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External floppy drive question

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supersnicker   10-02-2009 at 01:21:21 PM

**If this is the wrong sub, please move or remove**
Hey,

I have this question regarding external floppy drives, as I don't have one built into my computer.
Could I use external floppy drives for bios updating etc?

Thanks in advance,
Patrick

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Bronze Storage badge sub mesa   10-02-2009 at 01:33:15 PM
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probably not. You're not going to get any drivers working in DOS-mode, where alot of BIOS updating has to be done.

However, you can use a USB pendrive if you BIOS has support for USB pendrive DOS support. It will emulate the USB pendrive as a normal drive under DOS so updating the BIOS is easy without having to use a floppy. Try to avoid using floppies as they shouldn't be used by anyone.

------------------------------ ...man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but usually manages to pick himself up, walk over or around it, and carry on.
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supersnicker   10-02-2009 at 01:44:30 PM
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Ok. Thanks for your reply. My mobo doesn't support pendrives so that means I gotta get an internal floppy drive.

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Bronze Storage badge Paperdoc   10-02-2009 at 08:19:49 PM
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Internal floppy drives are cheap and easy to mount and connect. BUT if, for whatever reason, you don't want it in there permanently, remember that you can always connect it to your mobo with data and power cables, sit it on a non-conductive surface, and use it temporarily with your case open. Then disconnect when finished and store for the next time.

If you do leave it permanently installed but use it rarely, start looking for a floppy disk drive cleaning kit. The slot on the front is a potential air intake route and, over a long period of non-use, the drive will accumulate dust inside. To prevent damaging the floppy disk by dragging dirty heads on the disk surface, give the drive a quick cleaning, then let any solvent dry out before inserting the floppy disk. When I do this, I often prop the drive's front slot cover open with a pencil to let lots of air flow through for quick solvent evaporation purposes.

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Bronze Storage badge sub mesa   10-02-2009 at 11:28:46 PM
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You bring a smile to my face, Paperdoc. :)

Personally i've had so much frustration with floppy disks not working most of the time, even with fresh units still in their factory casing. After a night of struggling with these old mechanic hogs where i really needed them, they totally refused to comply to my authority. I had carried out the death sentence on my perpetrator and refused to use them ever again.

Now that i read your story, it might have been dust accumulation because i used an older unit to write to and a brand new unit to read from, which didn't work. Only when i used a new floppy and switched the floppy drive back and forth to my systems, could i finish my task. It costed me so much time and frustration i decided i never wanted to repeat this horrible experience. But it might have been avoided if i had implemented your rather detailed suggestion. :)

Cheers!

Back on topic: i don't know your motherboard, but some allow flashing directly from a USB pendrive, without having to boot from it or use any DOS shell. This option is either a key you can press besides the one to enter system BIOS, or its an option inside the system BIOS itself, something like "EZ Flash Utility" or something funky. They always come up with weird names. ;)

------------------------------ ...man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but usually manages to pick himself up, walk over or around it, and carry on.
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supersnicker   10-03-2009 at 02:13:45 AM
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Haha. As for Paperdoc's solution, I dont need one anymore. I needed it to backup/flash my GPU bios but found out it can be done in Windows except riskier. As for my motherboard I am using an Asus P5L-MX. This one doesnt support the ASUS EZ Flash utility and I can't use usb sticks as a boot source. Again thanks for the replies and both thanks for the information :)

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