Asus strix z490a strix gaming

Hello I bought a second hand Z490A strix gaming motherboard that seems to have a busted ME chip , tried the bios flash back it seems to update the bios properly , yet no post . When hitting the power button RGB starts but there is no post and no control led lighting up hence the idea of ME chip being corrupted . Is there any possibility of sourcing the Bios and ME dump files so I can try to rewrite them .

You sure it flashed correctly, according to the Asus BFB procedure?
Done with CAP file from Asus (It doesnt contain ME FW on it)?
Q-Led code?
Usually a user will not give, at least the bios region, as it contains its own motherboard data.
Do you have an SPI programmer to dump both chips?
image

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Ok so bought the motherboard got the cap files put them on a fat32 freshly formated stick and used the bios button several times … The bios fIashback button “flashed” like it said in the tutorial but i have to mention that the motherboard was probably flashed bad by the person I bought it from it didn’t work from the start… Took the motherboard to an ex coworker that opened he’s own repair shop that helped me with 10 more motherboards that had similar issues … Older models though . He said he can write both bios and me but needs the dump files , the cap files are only updates and aren’t of any help . He has an spi reader but from what I recall he can only write the me chip not the bios one

Yes we know that the Asus files cant be used to program, a dump from another user its hard to get since it may contain the system/motherboard data, buy the chips or dumps, good luck.

EDIT: You dont know the state of them…as you dint yet answered, again did you read them before and performed any backups, so yes probably.

finally got the reader for the bios and got the files
[email protected] (1.8 MB)
[email protected] (8.5 MB)

The dump GD25B64C@SOIC8z490ec its the ME FW and reported as seems broken…

Error: Firmware is incomplete/corrupted, expected 0x1800000 not 0x800000!

Warning: Firmware size exceeds Engine/Graphics region, possible data loss!

USB Type C Physical Version 0.0.0.000

Try to clean it: [Guide] Clean Dumped Intel Engine (CS)ME/(CS)TXE Regions with Data Initialization - Special Topics / Intel Management Engine - Win-Raid Forum (level1techs.com)

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thank you very much for your help @MeatWar

One would have to put both dumps together to get a complete image!

That’s at least the error for MEA if you use it on the 8MByte dump.

@lfb6
Yes but needed also for cleaning? Cant be cleaned only with the ME FW image and stitched back later?

EDIT: You maybe rigth m8…since i didnt did anymore cleanups higher than 11…
Give him a hand if you will please and if you have time for it, we know you’re on “Military mode” lol

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Last ME where one could clean region only is ME11, if I remember correctly

The 16MB chip is just fine, identical to latest stock bios + machine specific data. NVRAM empty

For the 8 MB chip:
Open latest Asus bios update in UEFIToolNE, open volumes as shown:

.
In this tree go almost completely down, open 63F23E9D-5FDA-415E-9C2A-64C4E2A6ECE8

From the Raw section “extract body”, that’s a clean content of your 8 MB chip :wink:

(Cleaning will be a pain because of the PHY dummy…)

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With this one… you really got me… :zipper_mouth_face:
A cleaned ME FW is inside the Asus bios update file… :astonished:
You’re the “man” :clap:

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got it extracted it next few days i’ll get it written mb not at my place and i have a bad cold , thank you very much for your help sir much appreciated :handshake: :handshake: