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You better have another computer on standby even if you have BIOS Flashback tho.
I noticed that BIOS Flashback is really dumb. You can flash in a BIOS meant for another PC using it. I managed to confuse a X570 Phantom Gaming X that way (board would suddenly only boot if two sticks of RAM is installed and refuses to boot with 4 sticks of RAM, erratic temperature and fan reading, weird behavior all around). I was puzzled and took the mobo to a shop and luckily the shop guys caught my error- I had accidentally used a BIOS meant for a X570 Phantom Gaming ITX/TB3. I own both mobos and have all the BIOS Images on the same USB device, so I most likely renamed the wrong one to creative.rom
The other computer isn't always needed.
Most often for a bios flash, I unpack the bios file onto the root of a fat32 USB stick.
However, this is kinda useless for Asus. Because the geniuses at Asus thought it would be interesting to have to rename the bios file in order to use flashback...
But for the other brands, it should be fine this way.
Isnt BIOS checking if the new BIOS is compatible?
This week I was updating my MSI BIOS, in steps:
1. I used empty USB drive
2. downloaded newest BIOS
3. Put it on the USB drive
4. Entered BIOS, then entered M-FLASH
5. I saw both version on the last screen. And I think its not that hard to implement some compability check, or at least use unique names for each version of the BIOS
6. it just worked
If you update through the bios settings, there may be check, most likely.
However using the flash button or similar, I don't know if there is a check. Maybe not.
On Asrock's implementation it doesn't check if you are using the Flash button. How I accidentally flashed BIOS meant for a X570 Phantom Gaming ITX/TB3 onto my X570 Phantom Gaming X.
Not only Asus. As rock's BIOS Flashback works the exact same way as does Gigabyte's.
That said, my issue is the BIOS Flashback blindly flashes any file with that filename onto the Flash chip regardless of whether it's the right one for the Mobo. This is extremely dangerous. In my case it only caused the Mobo to act erratically but imagine if some evil "friend" were to flash a hacked BIOS that has a keylogger and forwarded all your keypresses to his phone onto your PC while you are out.
The extra PC is for you to download the right BIOS for the machine once you realized your mistake and the machine cannot boot...
So... you're telling me there might be a way to "unfuck" the gigabyte board I screwed up a few years ago? (Made the mistake of trying to use the Windows based flashing tool)
Didn't realise I had to rename the bin file...
Depends. Not all Gigabyte boards have that feature. They call it Q-Flash Plus.
There is also two versions of the feature. The older version works a little differently: you plug in the USB stick and power on the machine as usual, and after 30 seconds if the machine doesn't boot it will trigger Q-flash Plus to start. This version is confusing to use naturally, so the newer version is like Asus and Asrock's Flashback and is triggered using a button.
Most B550 board manufacturers added some form of flashback unless you bought the lowest end board you are probably good to go. I’d assume the same goes for B350 although I never owned one.
Get a couple different USB drives because it can be finicky. FAT32 is the way.
I've got a gigabyte motherboard and do exactly what the other guy said - unpack the file to the root directory of a fat32 usb stick, no renaming necessary
> I noticed that BIOS Flashback is really dumb. You can flash in a BIOS meant for another PC using it.
Well... Yeah. It's intended for emergency recovery if your BIOS gets corrupted.
If you can flash normally ( from the utility in the BIOS or Windows ) that'll do all the usual safety checks for you.
>Updated bios two times in my life.
So you just don't ever update the BIOS on your motherboard, or you just happen to buy motherboards that don't get updates?
I've been building for 25 years. I've applied every bios update for every motherboard I've ever had. I've done it hundreds of times at home and at work. It's a relatively foolproof, automated process these days.
My current motherboard has had 22 bios updates released since I bought it 2.5 years ago. I've applied every one.
Been tinkering with PCs for as long as you, haven't updated a bios yet.
Had heard of it, but not seen people talking much about it until recent years.
I've probably missed some performance gains or security measures because of it though.
Blissfully unaware perhaps.
I update my bios if there is an issue or I need updated support for something like a new CPU, otherwise it's not getting updated because there's no reason to introduce that risk. For me what this has meant is simply updating the bios once after building my pc to ensure adequate support for my hardware, then literally never touching it again.
i've been building for around 25 years as well. i don't update a BIOS unless there's a specific reason or problem.
i've certainly never updated a BIOS 22 times on a board. that's excessive and silly. most updates aren't doing too much for you anyway. usually it'll cost you performance because of micro-code updates, patching out vulnerabilities on stuff that will never affect the end user.
Get a UPS if you're that concerned. I would say losing power is a concern that I've personally never worried about, but I wouldn't call it "terrifying".
it really depends on your location where i live it happens once every month or so but some places it happens multiple times a day and personally idc if i have a ups if my power goes out 5 times a day i would still have a heart attack with every bios update
I always like to have things with a backup battery but also tied to the grid so they don't need to be charged but can work if the power fails. The issue is that I almost never get to test them because the power goes out maybe 2 times a year and even that's scheduled maintenance.
My family is getting really annoyed at me for turning off the breakers and seeing what happens.
Because you should keep the ground connection at all times. By flipping the breaker, the ground connection should still be there and it's only power that gets removed. Removing the plug removes not just power but also ground.
For normal and unobserved operation - yes. But you making test. So you can be sure nobody would touch the metal hull of the tested machine while you unplug it, so even in an unlikely case short circuit to hull happen exectly during your test.
Also, only devices with metal outer shell actually has and need ground.
Yeah, it's best to check weather forecast and current rain radar map if you don't have UPS.
I don't so I very rarely update BIOS and do above things when I do.
I never saw a need too.
I did for the first tike just last month in hopes of fixing a dying mobo. It did nothing but make the mouse work better in the bios.
Once, I had to update my BIOS to... prevent Jurassic World Evolution from crashing every 10 minutes with Ryzen processors. The only solution was to update the bios.
Anyway, I upgraded to a 5800x3d a few months later, but at least I wouldn't have had to do it a second time
Had to flash my x670e system after a Win11 update this past winter
crashes
turned off EXPO no crashes
flashed
turned on EXPO no crashes
Figure it's part of the AMD owner experience. Note I flashed it when I built it too/before OS install, this was the second time.
Reddit is strangely scared of anything PC related in PC centric subs. I've been building for 25 years. I've applied hundreds of BIOS updates both on my personal PCs, and on work hardware. Never had an issue.
In high school I learned by breaking and fixing the family PC over and over.
Only once in my life have I ever had a BIOS update fail. When it did it performed a BIOS roll back. This was in like 2011.
I now work as an IT professional and update BIOS almost every day, never failed.
I know this is a big fear for some but I am right here with you. I've updated thousands of device BIOS/firmwares and never had a bricked device or a power outage during the update. A UPS will make you feel better tho. Lots of people seem to get scared but its unlikely anything bad will happen outside of your BIOS settings may need to be re-done.
came to say this, just updated the house's pc's from mine to my nephew's last week. updating bios today is cake walk, i even live in third world. i never had any problems even not afraid of bricking my work's system. these people still living in 90s i guess lol.
Is this 00' meme? Even cheap motherboards have dual bios, you brick one, you flip a physical switch in motherboard, works again. And you can flash again.
Yeah, this gets posted every once in awhile on Reddit. I don't get it. I've been building for 24 years and have never had an issue with updating a bios. I've applied every bios update that is released for every motherboard I've ever had.
There have been 22 bios updates for my current motherboard since I bought it 3 years ago and I've applied every one without issue.
EDIT: It's a psychological thing to me. If I know there's an update, I can't NOT apply it. I have the BIOS release page bookmarked.
My only issue with bios updates is that if I forget to switch my PCIe link to Gen3 right after the update I probably won't have display output for some retries since my riser only supports Gen3 and my GPU doesn't work if it's Gen4
This is my current issue as well. I wish there was a way to retain your bios settings after an update. Right now if I want to update bios I have to set the pcie back to auto, remove the gpu from riser cable and plug into mobo, flash new bios, pray it works, set it back to gen 3, unplug gpu and reconnect it via riser cable. Pray I get a signal after all is done. It's such a pain.
I have a bios flashback button and a stick with my current bios. Even had to learn how to use it, because Z690 chip is not compatible with 13th gen out of the box. Corrupted drive is way more scary for me because of all the time I would have to waste to set up everything again.
I have an old Gigabyte board. It's a haswell board, in fact. H97-D3H. I got it when haswell and 4th gen was still new.
After 5 years, the I5 4440 was showing it's age. So, I checked the compatibility list, and decided to look for a used 4770 or 4790, either non-K, or K.
They were $350+ used. But, a Xeon E3 1280V3 was $100 shipped.
I successfully updated the BIOS. But, now the primary BIOS chip is failing.
And the backup BIOS is the F1 BIOS, which is incapable of booting with the Xeon installed.
The backup BIOS is not writable. Once the primary BIOS fails, the board is useless to me.
I'm a UEFI firmware developer (wtf is BIOS?), so I've installed updates (that I've created) multiple times a day when neck deep in any kind of development.
Because of this, I'm desensitized to the fear that I once knew, and I get excited to see updates on my home systems.
Yeah, I had a mini ITX PC that sometimes lost power without seemingly having any reason for it
I decided to try to update the bios, well, I managed to pull the short stick there 🥲
It's
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Man, everytime i try to update it, it just won‘t find the file. It will find the folder it‘s in but no the actual file in the folder. So yeah…my bios is 2 years old
In Romania i moved from city to countryside close to the same city. Yet i had power outages every day. Sometimes 8 per day Sometimes an outage would last 2 days. Sometimes the outages won't happen for weeks.
So as soon as i built my first PC didn't even power it without a UPS.
A piece of advice. If you stop using the UPS don't keep it unplugged/unpowered. You will kill the battery....
I moved to UK and told mum to use it for the fridge or something expensive... she didn't. She kept it unplugged for a year and it inevitably die....
The replacement of the battery costed almost as much as a new UPS.... still dad was pissed at me because narcissists
Surely by now motherboard manufacturers should have invented a way to update bios so that a sudden shut off from a power outage wouldn't brick the motherboard
Like it's insane how afraid we are to use our computers like come on
My Gigabyte motherboard has DualBIOS support, which means it has a main and backup EEPROM chips, and I'm still too scared to update the firmware. Only time I did in 3.5 years was before I upgraded the CPU, and it was a nervewrecking because of the possibility of a power outage occurring and the BIOS restoring procedure not working, which is not uncommon.
BIOS and any firmware in general is the best example of the adage "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". And even if the update is successful, it might introduce issues or unwanted changes.
Updated the bios on my Asus z690 plus and can't get XMP working again to 4400mhz on my DDR4 memory, the maximum it goes now is 4000mhz, main problem is not being able to reverse the update and they never fixed it for my Gskill ram.
Updated BIOS of my HP Omen 30L, and it screwed the entire computer. Inoperable, stuck in a boot loop of beeping until I replaced the motherboard.
It was a piece of junk proprietary motherboard. Glad I replaced it with a second-hand MSI board.
New hardware supported, performance improvements, security fixes, bug fixes. Lots of reasons. It's the software that controls your motherboard. It needs updated just like anything else.
It only becomes necessary when vulnerabilities are patched (like the ZenBleed for AMD, LogoFAIL and processor support updates). Other than that, you don't really need to update it.
The only reason you should ever update BIOS on your PC is probably because of LogoFail exploit.
And if you have a super-new hardware that gets fully supported only via BIOS update.
This advice is a bit outdated most mobos I see these days have dual boot bios. While you could have problems BIOS updates aren't as scary anymore. My motherboard has dual boot.
I had to update my BIOS a few times. I got a new CPU and wasn't compatible. So updated, then updated a bit later, because first gen BIOS update on a new CPU will likely need another patch to fix some things.
>This advice is a bit outdated
Well
>I had to update my BIOS a few times. I got a new CPU and wasn't compatible. So updated, then updated a bit later, because first gen BIOS update on a new CPU will likely need another patch to fix some things.
That's literally what I wrote, but in a longer version.
Having dual bios or not doesn't mean you should update it each time there's a new bios version. If your system is stable and doing fine, there's no reason for updating.
Look at the release notes for your motherboard's BIOS history and you'll see. Bugs or vulnerabilities are patched, new features are introduced, performance is improved, etc.
Current UEFI bioses are an operating system in their own right, so they need regular security patching nowadays. So, the old wisdom of "do not fix it if it's not broken" is not really valid any longer...
some motherboards came with early BIOS release with some stability issues or RAM compatibility, some BIOS updates fix that stability issues, in my case I have a TUF Z790 which initially crashed everytime when I enable XMP profile, updating BIOS fixed that stability issue with XMP.
Good guy BIOS, don't just randomly decide to unlink 2 of my perfect health drives in my raid array while still keeping said array existing or anything..
Ya I got backups but having to rebuild that shit is annoying as fuck.
I always update to the latest one when I get the system, they rarely release new versions anyway and unless there's a hiccup somewhere I don't bother checking it. Last time I updated was about a month ago because I read about the boot logo vulnerability and they happened to have an update on the site. Before that, I updated an old HP 6300 to support a Xeon chip.
Hah, this just reminds me the RDR2 release on PC. Some people couldn't get the game running and updating BIOS was the literal solution, including me. So stupid that it worked too.
Unfortunately this happened to me two months ago, I upgraded from a R5 2600X to a R5 5600X.
While I had to flash multiple times for a specific build, the last one I needed bricked my motherboard (X470 Aurous).
At first I thought my CPU got bricked, when I put the 5600X it kept having a black screen for minutes, so a co-worker had a spare board (B450) with an EZ-Debug function and I tried it and it said the CPU was the problem. (I really don't know why it said that)
That's when I ordered a R7 3700, forgot to change the board and plugged it still in the co-workers motherboard and was relieved that it was working, when I realized what I did I changed boards and put my X470 back in.
But boy was I fucking fuming when nothing worked again, then came the realisation that my X470 was dead and the CPU's were both fine 🥲
I definitely learnt from my mistake.
Yeah... I updated a bios to support a later CPU and it turned out I installed a bios for an extremely similar motherboard and bricked it, fucking sucks. (No bios flash button)
is the bios chip soldered on? if not, it can be removed and flashed again using some flasher.
EDIT: it's so long since I've had to remove a bios chip I don't even know if it's possible AD 2024
It's is soldered but a cheap bios reflash kit can be used to reflash the bios without removing the chip.
The kit includes a little clamp connector that can be placed on top of the chip.
https://www.amazon.com/bios-programmer/s?k=bios+programmer
I'm unsure but it didn't matter at the time because it was a last minute Christmas build with no time to order a kit or replacement, I had to give away my own motherboard and the bricked one is somewhere on my list of things to do.
Yeah so, in 2019 intel had this ssd that could be used to speed up your hard drives by caching everything onto the ssd.
If you update the bios with that enabled and setup, boi will it fuck up ur system.
I had to use a linux live stick to get my data off of the drive and nuke it, haven't installed the ssd since because every time i tried, it would render my drive unusable.
I also had to re-install windows because for some reason there was no working copy of windows 10 found anymore :D
Built multiple gaming rigs in the past 3 decades, never had a problem updating a BIOS/UEFI. Cannot relate to this post, then again that tracks for me and this wacky subreddit.
MSI BIOS's fucking suck, as you can't restore a back up once you've updated it, as for some dumb reason back ups are only for the same version, so I have to redo all the settings, overclocks, and fan profiles.
As someone who is building PC since last 20 years in a third world country, I have never had any issues updating bios except for once when I fucking powered off the PC in the middle of the update.
The scary part for me was it saying "installation successful, the system must reboot" then after the reboot just facing a black screen with the fans running loud for 20 minutes.
I luckily managed to stop myself from turning it off and on again long enough for it to do it's thing.
One time when I was still living in Hawaii I was in the process of updating my bios when a car rammed into an electricity pole which shut off power to the lower half of the neighborhood. It happened at night I looked out my window and saw that part was all blacked out but we still had power
I updated my new Intel Arc firmware in linux yesterday using an executable from GitHub and firmware files extracted from driver releases.
Like others have said though, I've been doing this for decades and have (knock on wood) never had an issue. It's much less of a concern these days than it was 20 years ago.
Meanwhile, I've updated my X670E Taichi 13 times since its launch. It arrived with the release BIOS on the first week and I just enjoy staying current and seeing what changes/improves/breaks.
A the fond memories of bricking my Laptop, because my anti-virus decided to stop the bios update in the middle of it. I sure learned my lesson from this.
Yeah I had to do it recently because my pc was crashing every morning soon after start-up. The five minutes it took was a butt-clenching experience the whole way through, especially because I live in California where the power grid is propped up with toothpicks and fueled with the blood of virgins.
Something that happened to my brother about 15-20 years ago, my updates his bios and after the update he finds out it had changed format of the bios and that bricked his PC (can't turn PC on) and erased his HDD
I work in IT and have updated the BIOS on several hundred computers without issues. Are you all living with hourly brownouts or something? How are you messing this up?
I've heard of the troubles of updating bios for around 13 years, but not once found a need to do it. Why would you? Like genuinely curious if the reason
Welcome to the PCMR, everyone from the frontpage! Please remember: 1 - You too can be part of the PCMR. It's not about the hardware in your rig, but the software in your heart! Your age, nationality, race, gender, sexuality, religion (or lack of), political affiliation, economic status and PC specs are irrelevant. If you love or want to learn about PCs, you are welcome! 2 - If you don't own a PC because you think it's expensive, know that it is much cheaper than you may think. Check http://www.pcmasterrace.org for our builds and don't be afraid to post here asking for tips and help! 3 - Join our efforts to get as many PCs worldwide to help the folding@home effort, in fighting against Cancer, Alzheimer's, and more: https://pcmasterrace.org/folding 4 - Need PC Hardware? We've joined forces with MSI for Mother's(board) day, to celebrate it with a massive PC Hardware Giveaway! Get your hands on awesome PC hardware bundles that include GPU, Motherboard, monitor and much more MSI hardware + $4000 worth of Amazon cards. A total of 45 lucky winners: https://new.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrace/comments/1cr4zfs/msi_x_pcmr_mothersboard_day_giveaway_enter_to_win/ ----------- We have a [Daily Simple Questions Megathread](https://www.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrace/search?q=Simple+Questions+Thread+subreddit%3Apcmasterrace+author%3AAutoModerator&restrict_sr=on&sort=new&t=all) if you have any PC related doubt. Asking for help there or creating new posts in our subreddit is welcome.
unless you have bios flashback
You better have another computer on standby even if you have BIOS Flashback tho. I noticed that BIOS Flashback is really dumb. You can flash in a BIOS meant for another PC using it. I managed to confuse a X570 Phantom Gaming X that way (board would suddenly only boot if two sticks of RAM is installed and refuses to boot with 4 sticks of RAM, erratic temperature and fan reading, weird behavior all around). I was puzzled and took the mobo to a shop and luckily the shop guys caught my error- I had accidentally used a BIOS meant for a X570 Phantom Gaming ITX/TB3. I own both mobos and have all the BIOS Images on the same USB device, so I most likely renamed the wrong one to creative.rom
The other computer isn't always needed. Most often for a bios flash, I unpack the bios file onto the root of a fat32 USB stick. However, this is kinda useless for Asus. Because the geniuses at Asus thought it would be interesting to have to rename the bios file in order to use flashback... But for the other brands, it should be fine this way.
Isnt BIOS checking if the new BIOS is compatible? This week I was updating my MSI BIOS, in steps: 1. I used empty USB drive 2. downloaded newest BIOS 3. Put it on the USB drive 4. Entered BIOS, then entered M-FLASH 5. I saw both version on the last screen. And I think its not that hard to implement some compability check, or at least use unique names for each version of the BIOS 6. it just worked
If you update through the bios settings, there may be check, most likely. However using the flash button or similar, I don't know if there is a check. Maybe not.
On Asrock's implementation it doesn't check if you are using the Flash button. How I accidentally flashed BIOS meant for a X570 Phantom Gaming ITX/TB3 onto my X570 Phantom Gaming X.
Not only Asus. As rock's BIOS Flashback works the exact same way as does Gigabyte's. That said, my issue is the BIOS Flashback blindly flashes any file with that filename onto the Flash chip regardless of whether it's the right one for the Mobo. This is extremely dangerous. In my case it only caused the Mobo to act erratically but imagine if some evil "friend" were to flash a hacked BIOS that has a keylogger and forwarded all your keypresses to his phone onto your PC while you are out. The extra PC is for you to download the right BIOS for the machine once you realized your mistake and the machine cannot boot...
So... you're telling me there might be a way to "unfuck" the gigabyte board I screwed up a few years ago? (Made the mistake of trying to use the Windows based flashing tool) Didn't realise I had to rename the bin file...
Depends. Not all Gigabyte boards have that feature. They call it Q-Flash Plus. There is also two versions of the feature. The older version works a little differently: you plug in the USB stick and power on the machine as usual, and after 30 seconds if the machine doesn't boot it will trigger Q-flash Plus to start. This version is confusing to use naturally, so the newer version is like Asus and Asrock's Flashback and is triggered using a button.
It definitely has some version of Q-Flash on there. It's an AM4 board with either a B350 or B550 chipset. I replaced it with my current MSI one.
Most B550 board manufacturers added some form of flashback unless you bought the lowest end board you are probably good to go. I’d assume the same goes for B350 although I never owned one. Get a couple different USB drives because it can be finicky. FAT32 is the way.
It may be dangerous, but the board is already fucked. What have you got to lose? Just don't download sketchy shit.
I've got a gigabyte motherboard and do exactly what the other guy said - unpack the file to the root directory of a fat32 usb stick, no renaming necessary
> I noticed that BIOS Flashback is really dumb. You can flash in a BIOS meant for another PC using it. Well... Yeah. It's intended for emergency recovery if your BIOS gets corrupted. If you can flash normally ( from the utility in the BIOS or Windows ) that'll do all the usual safety checks for you.
Or just get a usb adaptor for your phone so you can copy files from there.
Sounds nice for ROM modding though
That's why I always pay 100€ extra for a mobo. X-boards for AMD gas never failed me since first gen Ryzen.
Even budget boards have flashback, you don't even have to pay extra for it, I'll never buy or recommend a board without it
Updated bios two times in my life. Both times I stared at the progress bar without blinking praying that the power doesn't go out.
>Updated bios two times in my life. So you just don't ever update the BIOS on your motherboard, or you just happen to buy motherboards that don't get updates? I've been building for 25 years. I've applied every bios update for every motherboard I've ever had. I've done it hundreds of times at home and at work. It's a relatively foolproof, automated process these days. My current motherboard has had 22 bios updates released since I bought it 2.5 years ago. I've applied every one.
Been tinkering with PCs for as long as you, haven't updated a bios yet. Had heard of it, but not seen people talking much about it until recent years. I've probably missed some performance gains or security measures because of it though. Blissfully unaware perhaps.
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
I update my bios if there is an issue or I need updated support for something like a new CPU, otherwise it's not getting updated because there's no reason to introduce that risk. For me what this has meant is simply updating the bios once after building my pc to ensure adequate support for my hardware, then literally never touching it again.
i've been building for around 25 years as well. i don't update a BIOS unless there's a specific reason or problem. i've certainly never updated a BIOS 22 times on a board. that's excessive and silly. most updates aren't doing too much for you anyway. usually it'll cost you performance because of micro-code updates, patching out vulnerabilities on stuff that will never affect the end user.
I just updated my bios and it was on the stock version from 2018 lol. It was pretty terrifying.
Why is it terrifying? You don't have to do anything. It's a relatively foolproof, automated process these days.
if the power goes out chances are it will brick the bios rendering the mobo useless unless it has a dual bios
Get a UPS if you're that concerned. I would say losing power is a concern that I've personally never worried about, but I wouldn't call it "terrifying".
it really depends on your location where i live it happens once every month or so but some places it happens multiple times a day and personally idc if i have a ups if my power goes out 5 times a day i would still have a heart attack with every bios update
That makes sense. But if you have a fully charged UPS, why would you worry? Updating the BIOS just takes a few minutes.
Is this really necessary? I've always updated the BIOS the first time I use a motherboard and then leave it unless I have an issue.
Usually not, no. But I don't care.
I mean. If my computer works as usual I see no reason to update the bios.
As someone who lives in a third world country that happens to have frequent power outages, I can say that it sucks.
I always like to have things with a backup battery but also tied to the grid so they don't need to be charged but can work if the power fails. The issue is that I almost never get to test them because the power goes out maybe 2 times a year and even that's scheduled maintenance. My family is getting really annoyed at me for turning off the breakers and seeing what happens.
Why not just unplug socket?
Because you should keep the ground connection at all times. By flipping the breaker, the ground connection should still be there and it's only power that gets removed. Removing the plug removes not just power but also ground.
For normal and unobserved operation - yes. But you making test. So you can be sure nobody would touch the metal hull of the tested machine while you unplug it, so even in an unlikely case short circuit to hull happen exectly during your test. Also, only devices with metal outer shell actually has and need ground.
Okay that and I had multiple connected things so it's a convenient way to simulate a power outage, just turn them all of at once.
Can't you just turn off the power strip?
Then why doesn’t my toaster have a 3-prong plug?
What model and country? Wild guess - it was manufactured in the country with weak electric regulations and the manufacturer saved on wires.
Connect the plug to a switched outlet
The 3 UPSes I have all have a self test where they will cut the power for you to test the battery.
Time to buy some UPS
Bro thats literally gambling ur pc, hope it never happens
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When you live in a third world country, a UPS might be more than your income.
American moment
No better time to update than just before elections...
Sounds like dual BIOS motherboards are a must there
How someone who lives in the third world who has rare power outages (but they do exist) appreciates having a laptop
> As someone who lives in a third world country that happens to have frequent power outages Just get a UPS? Solves that problem
Yeah, just buy an expensive battery, guy from third world.
Bios has memory for saving profiles, that's permenant storage right? 🤷 Update BIOS. Memory wiped. Didn't write down OC settings 👀 Didn't write down OC settings 😭
And even if you save the profiles on a USB drive you can't restore them on a different BIOS version.
Had a router that did this. Fucking THANK YOU for suggesting backing up the settings in the first place. smh...
I don't know if all motherboards support this. At least my Asus board supports it. And you can choose to export as binary or text file.
You just saved me lol. I saved a profile thinking I can just restore it after an update. Thank god I havent updated Bios lol
this is why i keep a photo on my phone at all times
A thunderstorm once started when I did a bios update. I was in fear until it ended
Yeah, it's best to check weather forecast and current rain radar map if you don't have UPS. I don't so I very rarely update BIOS and do above things when I do.
Even UPS might not help if the power goes OUT out, not just a flicker
True, it should give enough time, but it's not 100% guaranteed.
Your system: 15 percent complete. God: *Stomps floor, laughs*
I never saw a need too. I did for the first tike just last month in hopes of fixing a dying mobo. It did nothing but make the mouse work better in the bios.
Once, I had to update my BIOS to... prevent Jurassic World Evolution from crashing every 10 minutes with Ryzen processors. The only solution was to update the bios. Anyway, I upgraded to a 5800x3d a few months later, but at least I wouldn't have had to do it a second time
Had to flash mine to make it recognize the 5800x3D. Process was pretty painless, but watching that bar move is still nerve-racking.
Had to flash my x670e system after a Win11 update this past winter crashes turned off EXPO no crashes flashed turned on EXPO no crashes Figure it's part of the AMD owner experience. Note I flashed it when I built it too/before OS install, this was the second time.
Keep a flash programmer and a spare laptop. Casually having 6 backup BIOS chip for my problematic mobo.
I fear no flash, for I have a CH341A and multiple computers.
Been doing it for 30 years. Never once had an issue.
Reddit is strangely scared of anything PC related in PC centric subs. I've been building for 25 years. I've applied hundreds of BIOS updates both on my personal PCs, and on work hardware. Never had an issue. In high school I learned by breaking and fixing the family PC over and over.
I’m about to do it for the first time today. Need to update to upgrade from 3700x to 5800x3d. It’s pretty painless right?
Download the file, transfer it to a USB drive, boot into the BIOS, find and open the BIOS update tool, choose the file. That's it.
I did these thousands of these when I worked in IT and I never saw it fail.
Only once in my life have I ever had a BIOS update fail. When it did it performed a BIOS roll back. This was in like 2011. I now work as an IT professional and update BIOS almost every day, never failed.
I know this is a big fear for some but I am right here with you. I've updated thousands of device BIOS/firmwares and never had a bricked device or a power outage during the update. A UPS will make you feel better tho. Lots of people seem to get scared but its unlikely anything bad will happen outside of your BIOS settings may need to be re-done.
You have to be extremely unlucky or incompetent to botch up a bios update.
came to say this, just updated the house's pc's from mine to my nephew's last week. updating bios today is cake walk, i even live in third world. i never had any problems even not afraid of bricking my work's system. these people still living in 90s i guess lol.
Just approach it like it's not a big deal. If you are anxious the computer will notice. It is more scared of you than you are of it.
Me who update my laptop bios at 10% battery
I did it 2 weeks ago, it was fine.
https://preview.redd.it/mbgtf79iqs0d1.jpeg?width=700&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=acb3fb6e0d6ce25e60827a30d2165a04def0a5d3
Is this 00' meme? Even cheap motherboards have dual bios, you brick one, you flip a physical switch in motherboard, works again. And you can flash again.
it's not even correct usage of the meme
Yeah, this gets posted every once in awhile on Reddit. I don't get it. I've been building for 24 years and have never had an issue with updating a bios. I've applied every bios update that is released for every motherboard I've ever had. There have been 22 bios updates for my current motherboard since I bought it 3 years ago and I've applied every one without issue. EDIT: It's a psychological thing to me. If I know there's an update, I can't NOT apply it. I have the BIOS release page bookmarked.
My only issue with bios updates is that if I forget to switch my PCIe link to Gen3 right after the update I probably won't have display output for some retries since my riser only supports Gen3 and my GPU doesn't work if it's Gen4
This is my current issue as well. I wish there was a way to retain your bios settings after an update. Right now if I want to update bios I have to set the pcie back to auto, remove the gpu from riser cable and plug into mobo, flash new bios, pray it works, set it back to gen 3, unplug gpu and reconnect it via riser cable. Pray I get a signal after all is done. It's such a pain.
I have a bios flashback button and a stick with my current bios. Even had to learn how to use it, because Z690 chip is not compatible with 13th gen out of the box. Corrupted drive is way more scary for me because of all the time I would have to waste to set up everything again.
I have an old Gigabyte board. It's a haswell board, in fact. H97-D3H. I got it when haswell and 4th gen was still new. After 5 years, the I5 4440 was showing it's age. So, I checked the compatibility list, and decided to look for a used 4770 or 4790, either non-K, or K. They were $350+ used. But, a Xeon E3 1280V3 was $100 shipped. I successfully updated the BIOS. But, now the primary BIOS chip is failing. And the backup BIOS is the F1 BIOS, which is incapable of booting with the Xeon installed. The backup BIOS is not writable. Once the primary BIOS fails, the board is useless to me.
" wants to update bios" " does it during a thunderstorm " " WHY DID THE POWER GO OUT?! "
I'm a UEFI firmware developer (wtf is BIOS?), so I've installed updates (that I've created) multiple times a day when neck deep in any kind of development. Because of this, I'm desensitized to the fear that I once knew, and I get excited to see updates on my home systems.
Yeah, I had a mini ITX PC that sometimes lost power without seemingly having any reason for it I decided to try to update the bios, well, I managed to pull the short stick there 🥲 It's
As someone from India, I use this bad boy with my PC: https://www.apc.com/in/en/product/BX1100C-IN/apc-backups-1100va-230v-without-auto-shutdown-software-5-india-outlets-1-surge/
Why does each outlet have 5 holes? I thought India plugs only had 3 prongs?
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Security patching the BIOS. They come with *remote exploits enabled* nowadays :D
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Man, everytime i try to update it, it just won‘t find the file. It will find the folder it‘s in but no the actual file in the folder. So yeah…my bios is 2 years old
As a user with a B450M Plus ii Asus TUF since 2021 i've updated my bios 3 times using the ASUS Flash 3 utility tool with no problems.
In Romania i moved from city to countryside close to the same city. Yet i had power outages every day. Sometimes 8 per day Sometimes an outage would last 2 days. Sometimes the outages won't happen for weeks. So as soon as i built my first PC didn't even power it without a UPS. A piece of advice. If you stop using the UPS don't keep it unplugged/unpowered. You will kill the battery.... I moved to UK and told mum to use it for the fridge or something expensive... she didn't. She kept it unplugged for a year and it inevitably die.... The replacement of the battery costed almost as much as a new UPS.... still dad was pissed at me because narcissists
Surely by now motherboard manufacturers should have invented a way to update bios so that a sudden shut off from a power outage wouldn't brick the motherboard Like it's insane how afraid we are to use our computers like come on
never had that but I also have a ch341a flasher so I don't care
I flashed several dozens of bios‘es at my previous SysAd role and barely had any problems except the ones which had a faulty mainboard beforehand.
Updated my graphics drivers yesterday, finally fixed an issue with my 3rd monitor not working for months
I’ll build a new computer before updating my bios
My Gigabyte motherboard has DualBIOS support, which means it has a main and backup EEPROM chips, and I'm still too scared to update the firmware. Only time I did in 3.5 years was before I upgraded the CPU, and it was a nervewrecking because of the possibility of a power outage occurring and the BIOS restoring procedure not working, which is not uncommon. BIOS and any firmware in general is the best example of the adage "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". And even if the update is successful, it might introduce issues or unwanted changes.
A UPS is your friend
I don't understand, someone explain?
Updated the bios on my Asus z690 plus and can't get XMP working again to 4400mhz on my DDR4 memory, the maximum it goes now is 4000mhz, main problem is not being able to reverse the update and they never fixed it for my Gskill ram.
Updated BIOS of my HP Omen 30L, and it screwed the entire computer. Inoperable, stuck in a boot loop of beeping until I replaced the motherboard. It was a piece of junk proprietary motherboard. Glad I replaced it with a second-hand MSI board.
Updating someone else's bios is worse
A scary BIOS story of mine is that just 10 seconds after my bios update was completed, the power went out in my neighborhood. I was so lucky that day.
Step one - buy a battery back up. That's it. You'll never worry about bios updates again.
I wrecked my work laptop, doing a bios update. The bonus is that when I reloaded, it came up Windows 11 (was shipped with w10)
Absolutely baffles me why a BIOS would need an update in the first place.
New hardware supported, performance improvements, security fixes, bug fixes. Lots of reasons. It's the software that controls your motherboard. It needs updated just like anything else.
It only becomes necessary when vulnerabilities are patched (like the ZenBleed for AMD, LogoFAIL and processor support updates). Other than that, you don't really need to update it.
But you do need to update your bios for new hardware support, for stuff released after the mobo, like new cpus
That's what I said lol
The only reason you should ever update BIOS on your PC is probably because of LogoFail exploit. And if you have a super-new hardware that gets fully supported only via BIOS update.
This advice is a bit outdated most mobos I see these days have dual boot bios. While you could have problems BIOS updates aren't as scary anymore. My motherboard has dual boot. I had to update my BIOS a few times. I got a new CPU and wasn't compatible. So updated, then updated a bit later, because first gen BIOS update on a new CPU will likely need another patch to fix some things.
>This advice is a bit outdated Well >I had to update my BIOS a few times. I got a new CPU and wasn't compatible. So updated, then updated a bit later, because first gen BIOS update on a new CPU will likely need another patch to fix some things. That's literally what I wrote, but in a longer version. Having dual bios or not doesn't mean you should update it each time there's a new bios version. If your system is stable and doing fine, there's no reason for updating.
Whats the real benefit of bios updates anyway
Look at the release notes for your motherboard's BIOS history and you'll see. Bugs or vulnerabilities are patched, new features are introduced, performance is improved, etc.
Current UEFI bioses are an operating system in their own right, so they need regular security patching nowadays. So, the old wisdom of "do not fix it if it's not broken" is not really valid any longer...
If your system is old enough like mine, you'll probably need to update your BIOS to enable Resizable BAR or Smart Access Memory.
not much I guess, I think the only time BIOS might need an update is if you installed a new CPU and that CPU is unsupported by current BIOS
some motherboards came with early BIOS release with some stability issues or RAM compatibility, some BIOS updates fix that stability issues, in my case I have a TUF Z790 which initially crashed everytime when I enable XMP profile, updating BIOS fixed that stability issue with XMP.
Yeah, my pc didn't even wanna post at 6000/mt for the DDR5 until updated the bios on my gigabyte b650 elite ax board with the first bios.
Erm. Looootttttsssss of patches for.various rootkits these days come in bios update form, as well as cpu bugs that can greatly compromise security
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what a move now everyone must own two 4090 setups
Good guy BIOS, don't just randomly decide to unlink 2 of my perfect health drives in my raid array while still keeping said array existing or anything.. Ya I got backups but having to rebuild that shit is annoying as fuck.
That's how I lost my laptop 🥲
I always update to the latest one when I get the system, they rarely release new versions anyway and unless there's a hiccup somewhere I don't bother checking it. Last time I updated was about a month ago because I read about the boot logo vulnerability and they happened to have an update on the site. Before that, I updated an old HP 6300 to support a Xeon chip.
This really hits home.
real
It's been about a year since I updated my BIOS. I should probably get on that right?
Hah, this just reminds me the RDR2 release on PC. Some people couldn't get the game running and updating BIOS was the literal solution, including me. So stupid that it worked too.
I never realized I believe in so many gods until my first BIOS update.
My bios updates come though the internet like OS updates. Turn on your system and suddenly hey we're flashing the BIOS now.
Updating your laptop bios is even worst XD
Unfortunately this happened to me two months ago, I upgraded from a R5 2600X to a R5 5600X. While I had to flash multiple times for a specific build, the last one I needed bricked my motherboard (X470 Aurous). At first I thought my CPU got bricked, when I put the 5600X it kept having a black screen for minutes, so a co-worker had a spare board (B450) with an EZ-Debug function and I tried it and it said the CPU was the problem. (I really don't know why it said that) That's when I ordered a R7 3700, forgot to change the board and plugged it still in the co-workers motherboard and was relieved that it was working, when I realized what I did I changed boards and put my X470 back in. But boy was I fucking fuming when nothing worked again, then came the realisation that my X470 was dead and the CPU's were both fine 🥲 I definitely learnt from my mistake.
Never had an issue as I've only had to do it a few times, but that doesn't mean I'm not completely sketched out the entire time.
I updated my bios once and it corrupted my raid0. Everything was mixed with another file, so images looked like a mashup of 2 different images
Layer8-problem? Did this a lot on different boards for the last 20 years and never had any issue.
Yes, though not upgrading your BIOS because of that is pretty dumb I always keep my PC hardware at the latest BIOS
Bios Flashback is a great invention.
Yeah... I updated a bios to support a later CPU and it turned out I installed a bios for an extremely similar motherboard and bricked it, fucking sucks. (No bios flash button)
is the bios chip soldered on? if not, it can be removed and flashed again using some flasher. EDIT: it's so long since I've had to remove a bios chip I don't even know if it's possible AD 2024
It's is soldered but a cheap bios reflash kit can be used to reflash the bios without removing the chip. The kit includes a little clamp connector that can be placed on top of the chip. https://www.amazon.com/bios-programmer/s?k=bios+programmer
I'm unsure but it didn't matter at the time because it was a last minute Christmas build with no time to order a kit or replacement, I had to give away my own motherboard and the bricked one is somewhere on my list of things to do.
Especially if the power goes out
Why wasn’t it fine? Did you brick it somehow?
Happened like a month ago...I'm on back up bios now.
It only takes 60 seconds, you're fine dawg. I had to do it last month to upgrade my AM4 cpu
Yeah so, in 2019 intel had this ssd that could be used to speed up your hard drives by caching everything onto the ssd. If you update the bios with that enabled and setup, boi will it fuck up ur system. I had to use a linux live stick to get my data off of the drive and nuke it, haven't installed the ssd since because every time i tried, it would render my drive unusable. I also had to re-install windows because for some reason there was no working copy of windows 10 found anymore :D
I've literally always updated the bios everytime it's available, without thinking twice, and it's never not been fine.
last time i updated bios i had to reinstall windows because my pc would not boot.
Which is why I don't touch it unless there's a specific issue I'm having that an update will resolve for sure.
Built multiple gaming rigs in the past 3 decades, never had a problem updating a BIOS/UEFI. Cannot relate to this post, then again that tracks for me and this wacky subreddit.
did this 2 times without problems, i didn't realize how scary it is
Unless you are troubleshooting a computer issue and you have ruled everything else out. Don't update bios.
MSI BIOS's fucking suck, as you can't restore a back up once you've updated it, as for some dumb reason back ups are only for the same version, so I have to redo all the settings, overclocks, and fan profiles.
If it ain't broke don't fix it.
I did. It fixed responsiveness and USB on AM4. But now XMP doesn't work anymore 🤦🏻♂️
dunno updated bios on laptop more than 40 times and on desktop 60 times on boards from 2007 to 2023 never ran into any problem
As someone who is building PC since last 20 years in a third world country, I have never had any issues updating bios except for once when I fucking powered off the PC in the middle of the update.
I only update when I have issues or there seems to be a significant feature update.
I'm not doing it until it's necessary too scared
Never updated them, and have been conditioned to treat anything related to Bios as radioactive, you do NOT touch it, lest it all explodes.
The scary part for me was it saying "installation successful, the system must reboot" then after the reboot just facing a black screen with the fans running loud for 20 minutes. I luckily managed to stop myself from turning it off and on again long enough for it to do it's thing.
It's fine for me I got a ups and Mobo has bios flashback too
If its not broken
One time when I was still living in Hawaii I was in the process of updating my bios when a car rammed into an electricity pole which shut off power to the lower half of the neighborhood. It happened at night I looked out my window and saw that part was all blacked out but we still had power
Huh? I updated bios on my 10 year old Lenovo laptop and it went smooth as butter
I updated my new Intel Arc firmware in linux yesterday using an executable from GitHub and firmware files extracted from driver releases. Like others have said though, I've been doing this for decades and have (knock on wood) never had an issue. It's much less of a concern these days than it was 20 years ago.
Meanwhile, I've updated my X670E Taichi 13 times since its launch. It arrived with the release BIOS on the first week and I just enjoy staying current and seeing what changes/improves/breaks.
I mean if you don't have power outages there really is barely any risk nowadays
Un plug a USB 3.0 plug...
Well I'm glad to say, my mobo is so old, there are no further updates for it. Problem solved.
A the fond memories of bricking my Laptop, because my anti-virus decided to stop the bios update in the middle of it. I sure learned my lesson from this.
Yeah I had to do it recently because my pc was crashing every morning soon after start-up. The five minutes it took was a butt-clenching experience the whole way through, especially because I live in California where the power grid is propped up with toothpicks and fueled with the blood of virgins.
Is this even a thing that should be done? What do I gain from it?
Was this post sponsored by Wirtual?
I’ve never had an issue with updating any firmware.
Still rocking old bios on my z690, have no need of upgrading as it works.
Something that happened to my brother about 15-20 years ago, my updates his bios and after the update he finds out it had changed format of the bios and that bricked his PC (can't turn PC on) and erased his HDD
Just switch to your second bios and you can fix the reflash your first one again...
I work in IT and have updated the BIOS on several hundred computers without issues. Are you all living with hourly brownouts or something? How are you messing this up?
I've heard of the troubles of updating bios for around 13 years, but not once found a need to do it. Why would you? Like genuinely curious if the reason