Tomahawk X870 Wifi E-Flash tool won't find firmware file in USB disk

[pfeife15f202f3]

How can I upgrade the BIOS ?

The instructions given (in the youtube video) simply doesn't work. I copy the firmware file to a USB disk (formatted in vfat first, now in fat32), I tried copying it in Linux and in Windows, neither works.

THe E-Flash tool sees the directories, but not the new firmware file inside it.

Pls advise!
(Preferably in a way that works, I already lost almost 1 hour constantly rebooting here)

 

[Svet]

What's your current installed BIOS version and which version you trying to flash?
List the full ID as shown inside BIOS Setup.

 

[citay]

If the filename doesn't match your existing BIOS filename (up to and including the first character after the dot), then M-Flash won't even list the file. It's then a sign that you either downloaded the BIOS file for the wrong model (for example there's an X870E model too, that you might have selected by accident), or that the board was used in a pre-built PC with a custom BIOS. In either case, don't rename the file yourself, it will only cause trouble, you have to download the correct BIOS file instead (and extract that first, of course).

 

[pfeife15f202f3]

After a while I realized that, and solved it.

How does it expect the user to know there was another MB with an extra "E" somewhere in the middle of the meaningless code of in the name.

There should be a hint to this in the M-Flash tool (just list the wrong firmware files as red and state it's for the wrong model), or an easy way to check in the OS before downloading.

 

[citay]

Well, yes, you have to know how to avoid certain pitfalls. But it's good that you want to update the BIOS, a lot of people don't even get that far in their thinking.

 

[tfbisqui156f02d4]

After a while I realized that, and solved it.

How does it expect the user to know there was another MB with an extra "E" somewhere in the middle of the meaningless code of in the name.

There should be a hint to this in the M-Flash tool (just list the wrong firmware files as red and state it's for the wrong model), or an easy way to check in the OS before downloading.

In fact, you have to search-type the exact name+model to get to the appropriate support page where you can download bios files etc.
This has been the case for a long time now with all brands. They have boards with -V or -H or -E etc.
I had to do this for my Asus boards also and is in fact why I pay extra attention to it with any new board.
Anyway, best to put the extracted bios file in the root of the usb drive, so not in any folder. And don't change the name either. M-flash will indeed detect whether the file is suited or not.
As a tip, I once downloaded the correct bios file for this board, but in m-flash it was listed with several zeros in its name. I didn't trust that and redownloaded the file, this time it was read correctly by m-flash (the name should be the same as the one you downloaded). Probably something went wrong while copying or extracting the file, eitherway it was a red flag to stop and start over again.

 

[pfeife15f202f3]

Yes. Alas, I'm just annoyed that for a product that call itself "easy", they don't do their tools actually easy and friendly (and idiot proof )

 

[plutomate]

If you're talking about the E @ X870E TOMAHAWK, that is the chipset name from AMD and have nothing to do with MSI.

Motherboard is pretty straight forward (usually you just search for the model number such as 7E59 on MSI website search bar) but I'm having hard time finding the right model for MSI monitor

 

[pfeife15f202f3]

I think you are missing the point. It doesn't matter who/where the naming comes from, or whose fault it is. It matters is that most users will not know (or care) about the difference.

So in terms of usability, the tool that is interacting with the user, should be able to handle that, or guide the user to whatever it needs, without expecting them to know these things. This should be the "ABC" of UI design ... but sadly computer science don't often "put themselves on the normal user shoes", when designing things.

In this case, all the tool needed to do is say: look you have a firmware file here, but it's for another motherboard, I need the firmware for motherboard "X"... instead of simply not showing it and letting the user completely in the dark why it's not seeing it.

(I could also add another list of issues with the whole UI ... but I'm limiting only to the scope of this issue)

 

[plutomate]

If you're a PC novice, you download MSI Center, do advanced scan in live update, it tells you if newer BIOS is available or not and flash it for you.

Next time, don't bother with USB pen drive.

 

[pfeife15f202f3]

Funny, because I searched for that in the MSI Center ... but didn't find it ... it spent half an hour updating ... and then I didn't find it. And the youtube video I found on the site pointed me to the E-Flash thing on boot.

 

[tfbisqui156f02d4]

There are various ways of updating the bios. From within bios is preferable though. Using m-flash you can browse to any drive you have the bios file stored, but it's faster to have the file on a USB drive. Anyway, it's correct that m-flash can improve, give better directions, but space is limited on the chip where m-flash sits. However, it's usually not needed to flash a newer bios before installing windows, or first boot, from a drive with an old Windows install. Plenty of time to read up about the how's and why's.

 

[Jarous1]

I think you are missing the point. It doesn't matter who/where the naming comes from, or whose fault it is. It matters is that most users will not know (or care) about the difference.

It’s great that some users don’t care at all about what they’re actually buying... And they don’t care what they’re getting for their money...
The motherboard’s features—and the resulting price—are distinguished within a single model series by those very “letters”… If someone doesn’t want to understand this, they shouldn’t try to build a computer on their own and then complain that “the manufacturer is being confusing"

 

[pfeife15f202f3]

It’s great that some users don’t care at all about what they’re actually buying... And they don’t care what they’re getting for their money...
The motherboard’s features—and the resulting price—are distinguished within a single model series by those very “letters”… If someone doesn’t want to understand this, they shouldn’t try to build a computer on their own and then complain that “the manufacturer is being confusing"

Woah ... that was a jump in conclusions. Users don't care about the letters, codes and crazy feature names. They do care what they money buy in terms of: (1) Safety; (2) Performance (for whatever business one has, FPS if games); (3) And very important: how little time i need to spend on "friction", like updating a firmware ... I have my own stuff to worry about, I don't need motherboard firmware models added to it.

(I understand sometimes unfortunately one has to read about these codes/letters and features to see how it translates to business performance, it's not a simple conversion, but many don't do the research they only hope for the best, and even those that do the research, soon after the purchase forget about, they have other stuff to think about).

 

[citay]

However, it's usually not needed to flash a newer bios before installing windows, or first boot, from a drive with an old Windows install. Plenty of time to read up about the how's and why's.

Well, I always advise to update the BIOS before installing Windows. Not only do newer BIOS versions often contain important fixes for things that might otherwise cause problems, but also, they can update the TPM firmware keys for example, which can then make Windows trip up on the next boot. It's better to get all that taken care of before installing Windows. I posted about my usual modus operandi here before. Youtube videos about BIOS flashing, you can watch them beforehand on your phone, no need to install Windows first to research how to do it.

Anyway, the most important thing is to update the BIOS either way. Especially the early BIOS versions are so buggy nowadays. They want to get the boards released and there is no time to fine-tune. Also, the users tend to have a lot more different configurations than MSI test in their lab, so the bug reports come in thick and fast once the boards reach the end users. The boards are so complex that the BIOS is a constant work-in-progress, with big improvements especially in the first handful of updates.

I don't even wanna get into how we used to have to flash a BIOS.... oh, the days of floppy disks having to be prepared with boot files and then dealing with complicated awdflash.exe or afudos.exe command lines... glad that those are over. And that method had zero safeguards against flashing a BIOS file for the wrong model, as I once fell victim to.

 

[pfeife15f202f3]

If someone doesn’t want to understand this, they shouldn’t try to build a computer on their own and then complain that “the manufacturer is being confusing"

Oh, unfortunately they definitely should, because the pre-built computers almost always have horrible trade-offs. I've been building my own PC since early 90s (a PC XT was my first one), and I always wished for a pre-built computers that was worth it. Otherwise I'd be buying prebuilt ones. Not to mention that one has to deal with firmware updates in prebuilt computers also -- most don't do a good job automating that (I've fixed/updated/reinstalled my fair shared pre-built computers of friends over the years, and it's the same nightmare as home built ones, if not worse in some cases, because of proprietary drivers, et).

 

[tfbisqui156f02d4]

My first 2 PCs were prebuild, outdated after 6 months, never again for me, there is always a trade-off. As for the letters, they are certainly important and a buyer should think twice if he sees the same board with a different letter added for much less money. Because one could miss out on extra sata ports, USB speeds, overclocking potential etc.
As for flashing bios before a Windows install, sure good advice. But nowadays bios flashing seems to be considered the same as updating an app, which it isn't yet. There are still risks of bricking, or a bios file that can't be read. Just look at the threads from people that can't flash through the bios flash button. Having to try multiple USB drives in hopes this one will finally work.
But ok, while my old win10 booted fine on this system it took me 2 hours to get through post, for various reasons. So yeah, first soft reboot was to update the bios, which I had to do several times since the latest at that moment seemed to be troublesome also according to some forum posters.

 

[Jarous1]

Woah ... that was a jump in conclusions. Users don't care about the letters, codes and crazy feature names. They do care what they money buy in terms of: (1) Safety; (2) Performance (for whatever business one has, FPS if games); (3) And very important: how little time i need to spend on "friction", like updating a firmware ... I have my own stuff to worry about, I don't need motherboard firmware models added to it.

If you’ve been building computers since the ’90s, it’s really surprising that you don’t want to understand the different markings for the various motherboard versions... It's always been that way.
And with the X870 in particular, the differences are really significant. The one marked with an “E” has an additional chipset, which provides expanded capabilities in the form of extra ports, for example...
See the images: