I'm pretty sure, this card should work with any v4 agp bios. And may be with v5 agp too

Tv and dvi doesn't matter at all

Thanks for the reply.

I have a version 1.15 file for V4 4500 and I'm thinking I'll try that, but the normal V4 4500 is known to be a AGP 4x 1.5V card and this one is a AGP2x 3.3V even if it has two notches.

My experience of flashing video cards is close to zero. I know the procedure but I never did one. Most likely there are differences between the retail card(full PCB) and this OEM card(L shaped). If I know correctly this L shaped card was only sold bundled with a complete system. If I have the video BIOS file I can do it no problem.

https://www.3dfxzone.it/dir/3dfx/voodoo5/bios/roms/
http://www.rashly3dfx.com/files/bios.html

http://3dfxbios.stantoworld.co.uk/

Here's the BOOT screen and the information that was presented to me before it was shipped.

PCI.EXE in DOS.

Bios doesn't cares about shape of pcb. And about agp signal level too. L shaped card will work on 1.5v agp too by soldering just one resistor

I heard about this method but I've never seen it explained stept by step 😀

populate r97 0ohm

I took the 3dfx flash V2.17 program and the regular VGA BIOS 1.15 from this site https://3dfxbios.cl-rahden.de/index.php?title=Voodoo4

I followed the flashing procedure but I received ane error message saying that the EPROM chip is not supported by the flash program...DAMN.

1. I put in a folder on the HDD, C:\V4\ , the 3dfx flash 2.17 kit composed from the following files flash.exe, dos4gw.exe and readme.txt
2. In the same folder I also put the stock VGA BIOS V1.15 from the site above which I renamed to V115.rom
3. I booted into DOS and from the folder I launched flash.exe v115.rom
4. I selected from the list the V4 card: 1
5. The flash procedure couldn't continue because the EPROM chip wasnt supported....Error: Unknown flash EEPROM manufacturer. (Man. ID: FFh, Dev. ID: FFh)

The README.TXT from the 3dfx flash, versions V2.13, V2.14 si V2.17 clearly states: "The following flash parts are supported: AMD 29010, ATMEL 29010, ATMEL 49F010, SST 29EE010, SST 39SF010 and Atmel AT49BV512." I only tried the V2.17 and because the README.TXT listed the same supported chips I didnt bother to try another version. Only V2.XX are for the V4 and V5.

My card has the EEPROM CHIP: SST 39VF512 / SST39VF512 / SST MPF 39VF512 90-3C-NH 0014159-D UU002

It seems that the EvilKing is all bark and no bite...aka KAPUT.

I tried to do a copy of the bad VGA BIOS with the dumpbios.exe/dumpbios64.zip program but I couldnt select the card PCI or AGP and the program made only a copy of the S3 VGA BIOS.
http://3dfxbios.stantoworld.co.uk/

I found two sites from 2007 in which a guy with a v5 5500 PCI with the same EEPROM BIOS chip had the same problem. Even back then it couldn't be solved, so my hopes of recovering my card have gone up in smoke...
http://www.modlabs.net/forum/topic/10947/
http://www.david-baum.de/board/index.php?page … &threadID=13324

I might remove the BIOS chip and try to reprogram it using a BIOS programmer but I'm not going to do this anytime soon. I need a good soldering/hot air station and a BIOS programmer. At the moment I dont have any of these. Another solution would be to use a EEPROM chip with better support. Good luck finding that... After this experience I think it is obvious that a stock V4 VGA BIOS file wouldnt run on this card. I would need a PowerColor EvilKing IV VGA BIOS file which is hard to find.

In all the 3dfx flash kits I searched I found files that had the same date, size, MD5 / CRC32. I dont think that I'll find a flash program to support my chip SST 39VF512 . All the README.TXT files list the supported EEPROM chips as: AMD 29010, ATMEL 29010, ATMEL 49F010, SST 29EE010, SST 39SF010 and Atmel AT49BV512.

I still need a VGA BIOS file for my V4. If someone has it maybe he can send it to me.

Thanks in advance.

The reported Man. ID FF and Dev. ID FF look worrisome. I had a blown EEPROM that reports the same FF for both IDs. SST39VF512 should report BF, D4 for Man. and Dev. IDs, respectively.
If your mobo's BIOS has enough space you can try to squeeze video BIOS into your mobo's BIOS.

So many words...

Obviously, you have hardware malfunction, and blame software for it. Keep trying to find unique bios for this card

It seems the BIOS chip is dead - happened to me on Banshee card once. I guess the only way to repair it is to solder a new one and then flash V4 BIOS. I recommend to solder a socket on the card instead of the BIOS chip, it might come handy. Also I also believe BIOS of V4 L or anything else makes little difference. The issue here is not the file. Btw - I have no idea where I got this list but it states 39VF512 as supported:

Atmel: 29010, 49F010, 49BV512, 29LV512; SST: 29LE512, 29EE010, 39SF010, 39VF512; AMD: 29010

Did a long search.... found this site: https://3dfxbios.cl-rahden.de/index.php?title=Flash-Tools

It says this about the 3dfx flash program version 2.13 release notes: '' Added support for the SST 39VF512 flash part.''

This site also has two bios files for the Evilking L-Card but one says ''corrupted, do not flash'' so be careful. The other one is for the tv-out version (maybe it works anyway?)

Since there are Evilking versions, maybe the bios files are not the same as for the normal v4 agp?

Good luck! I do not like to mess with Vga biosses in any way or form unless it is REALLY needed (i did revive my voodoo 4500 pci from a bad flash).
But i do have a working agp voodoo4 L-Card so dumping the bios should be possible....... if nothing else works for you.

Yeah, V4 is actually very simple compared to modern HW... and therefore regular BIOS from reference 3dfx/STB V4 really should work - GPU is the same, memory is the same, clocks are the same.... and thats it. 😀 Anyway if everything else fails, I can provide BIOS from my PC V4 non-TV. http://hw-museum.cz/vga/60/powercolor-evilking-iv-non-tv

unexpected lack of support for one specific bios chip made me retire one HD 3850 back when it was relatively new, for some reason I corrupted a bios attempting to flash it, card was no longer detected, following some advice I reseted the bios chip with a short on the correct pins and the card was again detected, but for flashing an empty chip like that it required some specific support and every flashing tool supported lots of different chips for that but not the one on my card, found another person with the same problem (same chip), only solution was to flash the chip directly externally

Thank You very much meljor - I didnt see that indeed the V2.13 version lists the SST 39VF512 / SST39VF512 / SST MPF 39VF512 90-3C-NH 0014159-D UU002 chip, as supported. I thought that the V2.17 or V2.14 include the changes from the previous V2.13, but it seems it is not the case. I was so fed up with this V4 that I wasnt thinking straight 😁

I tried the V2.14 from that site and it said bad format on exec. It seems that the DOS4GW.EXE is bad in that archive. I tried running the program from the HDD C:\ and from floppy A:\ but I received the same error message. I took the DOS4GW.EXE from the v2.13 archive and then the v2.14 flash.exe worked but I received the same message as V2.17 - Error: Unknown flash EEPROM manufacturer. (Man. ID: FFh, Dev. ID: FFh)

Then I took the V2.13 version and I tried to flash a regular V4 4500 V1.15 bios from that site and this time I received another error message which GAVE ME A LOT OF HOPE:

THE INFORMATION IN THE BIOS FILE DOES NOT MATCH THE SELECTED HARDWARE. Continue (y/n)? Of course I said NO.

@meljor - I really need the VGA BIOS FILE for the L-shaped V4 card. If you have the time I BEG YOU to send it to me or upload it on the net so that other might use it. I really want to put this V4 story to rest and to know if it is dead or not 😀

@havli - if you also can send me the VGA BIOS FILE for your card it would be AWESOME. That card looks almost like mine so the chances of succes are pretty good.

I know that the work needed to upload the VGA BIOS files I need, require time and effort. All your help will be greatly appreciated 😀

Thanks for everybody who posted their thought and tried to help.

Who knows maybe this story will have a happy end...only time will tell...

THANK YOU Vogons Community 😀

I also have an "L-shaped V4". Are you still looking for a "BIOS dump" ?
Or is someone already making one?

Please do. Otherwise i will make one sunday and post it here.

I'll take as many VGA BIOS files as you can provide. They will be put to good use and I'll even send them to other people 😀 ATM I have none 😁

As soon as I'll receive them I'll try to see if my card is working or not. To think that back in the day I tought little about these cards and now 17 years later I'm trying to recover one is really something 😁

When you send of upload them please specify the model so that I wont mix them up.

Thanks for your help 😀

Ok I'll dig for my card.
Where should I upload the result to?