A couple of options…

1. Grab a post card analyzer
2. Grab a BIOS flasher like a Gecu TL866 II T48 Universal Programmer and flash back to the BIOS you were on

Can't be simpler than that! Either the BIOS file, or flash tool were "wrong", so the bios chip is "faulty" now. You need to flash other bios with programmer on this eeprom like zuldan told You in last post, ant that's it! No other option, unless You have same board and You can exchange BIOSes from one board to another 😀
It's not the first time ASUS has wrong tools and bioses on their website....

khyypio wrote on 2024-08-05, 10:05:

I booted to DOS and followed the instructions and the program said the update was succesful, so I exited the program and rebooted. Then there was no picture, the monitor won´t get a signal. I´ve tried the following:

If that update is only partially dysfunctional you can -maybe- get signal with an ISA video card.

Not clear if it's only a 'no video' problem or if the system is otherwise booting properly or not.

1014.003 should be the one to use (what version were you on previously?) and as long as the vrm chip (HIP6019BCB or equivalent) and the PCBA version is OK (see https://web-archive-org.translate.goog/web/20 … &_x_tr_pto=wapp ) can't think what the issue is except a random bad flash.

I recently did my P2B-DS, but used Aflash v2.21 (attached) without issue. One difference between the versions is that v2.21 supports command line options, so maybe if the machine is properly booting you could try a 'blind' re-flash with this version...

ASUS ACPI BIOS
FLASH MEMORY WRITER V2.21
Copyright (C) 1994-2002, ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC.

USAGE: AFLASH [Options] [ROMFile]
/AUTO ROMFile Automated update BIOS without Boot Block and ESCD
/BOOT Update BIOS including Boot Block and ESCD

zuldan wrote on 2024-08-05, 10:15:

A couple of options…

1. Grab a post card analyzer
2. Grab a BIOS flasher like a Gecu TL866 II T48 Universal Programmer and flash back to the BIOS you were on

butjer1010 wrote on 2024-08-05, 10:25:

Can't be simpler than that! Either the BIOS file, or flash tool were "wrong", so the bios chip is "faulty" now. You need to flash other bios with programmer on this eeprom like zuldan told You in last post, ant that's it! No other option, unless You have same board and You can exchange BIOSes from one board to another 😀
It's not the first time ASUS has wrong tools and bioses on their website....

Seems like my only option is to order myself one of those flashers. So, just to be clear: I have to pull out this Award chip with the chrome sticker on it, set it on the programmer and the software installs the BIOS on it?

PARKE wrote on 2024-08-05, 11:58:

khyypio wrote on 2024-08-05, 10:05:

I booted to DOS and followed the instructions and the program said the update was succesful, so I exited the program and rebooted. Then there was no picture, the monitor won´t get a signal. I´ve tried the following:

If that update is only partially dysfunctional you can -maybe- get signal with an ISA video card.

No such luxury as ISA video card in my possession 😁

PC Hoarder Patrol wrote on 2024-08-05, 14:27:

Not clear if it's only a 'no video' problem or if the system is otherwise booting properly or not. […]
Show full quote

Not clear if it's only a 'no video' problem or if the system is otherwise booting properly or not.

1014.003 should be the one to use (what version were you on previously?) and as long as the vrm chip (HIP6019BCB or equivalent) and the PCBA version is OK (see https://web-archive-org.translate.goog/web/20 … &_x_tr_pto=wapp ) can't think what the issue is except a random bad flash.

I recently did my P2B-DS, but used Aflash v2.21 (attached) without issue. One difference between the versions is that v2.21 supports command line options, so maybe if the machine is properly booting you could try a 'blind' re-flash with this version...

ASUS ACPI BIOS
FLASH MEMORY WRITER V2.21
Copyright (C) 1994-2002, ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC.

USAGE: AFLASH [Options] [ROMFile]
/AUTO ROMFile Automated update BIOS without Boot Block and ESCD
/BOOT Update BIOS including Boot Block and ESCD

Filename

aflash.exe

File size

65.38 KiB

Downloads

8 downloads

File comment

ASUS Aflash v2.21

File license

Fair use/fair dealing exception

I don´t think it´s booting properly, as it´s not giving any beeps as it normally does. But if I power it on without any RAM sticks, it gives the warning sound so it has some life in it. Too many twists and turns to try a blind re-flash, it simply won´t amount to anything 😂 I think the previous BIOS was 1008...?

Does it attempt to read the floppy disk when you turn it on?

Karbist wrote on 2024-08-05, 16:47:

Does it attempt to read the floppy disk when you turn it on?

If it beeps without ram, maybe its not fully "wasted" 😀 If the BIOS doesn't function at all, there would be no beeps without ram sticks....
If You don't have any isa graphics cards, the best thing is programmer. It is very easy to operate with software for "flashing" new bioses. You need to remove chrome sticker to see and set the chip version in programmer, erase eprom, load bios bin file, and program it.

Alright, thanks for the help everyone! I hope this thread is useful for anyone who´s struggling with this same board. Here´s a little update:

The only viable option was to purchase one those programmers (XGecu T48) to flash the chip.

I flashed the latest BIOS release to the chip, didn´t work. From there I continued flashing with older versions until finally 1012a.bin brought it back to life. I don´t know if the flash program just required a .bin file. After that I tried flashing from floppy with Aflash and the bios file, version 1013 was the latest BIOS that worked for this board so I´m going forward with this version. Now I just have to figure out what I´m going to with this programmer that I spent 100€ for and don´t need anymore...

However, my issues with this damn board aren´t over just yet. At first it didn´t detect any of the drives, optical nor storage. I initially had 80-wire IDE cables for all of them because many says that they are the best choice because even if the mobo can´t fully utilize them, it just uses them as 40-wire cables. Not so, I swapped them with 40-wire ones and now it sees the drives. Well, at least it sees the SD adapter but it can´t see either a 64 or 16Gb SD card, just says it´s 32 Mb.

It seems that many, or at least some of you are familiar with these boards, have you faced this same issue? Why doesn´t it recognize the SD card, is there something in the BIOS setup that I need to configure?

Asus P2B mobo + very large IDE HDDs = problem?
Maybe the answer is here?

Well, I don´t know what I did but all of sudden it sees the SD card correctly. Go figure... Anyway, thanks for the help everybody!

Maybe you didn't chose the right 1014.003 file as there are a lot different ones for each P2B derivative. Below I attached the right one from ASUS' FTP. I always recommend these latest ASUS betas as they are very stable and have many things fixed. To flash these (older) BIOSes I always recommend UniFlash 1.40 or higher which can be found on my website f.e. (-> https://soggi.org/motherboards/bios-update-fl … h-utilities.htm).

I would give it a second try.

kind regards
soggi