Messed with Bios, now stuck on blinking underscore

[steve1316]

The things in question:
Gigabyte G1 Killer Assassin 2 rev.1
3D BIOS UEFI DualBIOS
Sandisk Ultra II 480gb

I bought a sandisk ultra ii 480gb and installed it into my computer. My mobo is a Gigabyte G1 Killer Assassin 2. I was able to boot up normally with my old hard drive and I cloned my old hard drive into the SSD. So I wanted to check if it worked by changing the boot order to have my SSD be first. So I went into the 3D BIOS UEFI DualBIOS menu and did the following:

AHCI option is checked. I checked the "Boot Option" and it only showed my old hard drive. So I went and clicked "Override Boot Option" and selected my SSD. No change in boot speed.

I went back and tried to figure out whats wrong. Didn't know what so I selected "Load Optimized Defaults" because I wanted everything to be default and fresh. I then went back and looked at the option "Hard Drive BBS Priorities" and saw my SSD there so I set my SSD as the first, followed by my old hard drive.

I exited out and now... I hear one short beep which happens everytime I boot up my computer so thats normal for me. I see that my splash screen showing the G1 Killer logo is like only 25% of the size of my screen than usual and it hangs there. 4 short beeps follows afterwards in an interval of 20-30 seconds each. In that time, I can't press any buttons to go anywhere, not even the bios. Also, don't know if this is important but every time I press a button, I hear a dull clicking noise coming from the computer or the motherboard. After that, it leads me to a black screen with a blinking underscore and thats it. I even waited 30mins to see if it goes past the blinking underscore.

I decided to do the following:
Re-seating memory sticks and GPU.
Unplugging all peripherals and unplugging my HDD and SDD.
Removing CMOS batttery for 30 minutes and putting it back in.
Pressed the button for CMOS_CLR stated in the motherboard manual.

Also, I dont know when this happened while tinkering around in the computer, but my cpu fan stopped spinning. I know it was working before I started messing around in the bios settings.

Is the motherboard fried or is the CPU responsible for the small splash screen and blinking underscore?

[dmdilks]

Boy you got a real mess there. To start with when you clone your old drive what kind of drive was it? Now can you still get into the bios? If you can load default settings. Reboot and go back in and setup everything for your old drive. Don't forget the time and date too. Then see if it will boot with the old drive.

If you when from a HHD to A SSD you will not really see a boot change. You really have to set it up using UEFI. But the bad news that you might have to start from new to do that too. That is why I ask about the old drive and if will still boot.

If it does I would disconnect that drive reconnect the SSD go into the in your 1st boot option it should show UEFI DVD drive. Plus make sure you are booting AHCI too. Boot from that and reinstall windows onto the SSD. Plus make sure you delete all partition on the SSD before you install windows.

What it will do is it will put a boot manager into the bios and that is what you boot too. The UEFI will make it boot really fast. Get everything up and running and the reinstall all software. The move your stuff from the old drive.

[oraclenp1]

Can you post the debug code?

If it hangs up on A6, I suspect it has something to do with the hard drives you have connected (or dis-connected). I would r3eccommend that you keep your HDD connected if you haven't and you may have to keep it first in the boot order.

I had the same issue (black screen with blinking typing bar(?)) and I found that my hard drive had unplugged itself from the motherboard. (sata had come loose and was not connected to the hard drive)

You may just want to go back over all of you connections with the PSU off and unplug and replug a few of them. Other than that I can't think of anything besides keeping your hdd as the primary boot option.

[shadowsports]

Did we ever find out if he could boot successfully again with (only) his original disk attached?

A common mistake (post) cloning is leaving the source disk attached and thinking that you can simply modify the boot order/BBS options to 'test" booting from the new disk.  This doesn't work.  One or both of the disks can become un-bootable, either because drive letter changes to a partition or modification to the BCD.   

[steve1316]

Thank you for your responses. The main issue I have is I can't go anywhere when I boot. I tried to boot without any of the drives attached and I still can't get into BIOS. The same condition with the beeps still apply regardless of which drive I connect it to. Its just really confusing because my motherboard supports DualBios so if I did mess up my original bios, the second bios should have recovered it. The only component that I can think of that prevents me from getting past the splash screen is if the CPU overheated. Would I be able to tell if the CPU overheated?

[dmdilks]

There steps in how you can get the backup to recover the bios.

Method #1:
1. Shut your PC down (if you're reading this guide, than your PC isn't working anyways)
2. Hold the power button until the PC starts and shuts down again
3. Press the power button again, your backup BIOS should kick in now and should re-flash the main BIOS if there's anything wrong with it.

Method #2:
1. Shut your PC down
2. Hold the power AND the reset button for about 10 sec, than release.
3. Backup BIOS should kick in anytime soon now.

[steve1316]

Can you elaborate on what the reset button is? Is it literally a button on the computer case or motherboard called "Reset"? If so, my computer case has one. I will try these when I get home.

[dmdilks]

Most computer cases come with two buttons. One power and one that is usually 1/2 the size of the power button. When you built the computer didn't you plug in a cable wire with power switch & one that has reset on it.

[steve1316]

Most computer cases come with two buttons. One power and one that is usually 1/2 the size of the power button. When you built the computer didn't you plug in a cable wire with power switch & one that has reset on it.

I myself didn't build this computer, CyberPower did about 3 years back. But yes, the reset button is about half the size of my power button, I think.

[absic]

If I have read the user's manual correctly there is a BIOS switch on the back panel which allows you to switch between the Main bios chip and the Back-Up chip. Have you tried switching to the back-up chip via this method?

[steve1316]

If I have read the user's manual correctly there is a BIOS switch on the back panel which allows you to switch between the Main bios chip and the Back-Up chip. Have you tried switching to the back-up chip via this method?

Okay, finally got some free time to work on this. I have read the section where it indicates that and the LED on the back of the case is blue, which means that my computer is currently running on backup bios. Now I pressed the other button so now the LED is green, which means that my motherboard should be running the main BIOS. But no changes have occurred. And I also attempted the power with the reset button methods but also no changes

[steve1316]

Additionally, my bios on the motherboard is AMI and the beeps are: 1 long, 3 short.

Looking that up, it tells me that the error is Memory Test Failure and the description is "A fault has been detected in memory above 64KB".

Although on the Gigabyte website, it states that 3 short beep is "basic memory 64K address check error" for AMI bios.

What does that mean? My motherboard is faulty?

[dmdilks]

I had board one time lockup. You have nothing to lose. Pull the battery again, but this time let it set over night and jump out the 2 pins for the cmos.

[steve1316]

I had board one time lockup. You have nothing to lose. Pull the battery again, but this time let it set over night and jump out the 2 pins for the cmos.

Okay, but reading the manual on clearing the CMOS is confusing. There is a button to clear the CMOS at the back and there is also a 2 pin CMOS jumper. The manual details 2 ways to clear the CMOS, the jumper or the button. I have tried the button before but there was no change. The manual says to use a screwdriver to touch the 2 pins, but I dont know when I should do that. Do I unplug the power before I touch the 2 pins with my screwdriver then?

[absic]

Do I unplug the power before I touch the 2 pins with my screwdriver then?

Yes, make sure the PC is shutdown. Remove the mains power lead and then the CMOS battery from the motherboard. Then short the pins using a screwdriver.