Hello! I'm new here but this is the only place where I hope to find help - everything else has failed.
I was experiencing the same problems (freezing in several games, often PC lock-ups) with my Sapphire HD4870 512MB GDDR5 as some other people did and so I decided to to the BIOS flash as it was recommended on some forums.
First I did the flashing using ATIWinflash (I guess this was a HUGE mistake) and the BIOS update provided on Sapphire webpage. At first it failed displaying an error message "ROM programming FAIL" I tried the second time and it went "Flashing in progress" but then it stopped responding at all (freezed like before). I waited for some 15 minutes or so and nothing. As you may guess I rebooted the system and the GPU was fubar'ed. So, I got an old S3 PCI video card, followed the instructions here on http://www.techpowerup.com/articles/overclocking/vidcard/152. Went on DOS, did the flash, it said to reboot to complete VBIOS update. I went back on BIOS, changed the first graphic adapter back to PCI-E, turned PC off, removed the old PCI card, started the PC up again but nothing happens, it shows "NO SIGNAL". The video card's fan spins up, then down and that's it. There is no beep (witch indicates that system is OK) and I noticed that only 3 of 4 LED's on the videocard lits up just before starting the PC. The one witch didn't lit up is the one closer to motherboard, marked with D1603. I searched on some forums and it seemed that noone really knows what exactly these LED's indicate.
So, I'm stuck right now and I'm asking if someone knows what to do. Is the card really dead or am I doing something wrong? Will it do something if I try to flash it again using the BIOS version from Sapphire's webpage?
It was sucky to play games with often PC freezes, but it's more sucky to have a dead video with no chances to bring it back.
Hope someone would help.
-rnd
I was experiencing the same problems (freezing in several games, often PC lock-ups) with my Sapphire HD4870 512MB GDDR5 as some other people did and so I decided to to the BIOS flash as it was recommended on some forums.
First I did the flashing using ATIWinflash (I guess this was a HUGE mistake) and the BIOS update provided on Sapphire webpage. At first it failed displaying an error message "ROM programming FAIL" I tried the second time and it went "Flashing in progress" but then it stopped responding at all (freezed like before). I waited for some 15 minutes or so and nothing. As you may guess I rebooted the system and the GPU was fubar'ed. So, I got an old S3 PCI video card, followed the instructions here on http://www.techpowerup.com/articles/overclocking/vidcard/152. Went on DOS, did the flash, it said to reboot to complete VBIOS update. I went back on BIOS, changed the first graphic adapter back to PCI-E, turned PC off, removed the old PCI card, started the PC up again but nothing happens, it shows "NO SIGNAL". The video card's fan spins up, then down and that's it. There is no beep (witch indicates that system is OK) and I noticed that only 3 of 4 LED's on the videocard lits up just before starting the PC. The one witch didn't lit up is the one closer to motherboard, marked with D1603. I searched on some forums and it seemed that noone really knows what exactly these LED's indicate.
So, I'm stuck right now and I'm asking if someone knows what to do. Is the card really dead or am I doing something wrong? Will it do something if I try to flash it again using the BIOS version from Sapphire's webpage?
It was sucky to play games with often PC freezes, but it's more sucky to have a dead video with no chances to bring it back.
Hope someone would help.
-rnd