I killed my computer trying to flash the 4870 back to original. I actually never got to the flashing part. I still have a dead 4870 at this point. Since you have to have 2 video cards in the system and I didn't have another ATI card that would fit one of my slots, I tried with an Nvidia 7800.

This is with Vista64 and a P5E MB. Is it possible to kill a MB just by using 2 different cards at the same time? I wouldn't think so but if I get a new board I'm going to have to try it again so I want to be sure.

Right after I first put the card in the and booted to Vista i got a Blue Screen shortly afterward. I reseated the cards and tried again and everything seemed OK for a while. I also had to change my wireless PCI network card to the top slot because I no longer had room at the bottom with the 4870 in the next slot.

Anyway, I couldn't get my wireless network connected. Also on my other computer I was trying to figure out how to make a bootable cd with bios flash utilities. When I turned my 4870 computer back on it went to a blue screen just before getting to the desktop. I was able to enter safe mode but as luck would have it, the restore function would not function. I had already tried going to last working config with no luck.

At this point I thought I would try to repair with the V64 disc.
I set the Bios to boot from CD and everything was going well until it finished with a blank blue screen and a working mouse pointer.

At this point I'm thinking hardware again and disconnect everything except for the hard drive and I also put in a different video card and memory. Now I can't even get a display. Only thing left is my motherboard and CPU and I woud guess that I must have damaged the MB when inserting a card with static or maybe a hairline crack. Oh, I also reset the CMOS more than once.

I have the worst luck with computers, I should buy a Dell and never open the case. I've read most of this thread and searched the net quite a bit but I haven't seen an actual procedure for fixing the 4870. Can you just use the 4870 and any other video card? Looks like the best way is to use a boot disc and then flash the Bios.