Tom's Hardware > Forum > Motherboards & Memory > Chipsets & Bios > How do I create a DOS boot CD-ROM for bios upgrade?

How do I create a DOS boot CD-ROM for bios upgrade?

Forum Motherboards & Memory : Chipsets & Bios - How do I create a DOS boot CD-ROM for bios upgrade?

Tom's Hardware: Over 1.4 million members in 6 different countries available to answer all your high-tech questions. Sign up now! Its free!

Ask the community Add a reply

Bottom Search this thread

I need to upgrade my bios via CD-ROM, and I can't figure out how to create a bootable CD-ROM for the job. Any help here would be great. THanks.

Add a reply

I would certainly never suggest trying to update your BIOS from a CD. During a BIOS update, your old BIOS is copied first and written to the drive, in other words you need to do the update from a writable drive. If you don't have a floppy drive, I would highly suggest you spend $10 and buy one and use it for your BIOS update. I have had good success using some manufacturers Window's version of the updater, although I do prefer the old DOS-only method. Anyway, it does require you to use a drive that is writable during the update. You may be able to get away with it, but updating your BIOS can very easlily leave you with a dead motherboard if it's not done correctly. FACT. It happens to people all the time.

Reply to jitpublisher

Newer boards have a built-in BIOS flash utility accessible from the boot screen (like BIOS settings) and can access USB keys; might be less of a waste to get a USB key than a floppy.

------------------------------ The capacity to learn is a gift; The ability to learn is a skill; The willingness to learn is a choice. - Rebec of Ginaz

http://valid.canardpc.com/cache/banner/600609.png

Reply to Zenthar

usb is just as good as floppy, but faster...i killed my 2900xt by flashing from cd because i couldnt save my original bios and i had an unsuccessful flash. floppy is ok if you can stand the slow read and write times.

Oh, I didn't know that it could be done with a flash drive. How do I do that?

Reply to Van Halen Man

Depends on the board, what MB do you have.

As an example, this is the intruction for Gigabyte's Q-Flash utility.

------------------------------ The capacity to learn is a gift; The ability to learn is a skill; The willingness to learn is a choice. - Rebec of Ginaz

Reply to Zenthar

It is an Asus P4S8X-MX

Reply to Van Halen Man

Your board has EZ-Flash, which is kind of like Q-Flash, but I don't know if it supports USB keys. Take a look at page 2-3 of your user manual for instructions (or here for pdf); it seems you have to press <ALT>+<F2> at boot to enter EZ-Flash.

Message quoted 1 times

------------------------------ The capacity to learn is a gift; The ability to learn is a skill; The willingness to learn is a choice. - Rebec of Ginaz

Reply to Zenthar

USB DOS-
http://www.bootdisk.com/pendrive.htm
http://blogs.oreilly.com/digitalme [...] -driv.html
http://www.gamebeat.net/forum/showthread.php?t=1057

Message edited by Shadow703793 on 08-16-2008 at 07:31:04 PM

------------------------------

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2617/3815217176_0a5be7955d_o.gif

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3553/3818083596_1a772f7162_o.gif

Reply to Shadow703793

Ok, well, it doesn't seem like I am able to boot from USB, so what is this EZ-Flash thing and how do I use it?

Message quoted 1 times

Reply to Van Halen Man

Van Halen Man wrote :

Ok, well, it doesn't seem like I am able to boot from USB, so what is this EZ-Flash thing and how do I use it?

Answer:

Zenthar wrote :

Take a look at page 2-3 of your user manual for instructions (or here for pdf); it seems you have to press <ALT>+<F2> at boot to enter EZ-Flash.

If you cannot boot from USB, EZ-Flash might not be able to see the USB key either...

------------------------------ The capacity to learn is a gift; The ability to learn is a skill; The willingness to learn is a choice. - Rebec of Ginaz

Reply to Zenthar

Ok, well EZ-Flash can't boot from USB either. It says checking floppy, then once it realizes there is not floppy, it says checking CD-ROM. Is upgrading from a CD-ROM using EZ-Flash STILL a bad idea? Becuase I REALLY don't want to upgrade with a floppy drive....

Message quoted 1 times

Reply to Van Halen Man

Van Halen Man wrote :

I'm not sure it's THAT much of a problem, but if you have no way of backing-up the current BIOS, if the new flash fail, you might be the proud owner of a motherboard-shaped-brick.

------------------------------ The capacity to learn is a gift; The ability to learn is a skill; The willingness to learn is a choice. - Rebec of Ginaz

Reply to Zenthar

I got the motherboard from a friend and he upgraded the bios when HE had it, and he gave me a disk that had the original bios and the current so that should be alright.

Reply to Van Halen Man

Make sure all the BIOSes are on the CD because if the flash fails, you must not reboot.

------------------------------ The capacity to learn is a gift; The ability to learn is a skill; The willingness to learn is a choice. - Rebec of Ginaz

Reply to Zenthar

Quick question: Was the Flash drive formatted with FAT32? If you use NTDS it will fail.

------------------------------

Reply to Shadow703793

Ask the community Add a reply

Tom's Hardware > Forum > Motherboards & Memory > Chipsets & Bios > How do I create a DOS boot CD-ROM for bios upgrade?

Go to:

Help |
Forum rules

There are 1162 identified and unidentified users. To see the list of identified users, Click here.

Page generated in 0.369 seconds

Please mind

You are about to answer a thread that has been inactive for more than 6 months.
If you still wish to proceed, please ensure that your posting is original and does not duplicate or overlap any prior responses to this thread.

Add a reply Cancel

Focus On

How do I create a DOS boot CD-ROM for bios upgrade?

Forum Motherboards & Memory : Chipsets & Bios - How do I create a DOS boot CD-ROM for bios upgrade?

Please mind