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Totally K0'd My Bios


saparonia
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H Im new to the forum and also only been using Linux for a few months. I thought I'd post for the sake of other newbies using the disk partition tool in Mandriva.

I installed mandriva as I had bought the Mandriva Live Cd before I bought my computer which came with Ubuntu Linux pre-installed, and then Ubuntu decided to change the keyboard language to arabic when I installed the automatic upgrade last week.

I quite liked Mandriva except that I found the installation of the new java upgrade to 6.14 almost impossible within the konsole. (I don't understand why nobody has written a wizard or made it easier to install an automatic upgrade for java as its so basic to online games.)

 

I decided to retrieve data from the old hard drive which still had Ubuntu on it although of course it was inaccessible at least it would be until I could find a way to change keyboard settings on a system that I couldn't access without a password......

 

I started the partition thing in the configure hardware section and successfully retrieved all my photos and other stuff. Having gained some confidence I decided to change back to the other large hard drive and install mandriva as my permanent OS, so this I did , also with no hiccups, but now there was a problem with the sond on my online game although sound was fine on everything else, and I had stuff on the 2nd smaller drive that I wanted on this larger one, so I ran the partition program again to try to transfer files.

This time it semed to think the disk was already mounted and the options I got were to either move files or keep them hidden. I decided to move them and it began to format the partition. I knew straightaway I'd made a fundamental error but wasn't sure how bad. Of course you people who read manuals will know that I'd erased the BIOS of my computer. I now have to buy a new chip because theres no way Im going to attempt to programme the existing one, even with the tools putting in the new one which comes fully operational is going to be a physical nightmare.

I wonder why for the sake of people who aren't born complete with knowledge of how to use Mandriva tools there isn't a warning like "You are about to lose your computer please stop".

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This time it semed to think the disk was already mounted and the options I got were to either move files or keep them hidden. I decided to move them and it began to format the partition. I knew straightaway I'd made a fundamental error but wasn't sure how bad. Of course you people who read manuals will know that I'd erased the BIOS of my computer. I now have to buy a new chip because theres no way Im going to attempt to programme the existing one, even with the tools putting in the new one which comes fully operational is going to be a physical nightmare.

I wonder why for the sake of people who aren't born complete with knowledge of how to use Mandriva tools there isn't a warning like "You are about to lose your computer please stop".

This does not make any sense. Formatting a hard drive has nothing to do with the BIOS. Even partitioning the hard drive will not affect the BIOS. Are you saying you get no BIOS or manufacturer splash screen when you turn on your computer after it has been shut off (cold start)? If you boot up a Live CD such as Mandriva One you don't see anything on the display? Do you at any time see anything on the display?

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Of course you people who read manuals will know that I'd erased the BIOS of my computer.

Can believe a whole lot of stories, but this never ever has nearly occurred to me.

Cannot even imagine how you reached this point of disasterness.

Anyway, the best advice in repartitioning is, to make a good backup in advance.

And as you most probably will have done, nothing so much is wrong.

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Firstly, a warm welcome to MUB.

 

 

You say you managed to erase your bios while you were in Mandriva ???.

 

I don't think so. Other more experienced posters can correct me if I am wrong. I don't believe Mandriva was responsible for your problem at all.

 

Sure you can erase partitions by doing something incorrectly while in the OS or while installing an OS but usually you cannot do anything to the bios from an OS, you generally have to to enter the bios BEFORE booting into the OS ( except for programs designed especially for reflashing the bios which can be done with more recent modern motherboards).

 

I think you may have erased your MBR (Master Boot Record) instead which has nothing to do with the bios.

 

To restore the MBR, insert your CD or DVD you used to install the OS, reboot and use the Repair/Rescue as you reboot into the Rescue mode of the Disk. Select Restore MBR.

 

Cheers. John.

Edited by AussieJohn
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i used the partition programme to move files across and it gave me 2 options, either move or hide. What I didnt realise was that Id wiped the residual memory of the motherboard. I was stunned that it could do this.

 

The computer starts to boot but wont load any of the bios not even setup, it only displays the post bios message if im quick to press tab, and the keyboard only works for a few seconds, just long enough to select setup or bios

 

 

Also Iv tried using the live cd, it was already set to boot it first, tried making a boot win98se disk an that didnt work, tried making a hard drive with 98se on it on another computer to boot from an that didnt work either. tried both linux hard drives and i have no floppy drive.

Edited by saparonia
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The HD partitioner does not touch the BIOS, nor it could do so if the intention was there.

Simply check the condition of your onboard battery- this is the most probable reason the BIOS isn't loading.

If you still believe that the HD partitioner wiped your BIOS, then you're probably mixing computers with Star Wars.

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I agree Mandriva (or any other Linux) cannot have corrupted your BIOS.

Every motherboard has a procedure to do a CMOS reset, usually it's 2 pins on the motherboard that need to be shorted for a few seconds while the computer is switched off.

Check the manual of your motherboard and follow the procedure to reset the CMOS memory.

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I think you may have erased your MBR (Master Boot Record) instead which has nothing to do with the bios.
I agree with AussieJohn.

I agree with both of you.

 

@ saparonia- What is the name and model # of your motherboard?

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Well I finally acepted that my BIOS couldn't have been wiped so began to look at other possibilities. I put in the win98se hard drive I'd made and attempted to go into setup at the boot. I left it runing and went away as setup wasn't loading. After 35 minutes(!!) it decided to open setup and I changed the boot sequence to boot from HD. It wasn't booting so I left it again and then after another 15 minutes windows tried to load. It said there wasn't enough memory to load windows, so I went through the startup again which took another 35 minutes and in setup I reset to defaults. I got the same message about memory. I then borrowed a stick of extra ram from another computer and tried again. This time it went straight into setup. I halted the computer and put the mandriva HD back in and reset it to boot from the Live CD. It was angelic and did just what I asked it and so I formatted the HD and reinstalled Mandriva. Then I took out the extra stick of RAM and restarted and its fine.

 

Very strange.......... but Im happy now so tank you for lending me your brains

 

Must have been somethng left in the RAM? Is that star wars again!? lol i dont know but obviously the motherboard has developed autonomy haha

 

 

Oh and it's an Asus P5N-MX motherboard, dual core intel processor, plenty of ram, sata hard drive.

Edited by saparonia
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Check again the status of the CMOS battery. If the battery is tilt, then you should expect all sorts of anomalies.

Nobody can tell for sure if your RAM was faulty... did you run a thorough memtest on your old ramstick(s)?

The worst scenario is that the mainboard is misbehaving. In that case, it would be quite difficult to find a replacement- only secondhand ones, with no warranty.

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I doubt your battery is bad; your motherboard is too new for that to be a likely cause.When the cmos battery starts going you get symptoms like the date and time resetting. Without a good cmos battery, the cmos cannot retain its setting when power is removed and it keeps resetting to the cmos defaults. From what you describe, the most likely causes are/were bad ram or a failing power supply. It's almost surely a hardware issue, however.

 

If you want to test your ram use a utility called memtest. A lot of livecds like Parted Magic have memtest as a boot option:

 

http://partedmagic.com/

 

Just boot up with Parted Magic and select Memtest from the boot options. Let it run for a couple hours and see if any errors are reported.

 

You need special equipment to test a power supply.

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