GA-990FXA-UD3 -- can't access the BIOS on boot up

[jcnlv]

I just did an upgrade to GA-990FXA-UD3, AMD FX-8120, and G.SKILL Sniper Series 16GB (4 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM 1866 ram and have been fine tuning everything when suddenly I can no longer access the BIOS.

I had bumped the ram up from the 1333 default to 1600 (after trying 1866 without success) and since cannot access the BIOS. Other than that the system is running great, and is quite fast.

I want to update to the F6f Beta BIOS but ever since I set the ram to 1600 I can't get back into the BIOS or any of the BIOS utilities like Q-flash.  I just get the splash screen and I try the delete key, every way possible I think - tapping, holding etc..., I tried tab for post screen, I tried end for Q-flash and every option it shows and I always (at least 20 attempts) go stratight to "the loading Operating System" screen and into Windows.

Is there some other way to get back into the BIOS other than by key commands on startup?


GA-990FXA-UD3
AMD FX-8120
G.SKILL Sniper Series 16GB (4 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM 1866 (PC3 14900) Desktop Memory Model F3-14900CL9D-8GBSR
Seagate ST3500630AS Hard Drive
512MB GeForce 9800 GTX+ (EVGA)
BIOS Award Software International, Inc., Version    F5 Date    10/13/2011

[Dark Mantis]

Hi

The best way forward here is to use a PS2 keyboard instaed of the USB one thjat I presume you are currently using. It is handy to have for this type of useage when the USB keyboards don't always work. The other thing you could try anmd do is to clear the CMOS and go back to Optimised BIOS Default settings but that will mean that you will lose all your tweaks. If you want to clear the CMOS follow these instructions :

Remove the power cable from the mains supply and then press the power switch on the case for a few seconds just to drain any residual energy in the PSU capacitors.

Once done remove the motherboard battery for at least one hour before replacing it.
 
Next plug back into the mains supply and boot.
 
You will now need to enter the BIOS by pressing DEL and load Optimised BIOS Defaults.

Make any other changes to the BIOS settings to suit your self like disabling the floppy drive, disabling the full screen logo and making the HDD the primary boot device and then press F10 to save and exit.

[jcnlv]

Thank You Dark Mantis...

That did the job... Once I get into the BIOS using the PS2,  I can use the USB keyboard while the PS2 is still plugged in.  Unfortunately it looks like if I want to keep the ram at 1600  and be able to check in on my BIOS from time to time I will need to keep that PS2 hooked up forever.  The USB keyboard worked fine until I bumped up the ram to bring it to 1600, which is the only significant change I made... strange.

I also can't boot at all if I have my Rosewill USB 3.0 card reader plugged in. It just stalls and never finishes the boot. I will add that as a topic too if I can't figure it out.

Thanks again.

jcnlv

[Dark Mantis]

Another thing to check if you want to use the USB keyboard is that the entry for Legacy USB Devices (or something similar) is enabled in the BIOS. Otherwise you have no support for USB until the drivers are loaded for Windows.

[HamishKL]

On the topic of USB keyboards not being recognised at POST by this motherboard, I have the same issue. In my case this problem only happened after updating to the FC BIOS revision - it worked fine on the FA revision. I'm using a Logitech G15 keyboard and also have a Logitech G13 gamepad plugged in, which might be confusing things (I have yet to test this). Since the FC BIOS update, the G15 no longer powers up until after POST, which is too late to enter the BIOS.

I am not willing to switch back to the FA revision, as the update to FC fixed a problem where only 8Gb of my 16Gb RAM (G.Skill F3-14900CL10-8GBXL) was being recognised by Windows 7 64bit.

It is extremely annoying to have two keyboards cluttering up my desk just so I can access my BIOS. Oh well.

[HamishKL]

Aha! I finally got it working by swapping the USB keyboard between different USB2 and USB3.0 ports until suddenly it was recognised before the BIOS prompts. It is presently plugged directly into one of the USB2 ports at the rear and is working perfectly.

I don't know why it is now working, as I've tried it in this particular USB2 port in the past and it didn't work.

Interestingly, I don't have 'Enable Port 60/64' (or whatever it's called) turned on in the BIOS options - I was almost certain this would have helped, but it didnt.

Anyhow, it would be nice if Gigabyte would look into fixing this in the next BIOS release, as it shouldn't matter which USB port you have the keyboard plugged into, especially since it works fine in any port when using the FA revision. I have even gone as far as downgrading to FA in order to test this, and it definitely works fine in any USB port when using the older BIOS.