I've had this card for over a year now, and just stumbled upon the ability to flash the card to the GHz bios. (It really hasn't mattered much since I kept mine OC'd to 1100/1500 anyways.) I want to go ahead and do it as I have heard there were some other benefits to doing so (besides a permanent OC, so to speak). The problem is, I don't really know how to do it safely. From what I've researched, it appears that the executable file that was released to flash to the GHz bios does it all 100% automatically. However, other things come into play that I'm worried about. I want to either save the stock bios, or use the dual bios feature in case I have to revert back. I don't know how to do either, really. Does the .exe do that for you? I've heard there's a switch to change dual bios? Where is that located? Also, do I have to change the switch before installing a new bios? Anybody who has some insight on this, I'm ready to learn. EDIT: Here's the main discussion I found about the executable -- http://www.overclock.net/t/1281425/amd-release-hd-7970-ghz-bios-upgrade-for-reference-hd-7970
Ok, so here's what I ended up doing, and what ended up happening... I opened my case and made sure the BIOS switch on the card was set to 1. Then I ran the GHz BIOS flash executable. It ran for less than a minute, and then an error appeared that said "rom programming fail". I rebooted, and, as expected, I had no video. So, I shut down using the power button, switched the switch to 2, and it booted up the stock BIOS, no problem. So, now I have a corrupted BIOS on BIOS 1. I have been trying to fix it with no success. I have switched the switch back to 1 while on windows, and then tried the GHz BIOS flash again, but either I get the same error, or a new error that said "Adapter 0 rom not erased." I have tried using the ATI Winflash executable to restore the original BIOS and it gives an error stating "SubsystemIDs mismatch". So... what is going wrong, and what else can I try to fix the original BIOS and still get the GHz bios on there?
Expensive card to try a flash on but it was your choice, you`ll need a second card in your system to run the display off so you can reflash bios 1 on your fudged card. As to the software..ive not used it so someone else might be able to advise you on that. Last time i flashed a bios i used gpuz to dump the original bios and ATI winflash to flash the bios but that was some time ago. Good luck.
I wouldn't have done it if the card didn't come with 2 BIOS's. I suspect you didn't know that, even though I said it in my original post. My card isn't "fudged" by any means. I am booting on the 2nd/stock BIOS just fine. Runs like normal. However, I would like to keep experimenting on my BIOS 1 and eventually get the GHz BIOS to work. But thanks for the attempt at help anyways. You were the only one of like 100 viewers who took the initiative to respond, and I respect the **** out of that. If it's any consolation, I didn't know gpuz could dump the bios, and i am going to try and dump it first, then run the ****. I'll let you know if it works. If someone else has valuable advice, I'm all ears.
One more thing, really... How do you dump a bios? I opened GPUz and found no way to do such a thing. I know you can save the bios (as I have previously done), but i see no "dump" option. Could you perhaps elaborate or give a reference?
Everything's ok. Your card isn't bricked or anything it's just the 1st bios on the card is messed up. I will help you out with this since it happened with me too, but it's easily fixable so no worries. So I will quote from other places. First you need a USB stick, to make it into a bootable USB, then we need Atiflash and then at last, the procedure of fixing the 1st bios switch (and flashing your card with the right bios ). Never use the exe whatever they give you from whatever official websites, it's totally **** and never works. Best way to do it is using atiflash and a bootable usb, very easy. By dumping he means saving the bios. I'll be editing this post shortly.. Ok, so, first we need to make a bootable USB. Download HP USB Format Tool 2.2.3 - http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/Hard-Disk-Utils/HP-USB-Disk-Storage-Format-Tool.shtml Win98DOS files - http://www.bay-wolf.com/utility/usbkey/win98boot.zip Latest atiflash http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/2166/ATIFlash 3.99.html - So just put these files into the USB. And that's it. Now we have a bootable usb with atiflash and you can use this whenever you want to flash any ati card from bios to bios. So.. now we need to get the GHz edition bios into the USB, so for example if the file name of it is whatever.f3 or xxxx.f42 - just change the filename to ghzbios.rom (<- the file name can only be 8 characters long, so there it's 7) and put it into the usb. And also, put the original stock bios into the USB as well that you got from GPU-z, just in case if you want to use it later on. Now we need to boot from the USB to Win98 cmdprompt, so reboot, press DEL right at the start and in the bios options change the Boot Device Priority to 1. USB HDD 2. Hard Disk, save and restart. Now we're in atiflash. So for a start you can type: And then it will do it, and that's it! Then you're sucessfully done. It'll tell you to restart. So just hit the Power button on the computer and shut down, remove the USB and start up the PC, press DEL and go into bios options again and change the Boot Device Priority to the ones you had before.. 1. Hard Disk 2. CD-ROM most likely. Boot up and it should be fine. Check what clocks you have in MSI Ab and GPU-z and stuff. Also, what bios are trying to change it to? Information taken from/credit http://www.overclock.net/t/1313813/new-bios-update-for-gigabyte-hd7950/10 and http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/showthread.php?t=57750
Wow, thank you so much Deathchild. I will be doing this tonight. I haven't had a chance to check on this until now. I'll let you know how it goes. Again, thank you for taking the time to detail this. EDIT: Oh, and I am trying to change the bios to the GHz bios. So, your instructions are perfect.
Just wanted to let you know, Deathchild, that it worked flawlessly. Your instructions were impeccable. Thanks again. I put the GHz BIOS on there. I'll see how it fares. Good to know I can easily go back in case it's not worth it.
Absolutely lovely to see that it worked out. Good job and thank you as well for giving me the opportunity to help you. Yeah, remember, the GHz bios will have higher voltage/vddc there, just be sure to check those things.
