Windows 7 Gigabyte GA 970A D3P completely lost all BIOS settings

dachiesa

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Dec 29, 2014
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Today my wife told me after my kids were using my computer everything was messed up!

Windows 7 wouldn't start and was trying to do startup repair . . . so she left it on for me.

I rebooted, went to BIOS and NONE of my settings were saved -- I had to reset my processor settings (I do overclock, gently) set the hard drives to AHCI (for my SSD) and reset all my boot priorities (my computer was trying to boot windows from my DVD drive . . . so yeah).

I got it all set back up and couldn't find even ONE "saved profile" i had done before.

Possible causes? One of these?
-I recently changed my Ram from a 8GB stick to a 2x4GB dual channel kit -- doesn't seem capable of wiping BIOS settings though . . .
-I recently bought a bigger SSD and "cloned" the OS to this one -- a more likely culprit, but how on earth does a Hard drive affect the BIOS?
-We did have some thunder last night and might have lost power -- but the comp was off and I have a surge protector, and the computer was running fine earlier.

Just trying to figure out if my Mobo might have gone bad, or if it's even possible my kids could have deleted all the saved profiles (I don't even know how to do that).

Thanks for reading, and for any ideas you can share : )
 

clutchc

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If you didn't reset the BIOS yourself manually, then the CMOS battery might be the culprit. Although it is early for that to be dead already. But if there was electrical activity in the area, the CMOS chip may have gotten an ESD flash from a nearby strike. Is the BIOS saving now?
 

dachiesa

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Dec 29, 2014
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Right, but not sure how i could have reset the Bios. I wasn't there but I'm sure the kids didn't go to the reset Bios thing physically on the motherboard . . . is there a way to do that in the Bios menu? It is UEFI and it's possible my youngest son was mashing keys but not much more . . .
 

dachiesa

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Dec 29, 2014
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It saved now . . . but only one profile. I guess I could try others. The power strip is (supposedly) a very good one (belkin, grounded etc).

I appreciate the replies. Thankfully I was able to get everything running again, and I put a password on the BIOS settings now just in case it was due to button mashing . . .

The battery thing sounds more reasonable but like you I can't believe it would already be bad. I might call Gigabyte customer service just in case.
 

clutchc

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If the BIOS saves are not dissapearing now, the CMOS battery is most likely OK. You might want to change it though just for the peace of mind. But now that it's working normal again, it would be harder to troubleshoot any further.