Self building a Z96J

Hello,
I was in the process of buying a Z96J barebones and the necessary components to build it myself, when it dawned on me that I had better check something (Planning on buying the T7200 Merom and will not have another processor for this unit). It is my understanding that the current Z96J's do not have BIOS support for Merom. Does "does not support" mean the chip will not function at all or will it function at some lower level until I flash the BIOS to the updated version. In other words do I actually need another processor (Yonah) that is fully recognized by the current notebook bios, to flash the BIOS to the newer Merom capable one?
Also, I have changed the processor and flashed the BIOS in a desktop before, but I have never owned or really dissected a notebook. It does not appear to be that difficult in reading about it, but is this generally something best left up to the professionals?

Thanks.

Zack

 

It's not that hard to assemble it, there are complete guides step by step to take the thing apart in its entirety, I think Krista posted a link to it a few weeks ago in her broken audio port issue and I also posted a couple of screenshots from it for the inverters post. So it's not that hard in my opinion, and there is a lot of info out there to take you through it and help.

* - Removed section due to new info, and not wanting to cause confusion - *

Also note that if you put it together yourself you will not have as good a warranty as you would if the reseller did it for you. No matter what JPZ says, he likes to jump on me wherever he can because I corrected him once, I hope he eventually gets over it - anyway - if you want a full system warranty get it assembled from the same place (or most components) rather than getting the RAM from NewEgg, the HDD from eBay, the ODD from MileStone, etc... Not saying its bad the other way, but if you get it together somewhere it's better, ask any of the resellers.

Cat

 

Totally not the case. There is a way around where you can get the laptop to boot a merom with the original BIOS. The original BIOS is the only one that does not support the merom.

You can find the guide on how to boot the merom on the old BIOS here: www.asusforum.com.

If you use the workaround, you will be able to get the laptop to boot, but the BIOS will not recognize the processor model, and power saving features will not work. Your battery life will be short and the processor will run on the hot side. However, you can update the BIOS to fix these issues. It is possible to run the BIOS update with a merom processor.

It would actually take more time to install a yonah, flash the laptop, and install a merom than it would to use the workaround, not to mention the financial loss.

Where do you get this from? Your warranty depends on the reseller. Some resellers offer better warranties and service for people who build the laptop themselves than the companies who sell them pre-assembled. I actually find that the companies who sell the laptop only pre-assembled have the worst custom service and warranty policies.

If you know how to fix a computer(or atleast figure out what is wrong with it) it is much faster and easier(not to mention more reliable) to get the parts replaced for free under their manufacturer warranties. Make sure to get a good warranty on the barebones(this is the warranty from the company you buy the laptop barebones from). Good resellers will fix your computer no matter what fails even if you built it yourself with parts you bought from someone else, as long as they are under warranty.

 

Mine booted just fine. It well yell at you though that it doesn't recognize the processor and direct you to the bios setup. Just save and restart and it will boot up fine and you can flash to a newer bios. Make sure you get the latest one that fixes the screen grainyness.

 

I back what he said. You do NOT need to buy a Yonah. If you buy a Z96J now, it should already come with an updated BIOS, but if it doesn't, you can follow the above process to flash the BIOS with a merom in the computer.

 

Thanks for the replies guys! After reading the posts on ASUSforums suggested by JPZ, I have the confidence to give this a shot. The process seems simple enough. Just to make sure, the most up-to-date BIOS is Z96JS0901G (which should fix the graininess issue along with upgrading the merom compatibility) and the S96J and Z96J use the same BIOS (hence the Z & S in the Bios filename)?

 

I own the S96J which is the same as Z96, just a different screen and I have the T7400 2.13ghz Merom in it. I ordered from ISTNC.com and i did alot of price matching so you may want to order from there due to the excellent prices. From my experience with my pc, id surely reccomend a 7200rpm SATA notebook drive, it really does make quite the difference. If you are interested, you can compare the hitachi 7200 to the seagate on storage review, the hitachi blows the seagate out of the water, easily.Sadly, hitachi was out of stock when i was ready to order and I really couldnt wait.

My S96J
Intel Core 2 Duo T7400 2.13ghz (4mb cache)
2gb ddr2 RAM @ 667mhz
100gb Seagate 7200.1 hard drive
Ati X1600 256mb pci-express card
DVD RW Multi Drive (TSST - Toshiba Samsung Storage Technologies)

 

Sorry about the confusion above, I was going off of the official data from ASUS and the techs there. I do know though that the 901 BIOS will not fix the grainyness, just the CPU compatiblity. The final BIOS for Z96JS w/grainyness fix has not yet been released but everyone has been using the Beta BIOS 1001 and from what the tech told me when it was released the final will almost definitely be nearly identical to it. He also told me that 2 weeks ago when I last spoke to him, haven't had problems since. Not sure why its not on the ASUS website yet, seems to have eben delayed again.

Check out this post for info on the 1101 beta (but perfectly usable) BIOS.

Cat

 

Most stores will offer the Bios already flashed to work with the merom.
However, I was wondering and may be you guys can help me.
Wouldn't it be wise to wait till Asus releases the actual merom compatible laptops. I mean, they have to be just around the corner.
Or you guys think that the Z96J with the bios upgraded is as good as a laptop with the bios/motherboard made to work with merom?

 

All Yonah-based laptops are "merom compatible". But some manufacturer's haven't added BIOS support for the merom to all their yonah-based laptops.

There's no difference between what you just said. The Z96J BIOS was written to work with the merom. A "Z96J with the bios upgraded" is "a laptop with the bios made to work with merom".

Now if you were talking about the Santa Rosa platform, that would be different. But one merom laptop is just as good as another similarly configured merom laptop.

The Santa Rosa should be a little better than the Merom, but not by much. No much at all. You wouldn't notice the difference.

 

I have a few more questions before trying the BIOS flash procedure JPZ referenced above.
1) The ASUS website lists 4 different Z96 models (Z96H, Z96J, Z96Js, & Z96Jp). I know the Z96H and Z96Jp are not the correct model. Under the Z96J the newest BIOS is listed as "BIOS Ver.0601AS" and under the Z96Js the newest BIOS is listed as "BIOS Ver.0901" I am under the impression the Z96Js BIOS will work for both the S96J and the Z96J, is this correct?
2) Which flash utility do I need to use? Aflash2.exe is what I have found referenced most. The Asus website does not have any information.
3) When I plan on using Ultimate boot CD to boot from then load the flash utility. Do I need to burn the Flash CD to a bootable cd as well?
4) The BIOS File, Z96Js0901AS.ROM can just be burned to a cd as a data file or does it need to be changed into an *.ISO and burned as an image?


Zack

 

1) I don't think anyone knows the answer to this. I think it might be just the Z96J, but I honesly have no idea.
2) Download the image from Ken from Gentech. Burn the ISO file, boot from the CD, and run his batch file. Simple as that. Latest BIOS version is 1101, which includes the graininess fix.
3) I have no idea what you are talking about.
4) Burn it to the CD as a .ROM data file.