RX 460 bricked after flashing bios?

linardiedrick

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So just now i read this article on how to unlock my Sapphire Nitro RX 460 4GB https://overclocking.guide/amd-radeon-rx-460-unlocking-1024-stream-processors/ , so i tried it out after doing some research (backing up, flashing the backup/original bios, etc). And then i did the process, can’t say if it failed or suceeded, because after doing it, my amd driver isn’t recognizing my gpu, so i tried to reflash it with ATIFlash using my BIOS backup. After the flashing, i restarted my PC and... it won’t boot up! I turned it on and it beeped 4 times not showing anything. Please help! Need to do work on this PC. Thanks.

Specs :
AMD FX 8320-E
Sapphire Nitro Radeon RX 460 4GB
Gigabyte GA970A-D3P
16 GB RAM

(edit) Forgot to say that i’ve done this once and it worked (same card), but after i reset my windows, it suddenly becomes a code 43, AMD drivers cannot be installed even after reinstalling it several times. I fixed this once too but forgot how to do it haha. Please help me with the fix now that my pc is bricked. Thanks.
 
Solution
You can try it from a cmd prompt in windows

atiflash -p 0 biosname.rom

If that fails it can be forced (because currently that card is showing no bios)

atiflash -f -p 0 biosname.bin​

Rogue Leader

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After the first paragraph:

Note: It’s always possible that something goes wrong if you flash the BIOS of your card. In addition it’s possible that not all cards can be unlocked and that you might damage the card. Flash at your own risk!

Looks like you found a card that can't be unlocked. Keep in mind while they list it as confirmed, cards can change over a production run. Perfect example, I had an XFX R9 280 which should have had unlocked voltage out of the box. In fact the exact card was tested by multiple sites and they used that feature to overclock it. I got mine, sure enough voltage was locked. Contacted XFX and they basically told me to go pound sand, said "specs change due to the yield of our chips". And that was it.
 

linardiedrick

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Oops, sorry i voted down on your answer, misclicked. I forgot to say that i’ve already done this once and already edited my post. Please help me as i need to use this PC. Thanks.
 

Rogue Leader

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Wait, so you reset windows and it stopped working, or you reset windows, flashed the card BIOS again, and then it stopped working?
 

linardiedrick

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I resetted my windows and flashed my BIOS again, then it got the code 43 AMD card not recognized, so i flashed the BIOS again to the backup, and it stopped working, it beeps 4 times when i turn it on.
 

Rogue Leader

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There should have been no reason to flash the BIOS again being that you already did it successfully. Once you've done it, it is permanent until you flash it again. It clearly sounds like flashing it over and over may have bricked it.
 

Wolfshadw

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GIGABYTE GA-970A-D3P (rev. 2.x) BIOS Beep Codes
BIOS Beep sound Description
1 short beep Memory Error
2 short beeps Memory parity check error
3 short beeps Basic memory 64K address check error
4 short beeps Real Time Clock malfunction
5 short beeps CPU error
6 short beeps Keyboard error
7 short beeps CPU interruption error
8 short beeps Graphic card error
9 short beeps Memory error
10 short beeps CMOS error
11 short beeps CPU cache memory malfunction
1 long, 3 short Conventional/Extended memory failure
1 long, 8 short Display/Retrace test failed
two-tone siren Low CPU Fan speed, Voltage Level issue

Try resetting CMOS

Motherboard manual pg 77

Q: How do I clear the CMOS values?
A: For motherboards that have a Clear CMOS button, press this button to clear the CMOS values (before doing this,
please turn off the computer and unplug the power cord). For motherboards that have a Clear CMOS jumper, refer to
the instructions in Chapter 1 to short the jumper to clear the CMOS values. If your board doesn't have this jumper/button,
refer to the instructions on the motherboard battery in Chapter 1. You can temporarily remove the battery from the
battery holder to stop supplying power to the CMOS, which will clear the CMOS values after about one minute.

-Wolf sends
 

linardiedrick

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To Rogue Leader, i’m sorry i mis-explained, let me retell the story shortly. So i unlocked my card sometimes ago, it worked until i resetted my windows which made my card have code 43 amd card undetectable, then i figured out the problem and reflashed it to the original BIOS. Then after a bad performance, i decided to unlock it again to get better performance, not thinking about the code 43. Then i got it, the code 43 which made my performance even worse. So i tried to reflash it to the backup BIOS, and it failed and this happened.
 

Wolfshadw

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Nothing you've done should have affected the memory installed on your motherboard. It could have been failing this entire time.

Check each RAM module in each RAM slot. If your 16GB of RAM is comprised of 4x4GB RAM modules, that's 16 individual tests. If your 16GB of RAM is comprised of 2x8GB, then that's eight individual tests. If all you have is a single 1x16GB RAM module, then test it in each RAM slot.

Now I'm not entirely sure what "Conventional/Extended memory failure" means, but if it does extend to the graphic card memory, then it's possible your graphics card is fried as well.

-Wolf sends
 

Rogue Leader

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Ok makes more sense. However AMD locked down the chips at first because they were not up to snuff, later on for supply reasons they will even lock down good chips. The problem is there is no way to tell which is which. Very likely yours was not up to snuff which makes sense as to why you were getting that error. Unfortunately the bios flashing coupled with the not up to par chip may have fried it.



This makes sense as graphic memory can extend to the system memory once it runs out, I'd say its possible the board can read in the other direction for error reporting purposes. I'm just speculating though.
 

Rogue Leader

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Do you have another graphic card that you can run them both at the same time?

Unfortunately I don't think you did anything wrong, its more that sometimes it doesn't work. Also if this is a memory failure, reflashing it won't fix it.
 

linardiedrick

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Yup, borrowed a friend’s card. I just tried it and it recognizes my card, so let me try and reflash it later. Thanks so much for the help.
 

linardiedrick

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So i just downloaded ATI Winflash, and it comes with ATI Flash. Is it possible if i use ATI Flash on windows without doing the boot drive thing? Because the boot drive thing seems to be too complicated to me, can’t do it. And when i tried to use the ATI Winflash on cmd, it says “the specified path is not found” or whatever that is. And when i just run the Winflash program, it says “Cannot find discrete ATI video card”. What do i do now?
 

Rogue Leader

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If its not recognizing the card from within Windows as is, then you should set up the boot drive to do it. I think its doing that because its not your primary adaptor, but honestly its been a long time. It could also be beacause its failed.

 

linardiedrick

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But windows recognizes the card on Device Manager and i still can't manage to make the flashing program recognize it. So what do i do? Just do the boot drive thing? Or should i just take it to a local repair place?
 

Rogue Leader

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Follow the boot drive instructions.

A local repair place is going to sell you a new GPU.
 
Familiarise yourself with the atiflash dos commands.

Gpu-s are selecteable with the -p * toggle

If your friends gpu is in the top slot it will be on -p 0
, yours on the bottom slot will be on -p 1.

https://www.techinferno.com/index.php?/forums/topic/1331-guide-amd-vbios-flashing/

Some info there.

Just do not flash your friends card by mistake

Add the -p 1 switch to you commands in atiflash.
 

linardiedrick

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It opens the run dialog? No cmd shown? Is this wrong?