GA-X58A-UD5 rev2 - issues with AHCI and boot from USB

[Cogu]

I'm quite sure this motherboard is knackered, but am still posting here to see if someone can think of anything I have missed.

GA-X58A-UD5 rev2, shipped with FA.

USB booting was originally working, all of a sudden it stopped working (without anything changed on BIOS, legacy USB is still enabled).

Changing SATA from IDE to AHCI prevents me to boot from either HDD or Win 7 install DVD (DVD rom is also SATA).

Sometimes changing any setting in the BIOS and saving it causes the PC to, on saving settings, completely power down as oppose to restart.

Cannot flash BIOS from USB either (does this board even support that? Manuals say no).

Tried flashing BIOS with FD (latest version) and still not working. Also erased CMOS and nothing.

Apart from these issues the board is 'fine'. It does go past post and can boot from DVD rom and HDD.


Can anyone think of something I might have missed, or is this one a goner?


Thx,
Cogu

[Dark Mantis]

Hi and welcome to the Gigabyte Forum.

You can definitely flash the BIOS with a USB drive using QFlash. I can't see why there would be a problem using FlashSPI either.

The USB booting should be working but I must admit these Gigabyte motherboards/Award BIOSes are a bit fussy about which drives they see.

How did you flash the BIOS with the FD update if you didn't use a USB drive ?

I would suggest a prolonged CMOS clear using the following 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 Opimised BIOS Defaults.

Make any other changes to the BIOS settings to suit your self and then press F10 to save and exit.

[Cogu]

The USB drive I am attempting to use now is the same USB drive I had used before, and back then in worked. The contents of the drive have not changed at all. I have also tried 4 different USB drives from different manufacturers and they all suffer from the same problem.

The BIOS appears to see the USB drive, as when I go under "HDD boot order" I can see my USB drive there. Pressing F12 to invoke the boot menu and selecting USB-HDD will cause it go boot from the normal HDD and into Windows. Pressing F12 and selecting Hard Disk and then selecting the USB drive on the sub menu will cause it to say "Boot from CD/DVD", and then actually attempt to boot from CD/DVD.

I tried every single USB port I got and I could not get QFlash to see the USB drive, even though it was shown on the BIOS.

The only way I found of flashing the BIOS was by using @BIOS from the OS.

The only difference I noticed after the FD update was that it is now much faster to detect the IDE devices at startup (it ALWAYS used to take more than 15 seconds just on the IDE devices, it now takes about 3-4 seconds).

Ever since I bought the board I would sometimes have a problem where it would get stuck at POST if I had the SATA devices set to AHCI. Wouldn't even allow me to enter the BIOS at all. The solution was to remove the SATA connector from the HDD, enter BIOS, set SATA to IDE, plug HDD back in, remove all partitions from HDD, go back into BIOS and set it back to AHCI. Since deleting the partition table always fixed the issue, I never thought it would be a problem with the motherboard itself.

I'm more than happy to try the steps mentioned above, but those seem to be directed mostly at the issue with the USB booting directly. Do you think all the other issues are also related and could all be fixed with a prolonged CMOS clear?

[Dark Mantis]

To be perfectly honest it is hard to say but it certrainly wouldn't do any harm apart from the time taken to reset your preferences in the BIOS afterwards.

[Cogu]

Just tried the suggested steps and it seems to have worked.

Haven't had a chance to try everything out yet, but USB boot, AHCI and detecting USB drive with QFlash all seem to work.

The one thing I noticed right after going into the BIOS after the prolonged CMOS clear, applying the optimised settings and when trying to save is that instead of the pc restarting on exit it completely powered itself off for about 5secs and then back on. Is this normal nehaviour?

I am now wondering if this completely fixed the problem or if it just temporarily fixed it and if there is an underlying issue. Reason I ask is because the board is still under warranty and if it is likely to be a board issue I'd rather have it checked while I still have a valid warranty.

Thx,

Cogu

[Dark Mantis]

Once the CMOS is cleared and the BIOS has new settings inserted it is normal to swith off and then back on to do a cold boot so to speak.

You really don't need to worry about your warranty anyway as Gigabyte supplies a three year warranty with all it's boards.

[Cogu]

I'm still keen on having a stable working environment, as oppose to something that might crash again tomorrow Ofc

Basically my question/concern at this stage is if the motherboard itself might be damaged or if this was just a tiny little issue with the CMOS and it is now fixed, never to bother me again.

Cogu

[Dark Mantis]

Sometimes thesae boards have a leftover CMOS memory from when they were tested at the factory and if that is different to your setup(which it almost certrainly will be) the old CMOS wont match what it finds in your system so it can cause conflict. There is no reason to think that your problem should return but of course nothing is impossible.

[Cogu]

The bit that confuses me about that is that previously, it was working. If it had been a problem with the configuration it came with from factory, wouldn't the problem have been there forever, as oppose to working fine for three month and then going wierd?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not doubting you or anything, I'm just trying to understand why it only happened now.

Cogu

[Dark Mantis]

I agree that would be the most sensible explanation but sometimes these things don't seem to follow common sense. They are computers after all. I can only suggest using it and see what happens as with all these issues you can only postulate what might have caused them.

[davegibelli]

I have a similar issue with booting from USB Flash drive. My BIOS is FA but this machine will not boot from USB at all.

I will also try the BIOS reset as advertised above.

[Dark Mantis]

Hi

Have you with the USB stick inserted tried pressing F12 as you are booting and when the boot list comes up selecting HDD and then your USB stick on the next page ?

Have you got Legacy USB Devices and Legacy USB Storage enabled in the BIOS ?

[davegibelli]

I upgraded to BIOS FD

I have removed all disks bar one. So I have a DVDRAM drive on IDE Channel 4 master and a 80GB Maxtor 6Y080P0 as slave. USB-HDD is the first boot device with second and third disabled. Also I have:

USB Controllers = Enabled
USB Keyboard Function = Enabled
USB Mouse Function = Disabled
USB Storage Function = Enabled
Onboard USB 3.0 Controller = Enabled

If I press F12 and select Hard Disk, my USB flash drive is there and if I select this the board says the following:
Verifying DMI Pool Data .............
Boot from CD/DVD :
DISK BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER

Any suggestions?

[Dark Mantis]

Well technically you don't need to have your DVD or HDD connected either to do a BIOS flash form USB stick. I would suggest doing a long CMOS clear and clear the DMI too.

I know you have already tried to clear the CMOS but this is a more thorough way. Please do EXACTLY as described.

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 6 hours 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 Opimised 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.

[davegibelli]

I waited 7 hours to be sure but still the motherboard will not boot from the USB flash, this flash still boots in my Lenovo T500 laptop.

The flash drive does not show in the F12 hard disk menu. However, selecting F12 in BIOS (Load CMOS from BIOS) fixed the fact that the USB-HDD0 did not show up in the boot option. But still the MB refuses to boot from this USB stick (1gig with Fedora 14 on it).

Any other ideas?