################################################################# ASUS -- asus --- Asus -- AsUS --- AsUs --- asus --- asuS --- ASUS motherboards Mother Boards mother board mobo Mobo MotherBoards ASUS Mobo Model: B85M-E BIOs Firm: 0805 ------------ My ASUS mobo will only boot to BIOs --------------- Who ami I ? I have close to 30 years experience in system administration, system design and deployment as well as firewall, IDS/IPS and other ancillary experience around computing systems at the enterprise level. First of all, I am not the only one to have run into this. Why this was not annouced loudly and patched, fixed or firmware retrofitted I will never understand. Oh wait, yes I do. As long as you run windows on the original install you are fine, BUT ! Add a drive, change OSes, your drive dies and you have to re-install. Well, you are $#@% out of luck. The motherboard will allow you to install what ever you want, BUT ! You will NEVER be able to boot into it. Yes, through what is sure to be well thought out and well paid for(Microsoft) engineering. The ASUS BIOs-UEFI will not allow you to boot into any thing, I mean ANYTHING, ever again. Now, I know what you are thinking that doesn't sound right or maybe you consider this a challenge. Well be my guest, but ASUS has now made owning a computer as hard as it ever could be in 2020( starting in 2014, who knows if it carries over to other years, my guess, Yes. It does). Scenario: You go down to your favorite computer store where they have convinced you what you need is a ASUS motherboard. Not really a hard sell, BUT ! What they more than likely either don't know or won't tell you is that if you EVER repurpose the system. You will never be able to boot the system again. You take it home and enjoy your computer for several years, well now you want to upgrade it yourself. You buy a new hard drive and a bright shining new OS that you want to put on it(because I have heard this happening with Windows as well). You install the drive, hey that was easy. You insert, your install disc or netboot or what ever your install choice is and install your new OS. All done. Lets boot'er up. Wah,wah. WHAT ! WTH ! OK, OK. Lets try again. Here we go reboot her....... What ? Why am I being dropped into the BIOS, over and over again. Sounds like a Google moment. Sure is, and you will be there for the rest of our life. Thanks ASUS for taking us right back to dark ages of computing. Someone had to do it why not some half baked mobo manufacture. Some solutions I have read may work(I have not gotten any to). - Firmware upgrade. Didn't try it because my firmware was already at the latest(or last). - Replace the CMOS battery. I know this sounds ridiculous but some folks have said this worked. It did not for me. - Go into the BIOS/UEFI and adjust the CSM under Advanced setting. You get alot of options like legacy only, UEFI only , Both, UEFI first...... Yeah sounds good but no. - Now more than likely you have not gotten this far if you have not checked to see if the drive is even visible but in case you have not. Look in the BIOS and make sure the drive is visible. This is a very obvious one but again. Some people say this fixed their problem. Depending on your drive type, SAS SATA IDE..... There are some options in some BIOs, select or imulate those formats or use ACHI, or none. One of these options should work for your drive. If you never see your drive in the BIOs. You have bad drive, a cable is not connected or a different problem altogether. - Here is one I am going to try tonight. If it works it will undoubltly prove ASUS has created a bug and didn't bother to do anything about it. I wish I owed my own big compamy so I could piss off a bunch people. What I am going to do exactly: 1) Enabling "launch CSM" in BIOS 2) Then "launch PXE OpROM" apears, enable it too. (this option doesn't exist in my BIOs) 3) Reboot What happen ? Nothing, not a darn thing. As a matter of fact "lauch PXE OpROM" doesn't even exist in my version of the BIOs. I did find where you could turn on PXE. On reboot that just brought up the PXE boot prompt while it looked for a PXE server that does't exist either. What ever state this is, completely bricks a ASUS mobo. Why risk it. Things are going to happen to your PC or server. Why risk bricking it because of faulty BIOs without any solution. In an enterprise this would be disasters. The next move ? !! FIX !! I went back over my list of possible solutions including updating the BIOs firmware. A good thing too. I found the site I used to verify my BIOs version was a bit misleading. The BIOs version I had, 0805 , was from 2014. The latest was 3602 !! To think that a BIOs update would brick your system altogether was a little to far fetched for me to believe........ I was wrong, and really wrong. I thought, what the hell , download and install it. The box is already a boat anchor. Ta Da ! INSTALLING THE BIOS FIRMWARE UPDATE FIXED THE BOOT TO BIOS ISSUE ! Which speaks volumes about ASUS mind set( a mind set they refuse to explain ). If you buy a ASUS product and they want to obsolete it. Your done, your finished. You will boot your machine one day and it just will not come back. Is that really a marketing stradegy we in the computing community should support ? Some will say yes, I say hell NO ! If your any seaoned admin at all you know that systems have a second life after they have been retired and not just thrown out. I have taken old DB servers and turned them into log servers or backup/standby servers. I have taken retired email servers and turn them into jump boxes or dev boxs. Accepting this means you are giving ASUS the authority to brick a system you paid good money for. If you think thats fair, good for you. Then you should accept the Ford motor company turning your car off the moment it reaches 100k miles no matter when that happens. In the middle of the freeway, on your drive cross country or on your way to the hospital. Your Ford will start back up, but not until you install the latest upgrade to their on board computers. So, true. There is a fix but is the fix going to be done by the majority of people ? Does the fix fit into your idea of how computing in the 20th century should be, I hope not. Should simple maintence on a system or simple upgrade to a system mean that your BIOs version will prevent all of that and turn your system into a boat anchor ? It is obvious from a few Google searches that this problem exist and ASUS is NOT forth coming with the solution. Why ? Marketing? You have a problem with your system? You need to buy a new one. That ! is unacceptable. Firmware update site: https://www.asus.com/Motherboards/B85ME/HelpDesk_Download/ Reccommandation: Since my issue I have read ALOT of forums and issues and articles based on this very thing. If you have lots of money and you don't really care if your system or laptop goes away and never comes back giving you an opportunity to just buy a new one.....good on you. Everyone else. Leave ASUS in rear view mirror and go with Gigabyte, ASrock, MSI or SuperMicro. You could have a power outage one day and suddenly all you get is BIOs. For that matter, based on what I have read you could simple open your laptop one day and all you get is BIOs. You might want to upgrade the HDD and all you get is BIOs. This was a horribly thought out strategy that I'm sure has made ASUS lots of $$$$$ but is not forward thinking but like I mentioned earlier, a step backwards. I sure they have logic behind it(handed to some spoksman by the marketing dept.) but is not acceptable not only in the enterprise but even in the consumer market really. Note: I have heard of Gigbyte systems not booting if the CMOS battery is low but the fix there is pretty obvious. I have a Gigbyte mobo that has been running for 10 years. Other than the thermal alert that will not allow it boot if it is to hot. It been a champ.