BIOS gone haywire

[canidae]

Every now and then my machine freezes and I need to do a hard re-boot, as the keyboard and mouse are unresponsive. No big deal, as the reboot goes off with no problems. No error events are seen in the Event Viewer after reboot.

This last time was just a bit different. On reboot the BIOS sent a message that it's time and date were wrong. Once into setup it showed me a date of 01/01/2002. Fixed that - reboot then gives me a message of an OS load error :mad

Back into setup, and the boot sequence is missing my boot drive :eek. I figured my drive had failed

Further into setup I found the device list, with my Seagate (boot drive), my WD and my Maxtor all listed, but out of order. I put my Seagate back into it's first place - reboot - no problems.

Thoughts - CMOS battery? Virus? or, I was running a new defrag program when my machine went to screen saver (yeah, probably should have disabled the SS), but I wonder if it could have jacked up the BIOS in some way :dunno

 

[sierrabravo]

try going to the website that makes you computer and use your computers model type to find an updated installation for the BIOS. might help

 

[PoopaSwoof]

Looks like the bios was reset to default.It could be the cmos battery It could be an impending motherboard failure.

Inspect your motherboard and look for bulging/leaking electrolytic capacitors(the little metal cans).
If any are bulging or leaking goo, time for a new MOBO.

Your power supply could be the problem too.
In your Bios check and see if your voltages are ok. If they are 1~2 volts lower than they should be then that might be the problem.

 

[Codrus]

are you thinking voltage fluctuations?

was that a 430 ,440 ,450 or 500 that gave you that problem....

 

[canidae]

try going to the website that makes you computer and use your computers model type to find an updated installation for the BIOS. might help

The BIOS was updated a while back, and ASUS hasn't released anything for the P4C800-E for a while now. But, I will see if it shows the current BIOS version. But I would n't think it was possible for th BIOS to revert back to a pervious version - unless the computer was possesed :eek

Looks like the bios was reset to default.It could be the cmos battery It could be an impending motherboard failure.

Inspect your motherboard and look for bulging/leaking electrolytic capacitors(the little metal cans).
If any are bulging or leaking goo, time for a new MOBO.

Your power supply could be the problem too.
In your Bios check and see if your voltages are ok. If they are 1~2 volts lower than they should be then that might be the problem.

I'll get into it tomorrow, and will have a look. Last BIOS upgrade was '05, so the mobo is a bit dated. And I've been pushing the system pretty hard of late.

VCore 1.41
+3.3 is 3.28
+5 is 5.03
+12 is 12.34

all steady

Odd, my GPU diode temp shows 226ºC eek:eek that can't be right, can it?

 

[Codrus]

Odd, my GPU diode temp shows 226ºC eek:eek that can't be right, can it?

is it onboard with passive cooling?, when was the last time you blew out your system and checked your fans?
i ran into an instance with a laptop with a passive cooled video, the gpu would get hot enough to swell and pull the pins away from the board cuasing all sorts of hell, untill finally the video went out completey and i could no longer use.

it would be anything from the touchpad wouldnt work, reboot, freeze, memory dump blue screen etc.

 

[canidae]

is it onboard with passive cooling?, when was the last time you blew out your system and checked your fans?
i ran into an instance with a laptop with a passive cooled onboard/shared video, the gpu would get hot enough to swell and pull the pins away from the board cuasing all sorts of hell, untill finally the video went out completey an i could no longer use.

it would be anything from the touchpad wouldnt work, reboot, freeze, memory dump blue screen etc.

PCW2009 says GPU Diode is now 229C,

Everest, ASUS probe and PCW all say now the mainboard is 125C.

Back when I took the original GPU Diode temp Asus said the mainboard was well below alert temp.

THE vid card is a 7800GS with two fans. The CPU has it's fan and heatsink. I've got three case fans and the case side is off.

CPU temp 43C
GPU Ambient 36C

I just cleaned the thing out a few weeks ago.

Fan RPMs all look good

 

[Codrus]

are you using the asus ai overclocking utility?

 

[canidae]

are you using the asus ai overclocking utility?

Yeah, you da man :clap

I had just started the ai OC because I thought it would give me a GPU temp. I had it set for a 7% OC and it set that once the program started. I shut it down after I saw there was no GPU temp on it, and I think that's when the MB temp went through the roof.

I just rebooted, and the BIOS says MB temp is 28C, and that's now confirmed with ASUS probe and PCW.

PCW still says the GPU diode is 229C

 

[Codrus]

is the diode directly under the chip or is it touching it?

 

[canidae]

is the diode directly under the chip or is it touching it?

Don't know that at present. I'll have to do some poking around in there tomorrow. Everything else seems to be working with no problems, and the temp is stable, if extreme.

Thanks for the help :thumbup - I'll see if I can find out more tomorrow

 

[Tuffdisc]

Probably you had a jumper set in the Clear enable, and you accidentally or didn't know what a particular button was, and it erased all the settings