OK, I thought the purpose of this thread was to try to get the newest RAID ROM integrated into the BIOS.
 
My mistake, I will go sit in the corner now.

Note: if you guys throw something together for the FTW3, I would LOVE to test! This AHCI Update my fix my SSD! :D I have a kingston SSD now V series 64gb, and I am unable to install windows onto it currently when I set the sata ports to AHCI mode in the bios. Im guessing this would probably fix this? Thanks!

Arctucas
OK, I thought the purpose of this thread was to try to get the newest RAID ROM integrated into the BIOS.

My mistake, I will go sit in the corner now.

 
The purpose of this thread is to bring our BIOS as much up to date as possible,  and that includes being able to run latest RAID ROM.  So far RAID eludes all of us and EVGA will have to be handling that one.  However, now that there are two of us working on this we may just be able to come up with something   Either way, we have to keep pushing EVGA for the update!
 

lcabezas

dejanh
The AHCI has nothing to do with RAID.  However, as it is at least 2 years newer than the ancient Phoenix AHCI ROM it likely performs better for those running AHCI mode.

I agree too that we need just one thread, so when the BIOS is ready you guys can release it in one place.

So the Intel ROM that worked is older than the one you were trying dejanh? It would be good to see some benchmarks with old Phoenix ROM and Intel one.

Great job btw. Keep it up! and Thanks!

Yes, the Intel AHCI ROM that worked is older than the one that I was trying.  We have both tried the latest ROM as well but it does not load successfully.  However, this is still 1.20E and is fairly new (probably newer than stated copyright of 2008 as even the latest AHCI ROM from March 23, 2010 still has a copyright stamp of 2008).  I will coordinate with sromerod to ensure that all updates go through this thread.  With that said, read on as I will have some good news at the end of this post 
 

ddggttff3
Note: if you guys throw something together for the FTW3, I would LOVE to test! This AHCI Update my fix my SSD! :D I have a kingston SSD now V series 64gb, and I am unable to install windows onto it currently when I set the sata ports to AHCI mode in the bios. Im guessing this would probably fix this? Thanks!

Sure thing, and I believe that it will actually fix your SSD issues.  But, we'll know once you try it
 
With that said...
 
Thanks to the help and support of sromerod (please make sure that you thank him as well ) and his hard work in trying out many AHCI ROMs to find the one that works with the EVGA X58 boards I (or I should say we) will be releasing an updated BIOS for every EVGA X58 board with the following changes.

• New Intel AHCI ROM 1.20E (same as the one found in the newest BIOS for Gigabyte UD7 Rev 2.0 and UD9 boards)
• Latest Realtek PXE ROM 2.39

Following the AHCI ROM update I was able to integrate the newest PXE ROM into the E759 BIOS without issues and addressing conflicts.
 
Expect the updates in the next 1 to 2 days.

Idk about rest of everyone here, but screw giving you guys blue ribbons, Evga should be giving you jobs!
 
Thanx for the hard work and time spent for this!

Can't wait to see what you guys come up with... hope its soon

zalbard

dejanhThanks to the help and support of sromerod (please make sure that you thank him as well ) and his hard work in trying out many AHCI ROMs to find the one that works with the EVGA X58 boards I (or I should say we) will be releasing an updated BIOS for every EVGA X58 board with the following changes.

• New Intel AHCI ROM 1.20E (same as the one found in the newest BIOS for Gigabyte UD7 Rev 2.0 and UD9 boards)
• Latest Realtek PXE ROM 2.39

Following the AHCI ROM update I was able to integrate the newest PXE ROM into the E759 BIOS without issues and addressing conflicts.

Expect the updates in the next 1 to 2 days.

This sounds fantastic, thank you both for your hard work!
Any chance of a more recent Marvell 88E8057 ROM for E762?
Oh, and you forgot CPU Microcode Update...

I am not aware of a more recent Marvell ROM than the one EVGA has posted in the software/drivers section.  Adding to this, the Marvell ROM on this board is updated externally and I am not even sure whether there is enough space to be able to put it internally.  So unfortunately I guess the answer on the Marvell ROM is no unless sromerod can maybe provide something.  I also have no ability to test any changes to the Marvell ROM mod so I really would not be the right person to do this.
 
As far as CPU microcode goes things get a bit more complicated.  The more of these mods we do the riskier the BIOS becomes.  Modifying CPU microcode incorrectly could brick the boards so I am extremely weary of us providing any microcode updates by default.  Having said that if we can get enough volunteers for testing with various boards we could provide microcode updates, even for lower end X58 boards to support the same chips as upper tier X58 boards and even (as sromerod has demonstrated) microcode extracted from Rampage III Extreme.
 
VOLUNTEERS NEEDED FOR BIOS TESTING
 
I need volunteers for testing the newest BIOS changes.  Please PM me if you are interested with your email address and the board you can test on and I will provide the BIOS with newest updates to test.  Please keep in mind that BIOS modifying and testing is risky.  If there is a problem with the modification you could brick your board making it impossible to post or flash back requiring a backup BIOS chip and experience with hot-flashing BIOS.

codeman
dejanh would you be able to PM me a link to the latest Realtek PXE rom? 

You can find it here http://218.210.127.131/do...ID=3&GetDown=false
 
Just go down to DOS section and you are looking for PXE ROM code

Evga must be real embarrased by your efforts!

Way to go!

dejanh

Front page (first post) updated with latest BIOS link.  The latest packages are denoted as 78N.  The following denotes the changes (compared to official 78 BIOS from EVGA):

• Updated Intel AHCI ROM, v1.20E (replaces Phoenix AHCI ROM v1.06.70); compatibility update; new AHCI ROM should provide better compatibility with various SSD in the market
• Updated JMicron ROM, v1.08.01 (replaces v1.06.79)

• Updated Realtek PXE ROM, v2.39 (replaces v2.28)

If you are posting the link to the BIOS download from the front page anywhere else please give me and sromerod some credit   Full credit goes to sromerod for identifying a functional AHCI ROM that can be used with the EVGA boards.  The version that I am using in this BIOS release is extracted from the latest BIOS of Gigabyte UD7 board, revision 2.0.

Thanks for all your hard work!!!!!

rafale
Great job guys. Just one question, is the AHCI rom getting used when I run my drives in RAID or does only one of the two bios gets loaded depending on the mode used?

When using RAID, single drives default to AHCI but as far as I know they are still run through the RAID module, just in AHCI mode.

Just flashed my FTW3.... Right away I noticed that when set to AHCI, you are no longer able to hit esc to boot a device, and I am no longer able to set my boot priority in the BIOS, yet when I go back to IDE mode, it all works fine. Thanks for the work tho, progress is better then NO progress!!!! (...EVGA...)

ddggttff3
Just flashed my FTW3.... Right away I noticed that when set to AHCI, you are no longer able to hit esc to boot a device, and I am no longer able to set my boot priority in the BIOS, yet when I go back to IDE mode, it all works fine. Thanks for the work tho, progress is better then NO progress!!!! (...EVGA...)

Interesting, so you are not able to use the ESC function?  It works fine on the E770 and on my E759 even after enabling ESC.  I just tested it again and it works perfectly fine
 
Maybe you can be my guinnea-pig hehehe
 
By the way, are you finding that your SSD issues are resolved?  It was you right that had the SSD issues in AHCI mode?
 
Update: I think that ESC is actually working fine but you are having the same problem I was having when I switched to AHCI/RAID mode a long time ago.  This board boots a bit strange in that there is very little or sometimes no delay at the initial boot screen to actually hit DEL or ESC when using AHCI or RAID.  Normally I have to keep hammering ESC like mad right after I hear the boot beep all the way through the boot cycle and then I get the ESC prompt.  On IDE mode this is very easy to do as the delay is quite large.  There are very minor differences between your BIOS and my BIOS (E759) or that of E770.  I am almost 100% sure ESC is working fine, you just do not get an opportunity to hit it.  If you can please send me a link to a video of your POST cycle I would love to see it.  I think though it is user error hehehe

ddggttff3
A video on the way! Also I was unable to boot in AHCI as I kept getting a bootloader error (prob because it was trying to boot my USB HDD as I was unable to change the boot order in the bios.) but I will make a video of it all for you.

Yes, please do.  I really want to see this problem in action...so strange that it would not appear on the E759 and E770.  I literally have 0 issues with the AHCI BIOS (in fact using it right now, well, was, now on RAID ).  Just send me a PM with the link and I will look at it later.  Probably won't be tonight.
 
A couple things to show me in the video:

• your POST screen and full cycle with AHCI enabled and with AHCI disabled
• your BIOS configuration screens

I just want to make sure that we are doing an apples to apples comparison!

ddggttff3
OK, im converting it now, and il send you a link after the upload. I also tried another test, I unplugged all my HDD's except for 1, which has ubuntu on it, and it was still unable to boot when in AHCI mode. (same bootloader error).

Weird.  After I see the video I will probably prepare a new version of the BIOS for you.  It could be that some error was introduced when loading the modules back into the BIOS.

ddggttff3
Ok, PM sent. Hope its enough, if not, I can always make more videos.

Thanks, I will review tomorrow and report back