Acer X1200 BIOS update - Broken HDMI Audio

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I was able to backup my A3 bios after loading XP onto the system and using winflash that came with the A3 update. Unfortuantly that knowledge doesn't do anyone much good without a system with XP and the A2 bios.
 
Just a thought, has anyone tried the update that's on the Acer support site now? I know it says it's the same version, but it's possible that they snuck in a fix in between when they took it down and when they put it back up again.
 
please call acer about this and ask to escalate an issue to the level 2 techs. If acer doesn't have complaints on this issue they won't even think anything is wrong and never address the issue.
 
I was able to back up the A3 bios in vista 64 that comes with the pc using winflash v1.90 from the esupport website. Maybe this maybe if Flashvince could try using this version of winflash we might be in luck.
 
Introuble, I have been on the phone with acer support many many times since the bios came out, I have pushed to get to level 2. The most standard answer is "We don't support bios updates".

I am seriously getting ticked at Acer, Not that it does any good.

So how bout it Flashvince, Give it another try, Be my hero :D
 
Fastvince, You my friend, Are awesome, Thank you Soooo Very much. The A2 bios fixed my bios, And since I use 11n wireless for everything, I wont be changing it again anytime soon.

Thank you also BlackenedSS87, You to are awesome.

Edit,
One thing I have noticed, In the display driver settings, The connection type now actually shows up as HDMI and not as DVI as it previously did.
 
If you don't send it back, my advice would be to downgrade your BIOS.

What is your technician's reasoning for this:

"If you don't send it back, my advice would be to downgrade your BIOS."

What do you expect to accomplish for doing that, based upon what you know so far?

Because it was working prior to the BIOS being upgraded. If you knew anything at all about troubleshooting, you would know that if you make a change and something breaks to attempt reverting the change to see if it un-breaks.

Fastvince just sent me a copy of the a02 bios and as we all suspected, it fixed the hdmi audio issue.


Fastvince, You my friend, Are awesome, Thank you Soooo Very much. The A2 bios fixed my bios, And since I use 11n wireless for everything, I wont be changing it again anytime soon.


Once again proving that experience and proper troubleshooting techniques will invariably lead to an answer.

Thanks to fastvince for hosting the file and making it available to the obviously several people who have had this same problem.
 
Glad it works

I am glad the old version works.
I have been helped many,many times by other people.

I am glad I got a chance to return the favor....
 
Thank you fastvince!

Traker1001 I didn't intend to come across as berating you for not calling acer (when you actually had). I was trying to encourage everyone with this problem to at least call/lodge a complaint with acer in some way, or they will never think there is a problem or that the magninude of the problem makes it worth fixing.

Looks like the way to run these boxes is with the old bios and and an add-in network card.
 
Not a problem.

Are you guys getting full surround via your hdmi? I can only seem to manage to get stereo, Although, Not sure if this was the case before I started screwing with the drivers.
 
Stereo Only

My TV (sony-55") has built in speakers, If I set the audio on my TV to surround sound, I am getting it. I do not have a home theater setup. I am just using my TV's built-in speakers.
 
Thank you all!

I would just like to give a sincere and big "thank you!" to everyone on this thread for their invaluable assistance!

I have been a lurker on this thread - as I have an Acer x1200 to which I downloaded the newer bios, resulting of course in my sound not working - and have been hoping for a solution to get my sound working again. Due to the efforts of the contributors of this thread, my sound works fine now (but the network card is unstable again...but currently sound is the most important to me).

Even though I will freely admit that I am one step above an imbecile when it comes to bios, the version 2 bios posted in the link worked for me without a problem (once I thought to bring winflash up, that is).

All this being said, though, I believe we should still press Acer for a guaranteed fix to the network card program. I have been an Acer customer for many years (I still have one of their laptops which has proven rock-solid - except for the WD hdd frying...), and up until now I have been satified with their products. This x1200, however, is shaking my belief in the company. When I spend my money on a computer I expect it to work as it is advertised; this model is definitely not doing that.

I myself have been pestering Acer "support" for some time now about this problem and their need to provide a solid fix for it...usually a message every two days. Some are returned answered, some are not. However, I would hope that everyone in this thread will join me in pressuring Acer for a good fix for the network card problem - one that specifically will not screw anything else up. If this problem isn't in a senior tech's hands by now, it certainly should be. After all, we just only want what we paid for and was guaranteed us, right?

Anyway, thanks again for the great help and fantastic community support shown here! I do appreciate it very much, and I hope to be able to contribute something in the future.
 
I too have been a lurker on this thread also fallen victim to the BIOS "update".

Acer support is a complete joke. For a device that I've had for just over a month they want me to pay to ship back a device that only needs a BIOS fix? They've got to be joking. I guess I'm too used to Dell's quality customer support. First they hang up on me, or perhaps we were disconnected? But they have my number and information and we were in the middle of a system restore, so couldn't they have called me back? And then the next guy (who was actually very nice) sounded completely confused when I told him this nonsense happened after a BIOS update. He was like "why would anyone update their BIOS? You should never do that". Then I explained that I not only received instructions from Acer through email, but also been instructed through the "Acer Manager" software that came on the computer. And that was it. He had no ideas what to do, only to send me shipping instructions via email. A waste of time.

I've attempted to revert back to the old BIOS without any luck, but I think I want a fully functional network adapter anyway. Hopefully Acer will issue a new BIOS before the end of the decade and I'll be happy. But who knows, perhaps the next one will give us network and hdmi audio, but remove something like USB. Perhaps Acer's motto should be "either working half as good or half as good, pick one".

Anyway, does anyone have a level 2 or level 3 tech support email address that perhaps we can all email to explain this problem to? It's been over a month and there seems to have been no attempts from Acer to rectify this problem.

Sorry for the the rant, but we all shelled out hard earned money for these computers and are upset about what we get. Acer owes it to us to do something about this situation.

BTW, I've also posted this problem to www avsforum com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1046863 and www aramistech com/reviews/acer-x1200-mini-pc-450/ . We're not alone.

PS: I don't have more than 5 posts, so I can't link URLs.
 
Acer now has an updated Bios on their website. Updated 28 Aug, 08. I installed on my x1200 and it worked fine. My HDMI audio and Lan now seem to work correctly. Finally a solution.
 
This is intresting, It works great, It is still the A03 bios, and the timestamp in the actual bios is Jul 13. I am guessing that all the had to do was a very minor tweak of the A03, And it took as long as it did. Go figure...
 
Good news on the bios. My x1200 that I got from BestBuy hasn't seemed to have any problems so far (as purchased), though I haven't used it enough to know if I had the network problem.

Been able to play ripped Blu Ray (mkv) on it using Core, BS Player, and Media Portal and they all look great, no tearing or anything.

My big problem is audio. I got a new Samsung 650 at the same time, and I was thinking I could just run the HDMI from the Acer to the tv (which does work fine), and then the optical out from the tv into my Onkyo receiver. The problem I have is that the tv only outputs stereo via the optical when it's using a HDMI source, which leaves me with two options. 1) trying to hook audio from the Acer to the Onkyo, or 2) running the HDMI through the receiver (I'd have to buy a new one that supports that)

The lack of SPDIF out on the Acer is by far my biggest disappointment. I've seen posts on here about hooking a port up to the motherboard, but I haven't read that anyone's actually tried it. People mention the $30 Turtle usb, but that you'd have to switch to Vista 32 and lose out on half your RAM.

I was wondering if anyone has tried using a Creative Labs USB Sound Blaster X-Fi 5.1? I see that it has x64 support (via the MS Compatibility list), it runs USB 2.0 and has optical and coaxial out. Looks like it's about $60, but that beats a new $300 receiver.
 
Good news on the bios. My x1200 that I got from BestBuy hasn't seemed to have any problems so far (as purchased), though I haven't used it enough to know if I had the network problem.

Been able to play ripped Blu Ray (mkv) on it using Core, BS Player, and Media Portal and they all look great, no tearing or anything.

My big problem is audio. I got a new Samsung 650 at the same time, and I was thinking I could just run the HDMI from the Acer to the tv (which does work fine), and then the optical out from the tv into my Onkyo receiver. The problem I have is that the tv only outputs stereo via the optical when it's using a HDMI source, which leaves me with two options. 1) trying to hook audio from the Acer to the Onkyo, or 2) running the HDMI through the receiver (I'd have to buy a new one that supports that)

The lack of SPDIF out on the Acer is by far my biggest disappointment. I've seen posts on here about hooking a port up to the motherboard, but I haven't read that anyone's actually tried it. People mention the $30 Turtle usb, but that you'd have to switch to Vista 32 and lose out on half your RAM.

I was wondering if anyone has tried using a Creative Labs USB Sound Blaster X-Fi 5.1? I see that it has x64 support (via the MS Compatibility list), it runs USB 2.0 and has optical and coaxial out. Looks like it's about $60, but that beats a new $300 receiver.

I haven't been able to get anything but stereo from the X1200 hdmi port, Even connected directly to my yamaha receiver. I have tried different OS's xp,vista, vista 64, And all with different combination of drivers, I have always got either stereo or nothing, Few times I get stereo until I tried to play 5.1 then the whole setup just went mute.

As far as adding the spdif port, I took the system board out, The way they have the audio cluster setup, You would actually have to find a complet cluster and re-sauter the complete cluster to the system board.

I don't like the USB options because everything I have seen only capable of 5.1 and possibly not DTS at all, call me spoiled, I really like to take advantage of my 7.1 setup if I am going to spend more $$ on this thing.

With that said I have been looking at an internal card that looks promising.

The ASUS Xonar DX 7.1 Channels PCI Express Interface Sound Card

newegg
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16829132006
 
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