Viper GC not found by loader

[weezee]

Hi all, I've just installed an official Viper chip on a PAL GC DOL-1 (black model). I've followed brakken's FAQ, tested all solderings and/or shorts, been careful NOT to ruin the flexwire and then connected the programmer to my PC (and my laptop too, after the first failure): I've set my parallel port to ECP, the address was already 378 and the DMA 3.
So I've rebooted my PC and turned on my GC, loaded the cobra bios into the loader and pressed WRITE, only to see an error message stating that the Viper chip was not present.
GC was on, the cable is new (bought it today) and everything else seemed ok.
What can it be? Is it possible that my chip is broken? I've bought it in France by mail (at techworld.fr) and it was sealed in its original plastic bag...
Please help me



(my desktop is running WinXP SP2, my laptop Windows98; I've closed the firewall and antivirus on both, just to be sure there was no strange port blocking)

EDIT: Sob! I've just figured that my chip might be broken. This thread talks about my problem and I have exactly one of the bugged models, a 0447
http://forums.xbox-scene.com/lofiver...p/t348901.html
Is there any way to test if chip is "alive" ?