Updating Gigabyte Secondary BIOS

[mda]

Hi All,

Looking for a way to update the secondary BIOS on an X470 Ultra Gaming, or even choose from which BIOS it uses.

The board in question does not have a BIOS selector switch.

I may be planning to update my rig to a Zen2 based 3600/X since I can repurpose the 2600X for another system that doesn't need the grunt of the Zen2 CPUs, but I'm worried that the BIOS may one day magically decide to go back to it's launch date secondary BIOS which does not support Zen2 CPUs and I'll need to go through a lot of crap just to fix it.

Thanks!

 

[Denpepe]

Give this a read https://forum.giga-byte.co.uk/index.php?topic=8013.0

 

[mda]

I'll try that tonight. Went through the manuals and there was nothing. I actually came across that site but since it was from 2012, I doubted it was still relevant. I guess right now I have nothing to lose, heh.

Thanks!

 

[mda]

Update: Spamming ALT+F10 or ALT+F12 currently doesn't work.

Any other ideas? Scared of the idea of running Zen2 on this board now heh.

 

[pendragon1]

have you asked GB?

 

[mda]

Yup, made a ticket with them last night since I thought Id be needing the board SN.

Their support mentioned that there was a 3 to 7 day turnaround time to get a reply.

I'll update this thread if I hear from them.

 

[pendragon1]

some posts i found were saying that you have to boot into the backup bios and then flash it. they say to turn off the system and press and hold the power and reset for about 10 second, let go and it should boot into the backup.

 

[mda]

Will try that tonight. Thanks!

Edit:

What holding the power and reset button for 10 seconds actually did was to wipe the BIOS settings. I'm not sure if the secondary BIOS is also now on F50a or not.

I've tried setting my RAM speed to something I know the cpu/board/RAM can't handle and on settings reset it was still on F50a. Not sure how to confirm if the secondary BIOS is flashed already or not, though.

 

[mda]

Got a reply from Gigabyte.

I'll be quoting them verbatim:

Procedure as below:

1. Prepare DOS bootable USB with any utility, most users prefer using Rufus: https://rufus.ie/

2. Select the USB device you wish to clear and create into a bootable USB

3. Select to create as MS DOS boot.

4. Download the BIOS file from our website. It should includes the BIOS file, and efiflash file.

5. Boot into the DOS USB and locate the BIOS folder with following command without the quotations: "cd FOLDERNAME"

(Please make sure AMD CPU fTPM / Intel Platform Trust Technology option in BIOS is set to disabled. If it is enable during the BIOS update, it is possible for the BIOS update to result in a failure.)

6. Enter commmand without quotations and replace BIOSFILENAME with actual BIOS file name: "efiflash.exe BIOSFILENAME /DB"

7. The flash process should start for both BIOS and reboot when finished.

-----------------------------

Edit: I'm dumb and should have checked earlier and I wouldn't have needed to file a ticket.

The Gigabyte BIOS package has this in their readme:

efiflash [Input or Output File Name] [Command]..

Switch options for Efiflash.exe:
/C - Clear DMI data. (default: Keep DMI data)
/S - Save Original BIOS Image to Disk
/R - Reboot System after BIOS Update
/DB- Update both main & backup BIOS

At least I'll be confident if/when I make the switch to a Zen2/3 CPU.

Hope this helps anyone with a Gigabyte X370/470 and B350/450 that has DUAL BIOS and is using a newer chip.

 

[mda]

I can confirm that above procedure works. I guess this is the end of the thread.