GA-Z77X-UP5 TH 1.0 - BIOS corrupted 3 times in less than a year

[nachumk]

Hi,

I bought the GA-Z77X-UP5 TH in Dec of last year. I am using BIOS F12e. I am still within the warranty period. My system has self corrupted the main bios 3 times in the last year, and the first time was while I was building it. I have successfully copied the backup bios over each time and so I have been able to recover.

My question is whether this is indicative of a bad motherboard or whether some other system part could be suspect? I have never seen a bios go bad on any other motherboard so I am a bit surprised at this. Should I contact Gigabyte and ask for a replacement, or will a replacement behave the same way.

I bought this motherboard for the PCI Express slots, I do not use overclocking at all. It is a standard work computer for me.

The time before this one, the bios went bad when I plugged in an eSata. After recovering the bios, I was able to get eSata working properly. This time, the bios went bad just because. I have no idea why.

PS, F12e is a beta bios, but it is the latest one from Gigabyte and it has been there for almost a year now. I asked whether I can use it, and Gigabyte tech support indicated that it is safe to use and offers secure boot, options that the previos bioses don't have.

Thanks for your help,
Nachum

[absic]

Hi Nachum,

I too have this motherboard and have faced similar issues myself. Have you tried the latest beta BIOS F12j available over at TweakTown: http://forums.tweaktown.com/gigabyte/28441-gigabyte-latest-beta-bios.html to see if that helps. Remember to load Optimised Defaults in BIOS before running the update

Also try synchronising the BIOS chips once you have updated as this can also improve things. If you are not sure how to do this check here: http://forum.giga-byte.co.uk/index.php/topic,10304.0.html

[nachumk]

Hi absic,

I saw your post just as I was looking for release notes for f12j. Would've been nice to know that BIOSes were released through the forums, never even searched here before... Do you know what changes were made on that BIOS?

I guess if you've suffered the same issues then there is no reason for me to ask for an RMA.

Thanks for your answer,
Nachum

[absic]

Sadly I do not know what the exact changes are. 

If the BIOS update doesn't improve things, let us know your exact PC setup as there maybe another cause for the problem. I have recently discovered that my M-Audio Delta 1010 PCI Soundcard is causing an issue during POST, making the system reboot several times before actually starting up. I haven't solved this one yet as it doesn't happen every time and is one of those annoying intermittent problems that can sometimes occur with PC's.

[nachumk]

Thanks for the all of the information. Can you tell me why I would want to synchronize my BIOS? I would think that keeping an old stable BIOS on the backup would be best. Why risk the system with a beta BIOS on both main and backup BIOSes?
Nachum

[absic]

I too would have believed that syncing the BIOS chips could cause more problems than it solves but in fact, the opposite appears to be the case. I am not sure why but it was recommended by Gigabyte to do this when there were POST/BOOT issues and I can only assume that the BIOS chips "talk" to each other in some way during startup.

If the latest BIOS proves to be unstable or no better than the BIOS you have been running, with Gigabyte motherboards it is relatively easy to flash back to an earlier version if you wish to, as sometimes these can prove to provide better stability although some of the latest "enhancements" may not be present.