Here i made for you patched version of latest bios (yeah, 1014.003 - as you note) by suitable version (v4.23) of famous ROM.BY BIOS Patcher. Use it at your own risk! See report.txt inside the archive. Suitable ver. of ASUS flashing utility and patcher itself also in zip file.

rom.by? what util is this? the site is in Russian...

Some sort of universal tools for patching various motherboard bioses (in defined limits ofcourse). This version is a bit old but much more suitable for PI-PIII chipsets era.
Quick readme in english among with util itself inside archive.

I downloaded and tried this utility, using the following command line -

A:\BP-4_23.exe 1014ptch.003

After about 2 minutes of floppy disk based activity, and seeing messages appear on the screen very similar to the example provided inside the report.txt file, I rebooted my PC, and then tried the BIOS's HDD auto detection function, but it still sees a 300gb IDE HDD as approx 8,400 Megabytes in capacity.

Is this problem because my modern 300gb & 320gb HDDs are UDMA 4? I have tried an older 123gb UDMA 2 HDD, and that seemed to be detected correctly by the BIOS.

That rom.by is nice stuff, I've made a few pentium mainboards work with large harddisks with it (Award BIOS).

retro games 100:
If the BIOS doesn't recognize the right size then it's either bugged (couldn't they have made a large dummy harddisk to test their BIOS code??) or you put a jumper on the harddisk that limits its size. It's rather unlikely it has to do with UDMA.

Ah, sorry, my mistake. I didn't take note about 320gb drive. This patch applies only to 28bit LBA limits (prior to 128gb), not for 48bit LBA mode (with size after 128gb borderline).
1014ptch.003 is ALREADY patched by me and patching it twice might cause big problems. Don't!

@h-a-l-9000,

Let's assume the BIOS is "bugged", and the value it is reporting (approx 8.4gb) is a messed-up number, and not really the true capacity that an Operating System installed on this HDD can work with. Is there an application I can run in Windows 98SE, which can test this HDD, to see if it can read and write to the first 128gb of the HDD?

@aleksej,

Unfortunately, I don't understand how to use this rom.by software package.

As mentioned previously, I have done this -

A:\BP-4_23.exe 1014ptch.003

This is all I have done so far. I don't understand what this has done. Has it flashed my BIOS or not?

Perhaps all I need to do is this -

A:\aflash.exe

And then select your patched file (called 1014ptch.003)

Is that the idea?

Thanks for any help. 😀

You should flash already patched 1014ptch.003 or make it again from original 1014.003 bios by myself just if you interested in process 😀
For that:
unzip and place in one folder following files:
bp-4_23.exe
lha.exe
cbrom.exe
reall.cod
1014.003 (original from 1014-003.zip)

run from cmd-line - "bp-4_23.exe 1014.003 > report.txt"
Check report.txt!
If all ok, then flash new bios IN PURE DOS WITHOUT ANY MEM MANAGERS AND PROTECTED MODES!
"aflash /py /sn /cd /cp /wb 1014.003"
Then reboot.
Thats all.

Just becasue the bios can correctly tell you the CHS parameters, and accompaying size doesn't mean to knows how to use it, as I learned with my Alaris board.

OK, I did this -

A:\bp-4_23.exe 1014.003 > report.txt

I checked report.txt. It was OK.

Then, I tried these 3 commands -

A:\aflash.exe /?
A:\aflash.exe ?
A:\aflash.exe /h (h for help)

I wanted to learn more about the command line switches (/py /sn /cd /cp /wb) you have used.

But when I run aflash.exe with any of the 3 "help switches" above, aflash.exe seems to ignore my request for help, and instead it just takes me to the Asus ACPI BIOS Flash Memory Writer 1.37 program. Is this the correct flash program I should be using?

Thanks. 😀

Yes, it is correct version that i download among with latest bios from P2B mobo page.
Some of these switches is hidden/undocumented.

/cp - clear pnp data
/cd - clear dmi data
these two might be useful for avoid possible "postflash" lookups.

/py - don't prompt to flash
/sn - don't prompt to save old bios to file
these two just for automate flashing process.

/wb - flash bootblock part of bios image too. Normally that part of bios stay untouched when you upgrade with official new version of bios.
Very important switch. Must be used for modified bioses in some cases.

@aleksej,

Something's not quite right. When I try this command line -

A:\aflash /py /sn /cd /cp /wb 1014.003

I still get taken to the Asus ACPI BIOS Flash Memory Writer 1.37 program. It's as if the aflash program is ignoring all of the command line "/switches". This Asus flash program requires me to input what I want to do, such as the name of the ROM BIOS file. I don't understand why the Asus flash program is asking me for this ROM BIOS filename, when I have already supplied this filename as one of the command line parameters.

The version of aflash.exe that I am using is -

AFLASH.EXE 105,036 bytes 06-11-08 3:16p

Is this OK? Thanks. 😀

retro games 100 wrote:

@aleksej, […]
Show full quote

@aleksej,

Something's not quite right. When I try this command line -

A:\aflash /py /sn /cd /cp /wb 1014.003

I still get taken to the Asus ACPI BIOS Flash Memory Writer 1.37 program. It's as if the aflash program is ignoring all of the command line "/switches". This Asus flash program requires me to input what I want to do, such as the name of the ROM BIOS file. I don't understand why the Asus flash program is asking me for this ROM BIOS filename, when I have already supplied this filename as one of the command line parameters.

The version of aflash.exe that I am using is -

AFLASH.EXE 105,036 bytes 06-11-08 3:16p

Is this OK? Thanks. 😀

Archive.org is your friend
http://web.archive.org/web/20000620230715/www … lash/aflash.exe

"Download aflash.exe (83558 bytes, 2000/1/19)"

Try and find this older version

Try this one http://www.elhvb.com/mobokive/Archive/Asus/flash/aflash.exe

I have been able to solve my primary problem. (Please note, at this moment in time, I have not upgraded the latest Asus Beta BIOS, to one from rom.by - although I am still tempted to do so.)

I tried a modern Seagate 320gb IDE HDD. I downloaded SeaTools for DOS from Seagate's website. Inside this utility, I was able to manually set the HDD's capacity. I decided to set it to approx. 125gb, just under the "deadly" 127/137? gb 28-bit addressing limit. Now, the Asus mobo BIOS correctly reports the HDD's storage capacity as 125gb. I have re-installed Windows 98 on this HDD, without any problem. Windows 98 also sees this HDD as 125gb.

I reckon that using a utility such as SeaTools, you can probably get any older mobo to accept a very large capacity HDD. OK, granted, you cannot go over the 28-bit addressing boundary, but at least approx 125+gb is still a lot of storage to use. I.E, it's better than nothing! 😀

In one of my classic systems .. Socket 5, SiS Chipset, P133 with Award Bios 4.50g, I installed a Fujitsu 5.2GB hard drive, which in turn came from another system.

In BIOS, it can only show 1099MB space and the post screen also displayed the same.
But I can access the whole 5 Gigs after booting up with DOS. (I have partitioned it to (2+2+1) GB). Can access all the drives without problems.
Haven't tried with a larger hard drive.

You could try partitioning them to different primary and/or logical drives, to reclaim the rest of the space.
My Powerquest Partition Magic Pro 7.0 has been my true hard drive companion for many years.

You can also download many other free partitioning softwares.

Yes, Seagate did have very good hard drive utilities those days. I still remember when I was uh,..smaller,... 😁 ..., when the pc technician came to setup my corrupted super hard drive with a mind-blowing 20MB capacity!!! (Yes, that's TWENTY MEGABYTES)!! 😁.
He used a utility from Seagate.

@aleksej,

I have successfully flashed an Asus P2B mobo rev. 1.02 board, with the rom.by 4.23 BIOS. 😀

Please note - I am really happy with the Seagate SeaTools for DOS utility which can reduce a Seagate HDD's capacity to just under the "deadly" 28 -> 48 bit addressing barrier.

I re-ran SeaTools, and increased the HDD's capacity so that it was greater than the 28 -> 48 bit barrier. I made the HDD 176gb. I re-ran the Asus mobo's BIOS HDD auto detection feature, and it incorrectly stated that the HDD was 8.4gb. I'm not too upset by this. I can simply reset the HDD capacity to about 125gb using SeaTools - this is good enough for me.

Thanks a lot for your assistance. 😀

@Amigaz,

That archive website is a really useful resource! Thanks a lot! 😀

@Malik,

Thanks a lot Malik. I must learn about HDD partitioning! 😀 I think my first HDD had 20 (or was it 30) megabytes. It was quite a luxury. 1988 I think.

Had the same issue with the P3B-F as mentioned in this thread when I tried to connect a 250GB IDE drive. I used SeaTools for DOS and limited the size to 137GB (267000000 LBAs) 😀

I've successfully used Hitachi Feature Tool to limit a WD Scorpio 2.5" 160GB HDD to 128GB so it would work without file corruption in my old Creative Zen Xtra MP3 player. 😎

vetz wrote:

Had the same issue with the P3B-F as mentioned in this thread when I tried to connect a 250GB IDE drive. I used SeaTools for DOS and limited the size to 137GB (267000000 LBAs) 😀

Nice, haven't through about limiting it to a larger capacity 😀

I'll check it out and might make a video in your name 😊

OMG that works so well!

EDIT: Vetz, why not go with 268435456?