Menu
What's new
By:
Filters

BIOS Update for HP Pavilion 8650c

CyrylTheWolf

CyrylTheWolf

\/\/4ND3RING \/\/0LF
Hey folks. Been a while since I've been here. Life is hectic. :p

Alright. Here's the deal. I have a client that is of course paying me to work on her system. It started with her Plextor CDRW drive and an old LG CDRW drive that came stock with her HP Pavilion 8650c system. They weren't reading in WinXP Pro for some reason.

I flashed the firmware of the LG drive. It is finally able to read the WinXP CD in her system but nothing else. The Plextor is still a no-go. The trouble is that I brought both drives home to test them on my system. The LG reads and writes but won't even deal with CDRW discs and when it writes CDR's it says that it cannot 'End String' in any burning software I use. But the resulting CD works just fine. It even loads on boot. (Was a SuSe 9 Pro CD I made to test the drive.) The Plextor reads and writes perfectly in my system.

I took the drives back to her and put them back into her system. They both still register in the system. I can even boot the WinXP CD using the LG drive but the Plextor still doesn't respond when in her system. I updated the ASPI layer in WinXP. Still a no-go. The drives obviously just hate her system. (The LG is obviously on it's last leg anyway...)

This leaves only two more options. 1.) Windows XP has some sort of issue with the drives. (She needs a reinstall. BADLY.) 2.) The motherboard's IDE controller is starting to die.

I decided to try reinstalling Windows XP for her. I backed up all of her data. Booted the system with the WinXP disc in the drive, blah, blah, blah... (Lather, rinse, repeat...) Got into the loading screen and it's loading device profiles, etc. Gets to the part where it says, "Starting Windows" and it locks up. Blue screen of death. It cites the ACPI as the problem. It says to disable it or that it's incompatible, etc... I disabled all Power Saving features in the BIOS and attempted it again. No-go. I rearranged the BIOS in every logical way possible. No-go. Defaulted the BIOS to factory settings. No-go.

Now I'm lookin' for an update to the BIOS. This is getting ridiculous now. I can't really find one. Here's the issue.

It's an HP Pavilion. (They suck.) I have found out this much...

1.) ASUS made the board specifically for HP. There are apparently two models of this motherboard. The "HAWK" and the "Mercury". The Mercury is the one that HP used for the HP 865xC series.

2.) There appears to be two different BIOS updates for it. One from AWARD and one from Phoenix.

I can't find a concurrent update from Phoenix. I found an AWARD update. (Not sure of the version number...) But I have seen in certain sites where AWARD is associated with Phoenix. I'm tempted to go ahead and try flashing the BIOS with the AWARD update now. (Unless I can get my hands on a Phoenix update...)

Here are the board's vitals...

Hewlett Packard Pavilion 8650c (Celeron 533)
BOARD:
MEW-AM Rev. 2.01 (Made for HP by ASUS. "Mercury" model.)
Phoenix BIOS 4.0 R 6.0A
Hewlett Packard BIOS v2.10

Now I have updated other proprietary boards with a regular BIOS update before. Compaq boards for instance... I have updated their boards with a non-Compaq specific BIOS. (It kills the Compaq influence. Which = RELIEF. Ahhh... :) )

I know better than to screw up on a BIOS update and to not mix BIOS'. However I am running out of options. I want to see if these two CD drives will work properly in a new installation of WinXP. In order to do this I need to dispell the problem with the ACPI that is preventing the new installation of WinXP from occuring.

My request?

Who here could find an update for this particular board? (HP-specific if possible...)

If we can't find that update then who here would say that I could use the AWARD update for this board? As long as it's for the same board, right?

Quick responses will be very much appreciated as this is a 3-day project now and I'd very much like to end it. This is taking a ridiculously long amount of time...

Have at it! Thanks in advance.

Cyryl
 
OP
CyrylTheWolf

CyrylTheWolf

\/\/4ND3RING \/\/0LF
Gigahurtz

Gigahurtz

Feel the speed
CyrylTheWolf said:
Well... Ok.

Guess that's that, then.

*shakes head*

Damn... Only ONE reply? Man...
Click to expand...

Well, your problem is not easy to solve. But Good luck getting it to work
 
AlphaWolf

AlphaWolf

I prey, not pray.
My recommendation is to try a cd burner that you know to work *perfectly* in more computers than just yours, and then try that in hers. If it doesn't work, give her the task of backing up everything that she needs and cannot replace (or do it for her, but make sure to tell her that if she forgets to tell you of any specific thing to back up, that you aren't responsible for replacing it), then reformat the HDD and restart from scratch (if you are comfortable with it, reset the cmos settings and reconfigure them with good judgement while your at it.)

The chances are way more in favor of either the drive being bad or the operating system is badly configured than anything else. Plus, those are by far the two most safest things to fix first.

FWIW, I have had a job similar to what you are doing, hated it after the third time :D IMO, any job where you work with computers sucks balls, and I've had several computer jobs (besides just repairing PCs that is.) Fun hobby, miserable job, and nowadays computer related jobs don't pay shit, making them extremely not worth it.

Also, try not to be so wordy in your posts. I didn't read it the first time around because it was too long.
 
Last edited:
OP
CyrylTheWolf

CyrylTheWolf

\/\/4ND3RING \/\/0LF
*nods* Sorry about that. I'm a detailed individual.

At any rate... Yeah. After not getting any answers to my post I decided on the same course of action you just prescribed. I took my TDK drive over there and tested it on her mobo. No-go. It's just as you said and I told her the same. It's either her operating system is fux0r3d or worst case it's her mobo.

I had already backed up her data on my external USB2 60GB drive. (It's a small laptop drive kit for USB2.) So I once again attempted to reinstall and it yielded the same results. I found yet another firmware update for the drive and used it. Tried again. No-go. The plextor doesn't respond to the system in any way, shape or form but it still works perfectly on my system.

It's a null issue though because my client decided to flip out and act like a total bitch. I've never had a bad client before... I actually believe she did it to get out of paying me. But that's ok because I am now holding her CDRW drive hostage. She wrote it off as a loss so... I'll just toss it in my server. (It needs one anyway.) But thanks for the replies anyway. By the way. I was hoping you'd be the one to answer, Alpha. *nods*

If I was a real dick I could blackmail her with some of the incriminating videos that my lady just found in her backup... *convulses in disgust* She's going through the data on her computer as I type this... The horror! The SHEER HORROR!! *gets shown yet another pic as Jenn laughs her arse off* OMG!! SHE'S 60+ YEARS OLD for cryin' out loud!!

How screwed up are things when they turn out like this? Ack....

I'm going to go wash my eyes out with hydrochloric acid now... See you all later...if my eyes survive... *convulses his way to the bathroom to the sound of Jenn still laughing her ass off*
 
sheik124

sheik124

Emutalk Member
Wow, a horny 60 year old women, FYI, i have a hp Pavilion 520c and its bios is a bitch too, at one point it would like to randomly boot up WITHOUT detecting my optical drives, i'd give it a nice kick, reboot, and voila, there they are, thats why i am building my next rig :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Top