Gigabyte X58A-UD5 motherboard bios questions.

[Arty30]

Hello, not sure if this is the right thread or if it should be under repair. I acquired a gigabyte X58A-UD5 motherboard. It appears to be a nice board that has never been used. I also came upon a free i7 970 that should work in said board however I could not get a post, with the 2-digit post code stopping on what looked like "b8".Of course this is not a code mentioned in the user manual. I looked online a bit and only really found a thread mentioning it, and mentioned something with the CPU being the culprit. That brought me to look for a CPU support list for this board and I found one that listed a bios version along side it, notably the majority had version "F1", while the 6-core 970 had "F6". currently I believe this is my issue, however I have no way to verify the bios version on my board currently. I came to this thread to possibly get any info on how I might be able to find my bios version based on date or part/serial numbers. I have a date of Dec 25, 2009, on paperwork in the box. It seems like a long shot but it would be sweet to get this board going again.

[wraper]

Check for bent pins in CPU socket.

[rsjsouza]

Since the BIOS can be upgraded without replacing the part, to be honest I would buy a cheap core i7 920 on eBay (some go for as low as $9 with free shipping) and bootstrap your new board.

The core i7 920 was part of the first round of CPUs of this family that was supported by all X58 chipsets from the start.

[ejeffrey]

The normal approach is to get an older CPU that the factory bios supports and use that to update the bios, then swap CPUs.  Some newer systems can update bios from a USB flash drive even without a CPU present but assuming this motherboard doesn't have that feature getting an old CPU is the best option.

[wraper]

If you have experience with electronics best option is desoldering FLASH IC and programming a new bios. Cheap SPI/I²C programmers can be purchased for a few bucks.

[Arty30]

Thanks for the suggestions, I just have these parts laying around and I don't need another computer, so I'll probably leave it be or pass the parts on. even the 970 isn't worth a whole lot these days, and it seems lga 1366 is at that point where it's not old enough to be valuable nor new enough to hold up to today's games/workloads.

[amyk]

b8 is usually RAM related. What RAM are you using?

[Arty30]

I was using 2x4gb 1600mHz G-skill RipJaws. I tested them in another system and they seem to work.

[rsjsouza]

Did you try with three memory sticks? These processors work ideally with triple channel, but I am not sure if they work with single or dual channel.

[wraper]

Did you try with three memory sticks? These processors work ideally with triple channel, but I am not sure if they work with single or dual channel.

They work with singe stick.

[Arty30]

Good news, I found a working $5 Dell Studio XPS that donated it's 6GB generic DDR3 1066 and a i7 920. motherboard fired right up,  easily updated bios to version F6 and now my i7 920 works no issues.

[rsjsouza]

Thanks for reporting back the outcome of your issue - this might help others in the future.

Unfortunately not many have the decency to come back to their original thread after getting an answer/solution/tip...

[Arty30]

I just realized I said 920 that second time. I meant 970, the one that wasn't supported before. The process was actually super simple. I put the file on a floppy since that was what it was set up for, and used a built in utility to update it. A matter of hitting enter a few times later, the bios was updated.