EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

[PCBONEZ]

This is one thing I've never played with...

Any of you have one?
What kind?
How well does it work for you?
Tips and tricks?

Thanks!!!

.

[Gabriel]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

Got one and love it.

I bought a Xeltek 580U, according to Xeltek it supports 34955 chips as of now.
http://www.xeltek.com/SuperPro-580U-pages-254

I buy programming adapters on ebay quite cheaper compared to Xeltek.
Really fun to work with and can not understand why I did't buy one earlier.

[digge]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

I don't have one myself, but if you're getting one i would suggest getting one that can do SPI programming. Many motherboard manufacturers cut down on sockets for the chip just to save a few $.

[NxB]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

Never got one either. The situation came up so few times. I think there are designs you can build yourself somewhere.

[b700029]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

A parallel port connector, a few resistors, and some wire is all you need for the serial EEPROMs.

[Gabriel]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

Also, be careful with those crappy 3m clip adapters - for soic I have had several read and write errors. Dont know if Pomona soic adapters is any better.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

A parallel port connector, a few resistors, and some wire is all you need for the serial EEPROMs.

And a Program to make it do things...
I am not a Programmer.

[Dammon]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

I have an old Pentium II motherboard I use to hot swap bios chips in case of a failed flash. It works well with Uniflash, except for certain Phoenix bioses.

[severach]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

I just bought the True-USB from MCUMall. Parallel is too slow and too much fussing. My chance to use it left on the UPS truck before it arrived.

[bigbeark]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

I have an old Pentium II motherboard I use to hot swap bios chips in case of a failed flash. It works well with Uniflash, except for certain Phoenix bioses.

Can you please explain how you hot-flash the BIOS chip?

[PCBONEZ]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

Can you please explain how you hot-flash the BIOS chip?

You start up the [flash-host] board which loads the BIOS into RAM so the machine can run the floppy drive.
Then with the board powered up you pull it's BIOS chip and install the chip you want to flash.
Then you flash from the floppy drive.
Then you turn it off and switch BIOS chips back.

I suppose it might work with a USB or CD based flash but I've never tried that.

Quite risky but it works.
I've done that several [many?] times in the past but not for ages.

If you don't have a board you can afford to lose that takes the right BIOS chip you are pretty much stuck though..
.

[Gabriel]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

I also use a bios savior, it plugs in to the plcc socket and it has two chips and you can easily switch between them any time. Saved me a few times.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

Heard of those but I'm trying to resurrect boards that were dead when I got them.
Been just shoving those off to the back burner but at this point I have quite a build of of boards with no obvious problems that just won't boot.
A number of them are dual CPU server boards which aren't doing anyone any good in a box.

Also, I wanna play with BIOS modding a little bit and see how much stuff I can break.
[I'll use old P3 boards for that though..]
.

[bp1]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

I also use the MCUmall USB Pro 4X. The company that manufacturers them are in Canada.
This is the one i use http://www.mcumall.com/comersus/stor...idProduct=4312
Ive been using this on motherboard bios chips.
There is a nice review here. http://www.punj.co.uk/punjwebfiles/e...sbprogq4x.html

The good points on this programmer:-
Easy to use
A great support forum on the manufactures website
The forum users help and in some cases help to add new bios chips to the programmer if not supported.
Regular programmer updates by the manufacturer


The bad points:-
None encounted so far

Hope you find the above useful

Kind Regards
bp1

[Scenic]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

I've been using an Asus P3B-F for a while. replaced the original BIOS socket with a ZIF one (example pic 1), and for PLCC32 chips i use adapters (pics 2, 3, 4)

http://www.satistronics.com/images/l...2689745010.jpg

no thrills PLCC32 adapter (cheap)
http://www.zeitech.de/bilder/produkte/gross/140_1.jpg

"better" one with a jumper for 3.3V / 5V
http://www.zeitech.de/bilder/produkte/gross/28_1.jpg

deluxe version with a ZIF PLCC32 socket (much easier to put the chips in and remove them)
http://www.conrad.de/medias/global/c...FB.EPS_250.jpg


for 8pin SOIC Serial EEPROMs i use an older Gigabyte board with messed up RAM slots. doesn't matter as you don't need 2GB RAM for flashing a BIOS in DOS
runs with a 256MB DDR2-533 stick (useless for everything else).

removed the soldered original BIOS chip, soldered wires to the pads and connected it up to a SOIC8 ZIF adapter thingy..

http://www.zeitech.de/bilder/produkte/gross/586_1.jpg

that gigabyte board has no probs flashing chips up to 8MBit. haven't seen bigger ones so far. all that's needed is a modified/patched version of gigabyte's SPI flasher that doesn't stop with an error message if the BIOS file doesn't match the board..


edit: for booting, i use a CF card to IDE adapter with a bunch of bootable old CF cards with a clean DOS and lots of different flashtools and BIOS editors on it.
just stick it into the cardreader of your main PC, put the bios file you downloaded on it and boot it in one of those flash-boards
no need to fiddle around with floppys..

[Per Hansson]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

I'll vouch for the Willem True-USB PRO GQ-4X programmer aswell.
I have it plus allot of adapters, it works really great.
With the correct adapter it can also do SPI flashing, very useful for modern boards...

[PCBONEZ]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

Couple questions.

What does SPI stand for? [I may say "duh" when you answer that..]

Can you read what is recorded into those older 'write once' type chips with these gadgets?

Thanks.
.

[Scenic]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

SPI = Serial Peripheral Interface
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_..._Interface_Bus

edit: and this
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_memory#Applications

[kiddznet]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

Scenic thanks for that info. You would be a handy next door neighbour.

[jay007]

Re: EPROM [BIOS] Programmers - What's good?

Has anybody had any experience with this board/software/support???

http://www.sivava.com/EPROM_Programmer_5.html

I'm in the same boat as PCBONEZ, i have laptop and desktop boards with spinning fans that need resurrecting and re-flashing seems like the way to go.