a Rev 2.1 board
and we could then use the 2.1 bioses. After all, the "1.2" board is
using a 2.1 bios. In your case, this is bios Rev FA. I would guess
that when you did a backup of your bios, the filename is M55PS3G.FA

Well, that was the file that I got when I ran the Rev FA download
executable "motherboard_bios_ga-m55plus-s3g_2.x_fa.exe".

If you are a gambler you could download and install Rev FH bios.

If you are not a gambler then you might leave the bios alone !

Your opening sentence began: "When I boot my computer, the first
screen of the BIOS claims: "Award v6.00PG"."

I Googled "Award v6.00PG" and all the pages that I viewed wanted to
upgrade their bios from that level.

I know that my initial response was not technically correct; I only
attempted to give a conceptual description of how a bios revision
level is not a name like "Award v6.00PG".

Cheers,

 

Well.... I had to go back and run Q-Flash again to be sure,
because I had renamed the saved file. When I re-ran it, the
filename field was blank--I was required to type something
in

I'm not really a gambler, but I am an idiot--does that
count? ;-)

Yeah, I didn't realise that somewhere a little further down
it was telling me that the BIOS revision was "FA". I had
only looked at the available updates for a REV: 1.0 board,
and nothing like "FA" was listed. Now I see "FA" listed for
the REV: 2.1 boards, and the initial BIOS was Revision "FA".

I led you astray. That idiot thing again.


If the box continues running ok, I'm just gonna leave it.
The descriptions of the BIOS updates on the Gigabyte pages
are so terse that I have little idea of what may work
better--or not.

If the box gets too wonky, and I suspect it might have
something to do with the BIOS, I'll just start looking for
another board, and only play with flashing this one after
the new board is in hand.

Thanks again for your time.

 

What a treat to get a message from someone who is/was
actually in the thick of it.

After having worked in that arena, do you have a brand of
boards that you prefer?

Understood.


I ran Q-Flash, just to back up the current BIOS, hoping that
it would suggest a filename that would include the revision,
but it only offered me a place to type in a filename. When
I un-lha'd it, the name was "m55ps3g.BIN"

So now, I'm stuck with a questionable board revision,
apparently running a "FA" BIOS revision.

But the board is working again, so I think I'll just crawl
back under my rock, and wait to come out until it *isn't*
working. Then, when I get a new board in hand, I'll play
around with this one until I either get a fresh BIOS rev on
it, or have it smoking and curling on the edges!

Thanks for your insights!

 

croy wrote:

This information, comes from a few interviews the enthusiast
sites have done with the major motherboard makers. In one
case, they gave a breakdown on the development process.
In another, there was a short video, showing how a motherboard
is tested at the factory. It's quite illuminating. It must
take hundreds and hundreds of employees to test millions of
motherboards per month. The testing is by hand, which is the
amazing part (test person inserted stuff in motherboard, and the
test lasts around 2 minutes).

I'm a digital designer, but I've designed communications
equipment. The difference is, the products I worked on,
cost $100,000 each, and we sell very few of them. But I
go through the same development process, as a motherboard
does. My final "spin" has to be cut and strap free too. My
initial prototype quantities vary from five to about thirty.
(Those are for testing in the lab.) But it's the same
style of development as with motherboards. And about
the same level of complexity.

How motherboard design differs from what I've done, is
a motherboard designer first and foremost, has to be
a "historian". You have to be aware of design decisions
made twenty years ago. And preserve compatibility. Whereas
for the things I've designed, they're largely constraint-free.

If you use awdsplit, lha, and strings.exe, you can dump a lot
of stuff in the BIOS into a text file for examination. You
should be able to see the BIOS string that way. For AMI BIOS,
you have to find a copy of mmtool for those. Award, you use
awdsplit.

http://groups.google.com/group/alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt/msg/340b0373d49b1e4c?dmode=source

Paul