Why dont all motherboards have dual bios?

[MyName13]

It seems that gigabyte is the only motherboard manufacturer who has motherboards with dual bios, they put it even on their low end motherboards, why don't other manufacturers have this feature?It's crazy how even now PC users have to worry about losing their motherboard in case of power outage during bios flashing.Is it so expensive to implement?

[Guest]

Might be due to a patent they have, would need to confirm though.

[scighera2]

2 minutes ago, MyName13 said:

It seems that gigabyte is the only motherboard manufacturer who has motherboards with dual bios, they put it even on their low end motherboards, why don't other manufacturers have this feature?It's crazy how even now PC users have to worry about losing their motherboard in case of power outage during bios flashing.Is it so expensive to implement?

My MSI z87-gd65 has a BIOS A and B.

It's probably expensive to have 2 bios on one board.

[just_dave]

It is not that cheap as you think.

It is present on the higher end only for a reason.

It is still nice to see manafacturers include the failed overclock count, so you dont have disassemble your system and reset CMOS even on the lower end

[Bananasplit_00]

Gigabyte has one of the nicest implementations of it for sure, but BIOS chips arent as cheap as you think. its an extra cost and only usiually usefull for the high end tech savey people. most people dont even know what the BIOS IS

[MyName13]

7 minutes ago, dave_k said:

It is not that cheap as you think.

It is present on the higher end only for a reason.

It is still nice to see manafacturers include the failed overclock count, so you dont have disassemble your system and reset CMOS even on the lower end

How expensive can it be if gigabyte's a320 motherboards have it?As far as I know CMOS reset can't repair corrupted bios.

[Leonard]

It is called features for the price and it isn't a standard, the standard is one BIOS per MOBO.

[just_dave]

22 minutes ago, MyName13 said:

How expensive can it be if gigabyte's a320 motherboards have it?As far as I know CMOS reset can't repair corrupted bios.

Yeah, i had bad info due to our shops not listing the feature on Gigabyte boards.

Sorry

 

[MageTank]

7 minutes ago, dave_k said:

Thats stupid to think like that

Who would buy A320 just because of Dual BIOS?

You completely missed his point. His point is, they put it on cheap A320 boards, so he is questioning why other manufacturers do not put it on their more expensive boards if a cheap board has this feature. Let's not call the thoughts of others stupid when you are not thinking it entirely through yourself. 

[spat55]

Dual Bios has saved me many times over 5 years, I've had power loss and a failing PSU cause me to get a corrupt BIOS, having dual BIOS has saved my RMA experiences.

[just_dave]

9 minutes ago, MageTank said:

You completely missed his point. His point is, they put it on cheap A320 boards, so he is questioning why other manufacturers do not put it on their more expensive boards if a cheap board has this feature. Let's not call the thoughts of others stupid when you are not thinking it entirely through yourself. 

Because even Gigabyte itself doesnt include that on B350s for example.

At least the models in my country dont have that anywhere in the description.

[Mira Yurizaki]

Most manufacturer's already do this on their higher end boards. But it's hit and miss.

 

Really, you shouldn't update BIOS unless it's necessary.

 

And as to why they don't do it for every motherboard? Probably a cost saving measure. Sure it may cost pennies more to double the space in the flash or EEPROM chip (BIOSes are like 8MB), but when you produce millions of them, that's a significant chunk of change.

[Fardin]

3 minutes ago, dave_k said:

Yeah, but Gigabyte itself doesnt include that on B350s for example.

There is no B350 with dual BIOS

no bro they have, their boards have dual bios almost lower end to higher end in every platform as i remember. I just looked at b350 gaming 3 & it has . 

[just_dave]

1 minute ago, Fardin said:

no bro they have, their boards have dual bios almost lower end to higher end in every platform as i remember. I just looked at b350 gaming 3 & it has . 

Thats weird hmm, my local shop has no mention about that on the G3

[Guest]

This thread has surprised me with the number of failed/corrupt BIOSes (Is this the correct plural?). Not once has a bios failed on me

[just_dave]

Also, it is obvious why Gigabyte lowends have that.

They cheaped out on the VRMs like noone.

[MageTank]

Just now, dave_k said:

Yeah, but Gigabyte itself doesnt include that on B350s for example.

There is no B350 with dual BIOS

That's still not his point. He used an A320 board as an example, to show it's not a feature limited to premium high-end boards on gigabyte. He is simply asking why such a feature is not commonly available on other boards if it's been implemented on a lower-tier board already. 

 

As for the answer, it has very little to do with price. BIOS EEPROM's are cheap, costing anywhere from $2-$10 depending on size. You can even make your soldered EEPROM's socketed by unsoldering it from the board, and soldering an EEPROM socket for your bios chip size. Here is an example of Mr Fox doing it on one of his laptops: 

 

Get yourself a TL866A programmer, and you will be able to fix any bios issues you have by just pulling the EEPROM out of the socket, and rewriting to it.

 

As for why they don't implement dual BIOS often on every board, the answer is relatively simple. It's a feature that is unlikely to be utilized by the vast majority of end-users. A lot of low end boards lack overclocking features (at least on Intel's side) and most people don't tinker around inside of the bios/update them. Manufacturers likely see it as a waste of time and resources to throw something on a board that will see very little use. A lot of high end overclocking boards do have these features, mostly because they are used more often on those kinds of boards. We are even seeing it on higher end graphics cards as well. 

 

I know this is not the answer you are looking for @MyName13, as it is very unsatisfying, but that's basically the reason. Once overclocking becomes a standardized feature across all boards and CPU SKU's, it will probably see a much larger adoption on most boards. Until then, the market of dual-bios boards is likely going to remain the same. 

[Fardin]

5 minutes ago, dave_k said:

Also, it is obvious why Gigabyte lowends have that.

They cheaped out on the VRMs like noone.

yeah sadly have to agree specially for am4 platform, gigabyte didnt do well. 

[just_dave]

1 minute ago, MageTank said:

That's still not his point. He used an A320 board as an example, to show it's not a feature limited to premium high-end boards on gigabyte. He is simply asking why such a feature is not commonly available on other boards if it's been implemented on a lower-tier board already. 

 

As for the answer, it has very little to do with price. BIOS EEPROM's are cheap, costing anywhere from $2-$10 depending on size. You can even make your soldered EEPROM's socketed by unsoldering it from the board, and soldering an EEPROM socket for your bios chip size. Here is an example of Mr Fox doing it on one of his laptops: 

 

Get yourself a TL866A programmer, and you will be able to fix any bios issues you have by just pulling the EEPROM out of the socket, and rewriting to it.

 

As for why they don't implement dual BIOS often on every board, the answer is relatively simple. It's a feature that is unlikely to be utilized by the vast majority of end-users. A lot of low end boards lack overclocking features (at least on Intel's side) and most people don't tinker around inside of the bios/update them. Manufacturers likely see it as a waste of time and resources to throw something on a board that will see very little use. A lot of high end overclocking boards do have these features, mostly because they are used more often on those kinds of boards. We are even seeing it on higher end graphics cards as well. 

 

I know this is not the answer you are looking for @MyName13, as it is very unsatisfying, but that's basically the reason. Once overclocking becomes a standardized feature across all boards and CPU SKU's, it will probably see a much larger adoption on most boards. Until then, the market of dual-bios boards is likely going to remain the same. 

I am sorry i was checking info on my local shop and it has no mention about Dual BIOS except on the highest end ones

[Enindee]

Well, Asus for example has a solution which I prefer over dual bios. It allows you to flash a bios with a thumbdrive even without having a cpu installed.

[just_dave]

8 minutes ago, Enindee said:

Well, Asus for example has a solution which I prefer over dual bios. It allows you to flash a bios with a thumbdrive even without having a cpu installed.

But on Crosshair/Maximus only right?

Edited September 19, 2017 by dave_k
maximus is apparently a thing lol

[Enindee]

1 minute ago, dave_k said:

But on Crosshairs only right?

No, not at all. My Maximus VIII Hero has it and I guess all of their mid/high tier motherboards have it by now.

[just_dave]

1 minute ago, Enindee said:

No, not at all. My Maximus VIII Hero has it and I guess all of their mid/high tier motherboards have it by now.

Yeah, sorry i meant ROG mobos, i didnt realize Maximus is a thing

[MyName13]

1 hour ago, MageTank said:

That's still not his point. He used an A320 board as an example, to show it's not a feature limited to premium high-end boards on gigabyte. He is simply asking why such a feature is not commonly available on other boards if it's been implemented on a lower-tier board already. 

 

As for the answer, it has very little to do with price. BIOS EEPROM's are cheap, costing anywhere from $2-$10 depending on size. You can even make your soldered EEPROM's socketed by unsoldering it from the board, and soldering an EEPROM socket for your bios chip size. Here is an example of Mr Fox doing it on one of his laptops: 

 

Get yourself a TL866A programmer, and you will be able to fix any bios issues you have by just pulling the EEPROM out of the socket, and rewriting to it.

 

As for why they don't implement dual BIOS often on every board, the answer is relatively simple. It's a feature that is unlikely to be utilized by the vast majority of end-users. A lot of low end boards lack overclocking features (at least on Intel's side) and most people don't tinker around inside of the bios/update them. Manufacturers likely see it as a waste of time and resources to throw something on a board that will see very little use. A lot of high end overclocking boards do have these features, mostly because they are used more often on those kinds of boards. We are even seeing it on higher end graphics cards as well. 

 

I know this is not the answer you are looking for @MyName13, as it is very unsatisfying, but that's basically the reason. Once overclocking becomes a standardized feature across all boards and CPU SKU's, it will probably see a much larger adoption on most boards. Until then, the market of dual-bios boards is likely going to remain the same. 

Overclocking motherboards aren't for the average consumer anyway, even some high end motherboards lack this feature, there isn't a single low and medium end B350 motherboard (other than gigabyte's) that has dual bios (I think that msi doesn't offer this even on the high end).Most people would rather pay few dollars more to protect their hardware.

[just_dave]

3 minutes ago, MyName13 said:

Overclocking motherboards aren't for the average consumer anyway, even some high end motherboards lack this feature, there isn't a single low and medium end B350 motherboard (other than gigabyte's) that has dual bios (I think that msi doesn't offer this even on the high end).Most people would rather pay few dollars more to protect their hardware.

Yeah, thats true, but i think updating BIOS is pretty safe until you are awaiting a hurricane or doing it during thunderstorm.

Too bad the Gigabyte AM4s are unusable, they would be pretty nice with that feature.

Although i think the Asus´s highend system is nice too, you need only 24pin to flash the BIOS.