BIOS Update using USB Stick

F

fbsd1

BIOS Update using USB Stick.​

There may be times when your PC BIOS may have a update provided by the vendor. To physical update the motherboard BOIS chip the PC has to be booted in MSDOS and then the vendor supplied flash program can be executed to apply the new bios.bin file to the motherboard BOIS chip. This was all fine and dandy when all PCs had floppy drives. But in today’s world PCs are not manufactured with floppy drivers any more and MS/XP and newer Windows
systems have no option to create bootable MSDOS media. That leaves you with two options. Create a MSDOS bootable USB Stick or create a bootable CDROM.

Creating a bootable MSDOS USB stick (flash drive) is simple.
But it has it’s own set of problems depending on how old the PC is.
It’s not un-common for PC’s manufactured before 2008 to have BIOS that lack
the option to boot from USB devices or may even fail to recognize USB media
as bootable.

First thing is to determine if your current bios have option to boot from USB devices. During power on enter BIOS setup menu and check the boot device order for option to boot from USB. If it’s absent this procedure won’t work for you.

If your PC BIOS has a option to boot from USB, configure the first boot device to be from USB and the second from cdrom and the third from the hard drive. If there is no bootable usb device plugged in and no bootable CD in the CDROM/DVD drive then you will default to booting from the motherboard cabled hard drive.


There are three files you have to acquire before starting this process.

1. A bootable floppy image. Download the floppy.img from http://www.daemonforums.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=300&d=1267845079
You may have to click the link a second time to get the save download box. Once you have it downloaded, rename it removing the .zip suffix. In this case the floppy image contains the basic programs to fix any fat32 drive, IE. [fdisk, format, scandisk, edit, chkdsk, more, find, command.com, sys.com, io.sys, msdos.sys] files and was created using Windows 98. Note: This forum has
restrictions which severely limit the size of attached files which the 1.4MB floppy size exceeds. Forcing me to point you to another forum which will host the floppy.img.

2. The MS/DOS flash.exe utility provided by the BIOS vender used to update the BIOS chip.

3. The vender supplied bios.bin file used to write over the old PC BIOS chip’s content.


Warning: Using the wrong flash utility or wrong update bios.bin file can result in
irreversible damage to your motherboard BIOS chip making your motherboard un-usable.


Make a memory disk of the floppy.img

Code: 
   mdconfig -f /path/floppy.img
   mount_msdosfs /dev/md0 /mnt
   cd /mnt
   ls

Now you see all the files in the floppy.image. To this you have to add the
2 vendor supplied files used to update your motherboard BIOS chip.

Code: 
  cp /path/flash.exe  /mnt/
  cp /path/bios.bin /mnt
  ls

Now you will see your BIOS update files are added to the floppy image.
Now back out.

Code: 
   cd /root
   umount /mnt
   mdconfig -d -u md0

Write the floppy img to the USB stick

Code: 
dd if=/path/floppy.img of=/dev/da0


Before powering on the PC that’s to have it’s BIOS updated
Plug in the USB stick you just created. The USB stick will boot and
put you at the MSDOS command line as drive A:
To display the contents of drive A: issue

Code: 
dir


Then key in the program to update the system BIOS chip and
follow the vendors instructions.

Code: 
Flash


When completed, remove the USB stick and reboot the PC.
If your PC doesn’t boot then you know you have a very big problem. The BIOS update you just ran didn’t work or the update bios.bin file was not the correct one for your bios chip. Your only remaining option is to buy a new motherboard from a know vendor who provides technical support for their equipment.
 
Hi,

Thank you for the how to. I do have some questions though. I went to my PCs vendors website and all thats available is the .exe file. I do not see a bios.bin file as indicated in your post.

Also I copied over the .exe and I don't see it named the same as whats in my original path:

Code: 
yeaguy# ll /root/bios/
total 2000
-rwxr--r--  1 samba  wheel   529181 Nov  1 22:43 [color="Red"]DXP061-020503.EXE[/color]
-rwxr--r--  1 samba  wheel  1474560 Nov  1 22:57 floppy.img
yeaguy# ll /mnt/
total 1287
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel      45 Sep 20  2008 autoexec.bat
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel   28096 Apr 23  1999 chkdsk.exe
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel   93890 Apr 23  1999 command.com
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel       0 Jan 12  2000 config.sys
-r-xr-xr-x  1 root  wheel   68871 Apr 23  1999 drvspace.bin
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel  529181 Nov  1 22:56 [color="Red"]dxp061-0.exe[/color]
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel   69902 Apr 23  1999 edit.com
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel   63916 Apr 23  1999 fdisk.exe
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel    6658 Apr 23  1999 find.exe
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel   49575 Apr 23  1999 format.com
-r-xr-xr-x  1 root  wheel  222390 Apr 23  1999 io.sys
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel   10471 Apr 23  1999 more.com
-r-xr-xr-x  1 root  wheel       9 Apr 23  1999 msdos.sys
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel  143818 Apr 23  1999 scandisk.exe
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel    7329 Apr 23  1999 scandisk.ini
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel   18967 Apr 23  1999 sys.com
yeaguy#

I will stand down on attempting this BIOS update since my steps do not match your at the moment.

Please advise,

Thanks.
 
Does your machine still have support for floppy drives (or USB-connected ones)? Any reason for *not* using the provided boot floppy/executable file?
 
A problem I encounter often is that some updates require more space than is available in a floppy image. Building a larger, bootable DOS image is a real pain.
 
manilaboy1vic said:
Also I copied over the .exe and I don't see it named the same as whats in my original path:

Code: 
yeaguy# ll /root/bios/
total 2000
-rwxr--r--  1 samba  wheel   529181 Nov  1 22:43 [color="Red"]DXP061-020503.EXE[/color]
-rwxr--r--  1 samba  wheel  1474560 Nov  1 22:57 floppy.img
yeaguy# ll /mnt/
total 1287
[...]
-rwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel  529181 Nov  1 22:56 [color="Red"]dxp061-0.exe[/color]
[...]
Click to expand...
I missed this last time. It is FAT12's 8.3 "FILENAME.EXT" file naming convention. Just boot the floppy and execute "dxp061-0".


~~~~


aragon said:
A problem I encounter often is that some updates require more space than is available in a floppy image. Building a larger, bootable DOS image is a real pain.
Click to expand...
Well, for starters one can remove all unnecessary and relatively large files: chkdsk.exe, edit.com, fdisk.exe, format.com, more.com, scandisk.exe (=357KB).
Plus once MS-DOS has booted, io.sys and command.com (i.e. the entire system) remain resident, so the boot floppy can be removed and replaced with one containing the flashing tool alone.
 
Wait. Cant Can't I just mv the DXP061-020503.EXE file to the USB drive and then set the bios to boot from the USB drive and then run the .exe?

Do I need the floppy files on the USB as well? The reason I pulled the plug on this maintenance is because I was never provided a bios.bin file from the Vendor site.
 
I think Im I'm ready to go with this... Here is what is on my thumb drive. I never got a bios.bin from the vendor site, I do not believe one is available.

Code: 
yeaguy# mount_msdosfs /dev/da0 /mnt/
yeaguy# ls /mnt
autoexec.bat    config.sys      edit.com        format.com      msdos.sys       sys.com
chkdsk.exe      drvspace.bin    fdisk.exe       io.sys          scandisk.exe
command.com     dxp061-0.exe    find.exe        more.com        scandisk.ini
yeaguy# umount /mnt/
yeaguy# mount

Now it's just a matter of pulling the trigger on dxp061-0.exe and praying that nothing goes wrong.
 
I reviewed the documentation from the Vendor. The BIOS file I received is meant to be run in a Windows environment. You are supposed to launch the file from the desktop. Looks like my BIOS update will be on the back burner for now.
 
I am on a similar issue: Toshiba Satellite a100, version psaa9e, Toshiba delivers a 2.2 Mbyte .exe BIOS upgrade file to be run from windows environment... have to search for a bootable DOS image of, say, 3MB, but still I don't know if it'll work... maybe these BIOS upgrade .exe files to be run on Windows can be run on DOS?
 
Thank you so much for this marvellous guide! Yesterday I could perform a BIOS upgrade on an old ASUS board with this even using a 1.44 floppy drive. Only step that changes is obviously

dd if=/path/floppy.img of=/dev/fd0

Only thing was that the awflash utiliy reported that the old bios could not be backed up because there was not enough space, but who cares when the upgrade performed well.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top