CBROM is showing the position of the microcode-section. You can simply replace one or more sections with new microcode with hex-editor - but consider the size and position. Windows 10 should work on the machine, you can try to use an older build and/or the x86-version instead of x64.
Ahh, I kind of overlooked the obvious in that intelmicrocodelist shows the offset in the binary file. I think I will probably find my way around a hexeditor too, however I'm still finding it difficult to match the CPUID/Platform ID to the right microcode files as they seem to use different notation. I thought I once found some cross table for that somewhere, but I can't seem to find it (back) on the delidded website so far. Also I'm a bit worried about the potential effect of flashing a bios with the wrong checksum, wouldn't that be sort of be sort of fatal ? IF not, then it's worth a gamble.
Checksum will be checked from the flashtool before programming to ensure a unaltered file, which could brick the machine. I did a similar mod yesterday (AMIBIOS modded with MMTool), the file was accepted by flashtool and the mobo has the latest microcode now.
Well after modding the BIOS binary with a hex-editor I am getting stuck on something completely unexpected. I can't seem to get the BIOS flashed. It seems like it's got nothing to do with the modded file though. I can't even update the existing BIOS with the manufacturer provided binary and tools. the "Bflash" tool always reports some kind of error identifying the BIOS/Chip. I must have tried at least half a dozen alternative flashtools, including uniflash. Although Uniflash appears to read/dump existing BIOS just fine after trying to write there is no change. I like a little challenge, but maybe the cosmos is telling me to call it quits on this board here
Ok, so I couldn't give it a rest still I've checked the info on other boards from the same manufacturer and similar type/time period. That led me to another flashtool, or at least a much later version. Now it seems that this tool does the job, no errors come up. After rebooting and reading back the BIOS from the system I can see there's an additional microcode as expected. Unfortunately though after putting the modded XEON (5130 with s-spec, SLABP) in place the system wouldn't boot up. Now I am left wondering.... - is the modded CPU ok - did I put the correct microcode in the bios (lga 771 microcodes\65nm\cpu000006f6_plat00000004_ver000000d2_date20101001.bin) - is this board at all capable of booting with this or any other more recent CPU. This Xeon is 65nm but it's a 1333Mhz bus while the board supposedly supports 533/800. I would've expected it to at least boot up although not at full speed.
So yesterday I put microcodes in the BIOS for just about every spare LGA775/modded LGA771 CPU I had laying around. However I couldn't get the board to show me anything on display with any of those. So I conclude that my mission was sort of successful but it seems the board just can't be pushed to operate with anything beyond old P4/Celeron @533/800 mhz bus for technical reasons that I don't care to find out. Thanks to Lutschpuppe for helping me out here. And that's it for this topic.
