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Questions about GIGABYTE products => Motherboards with AMD processors => Topic started by: frozen_sun on November 26, 2011, 06:24:46 pm

Title: GA-870A-USB3L and Phenom II X4 960T,do I need to flash BIOS or not?
Post by: frozen_sun on November 26, 2011, 06:24:46 pm
I am planing to buy both this MB and CPU AMD Phenom II X4 960T in local store.I am planing to build PC by myself but before I do that I want to know if this CPU will work on your motherboard withot upgrading/flashing BIOS.I don't want to mess with flashing BIOS,and I really don't know which revision of BIOS I will get on that motherboard.
Title: Re: GA-870A-USB3L and Phenom II X4 960T,do I need to flash BIOS or not?
Post by: absic on November 26, 2011, 06:46:26 pm
Hi there,

looking at the CPU support list http://www.gigabyte.com/support-downloads/cpu-support-popup.aspx?pid=3801 I feel that you will need to update the BIOS before you will be able to run the 960T on this motherboard.

You will need a processor supported by the F2 BIOS to allow you to update to the F4 version. If you have a CPU that is supported then flashing the BIOS is pretty straight forward and you can easily do this yourself using QFlash. Check out this guide: http://www.gigabyte.com/support-downloads/cpu-support-popup.aspx?pid=3801

Another option is to ask the supplier to flash the BIOS to the F4 version before they ship it to you. They may make a charge for doing this but it would save you a lot of headaches.
Title: Re: GA-870A-USB3L and Phenom II X4 960T,do I need to flash BIOS or not?
Post by: frozen_sun on November 26, 2011, 06:56:53 pm
Hi there,

looking at the CPU support list http://www.gigabyte.com/support-downloads/cpu-support-popup.aspx?pid=3801 I feel that you will need to update the BIOS before you will be able to run the 960T on this motherboard.

You will need a processor supported by the F2 BIOS to allow you to update to the F4 version. If you have a CPU that is supported then flashing the BIOS is pretty straight forward and you can easily do this yourself using QFlash. Check out this guide: http://www.gigabyte.com/support-downloads/cpu-support-popup.aspx?pid=3801

Another option is to ask the supplier to flash the BIOS to the F4 version before they ship it to you. They may make a charge for doing this but it would save you a lot of headaches.

I guess I will let them do that,the problem is I ain't buying MB+CPU in my current country,I need to travel to foreign coountry and buy there.So basically they first need to plug CPU which was supported by F2 version,flash BIOS to F4 and then plug 960T?Did I understand correctly?
Title: Re: GA-870A-USB3L and Phenom II X4 960T,do I need to flash BIOS or not?
Post by: absic on November 26, 2011, 07:07:17 pm
Yes you've got it right.
Title: Re: GA-870A-USB3L and Phenom II X4 960T,do I need to flash BIOS or not?
Post by: frozen_sun on November 26, 2011, 11:02:29 pm
Yes you've got it right.

Motherboard can't be flashed when I plug only 960T?Why?
Title: Re: GA-870A-USB3L and Phenom II X4 960T,do I need to flash BIOS or not?
Post by: absic on November 27, 2011, 08:57:10 am
If the motherboard is shipped with an earlier BIOS version than F4 which is needed to support the 960T then when you put this processor onto the motherboard and try to start it up it won't POST or start properly, therefore you won't be able to flash the BIOS. The motherboard needs to be able to get past POST to allow the flashing of BIOS.

The problem is you don't know which BIOS version your motherboard will be shipped with as it could have sat on the vendor's stock shelf for some time.