Windows 7: Modding/Flashing BIOS??

Lately, I've been hearing a lot about flashing your bios, or modding your bios somehow.

I've just started working with computers not to long ago, and haven't really modded BIOS before...

Can someone put it in as simple a form as possible what it all is?

How do I know if I have a Award, or Phoenix BIOS?

What's "Flash BIOS" mean"

How can you mod your BIOS? and do all these mods online actually work, cause i don't want to brick a motherboard.



I will be experimenting on a hp slimline s3400z. M2N61-ARMotherboard. v5.18 bios from what i can tell (blue hp screen has those numbers on start up, no other bios info)

This probably makes me sound like a noob, but I'm really interested in all this, but can't find a simple answer anywhere.

THanks!

Here's a description of the BIOS, including a mention of "Flash BIOS", which is a type of chip used to store BIOS info.

BIOS - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

You can see if you have an Award or Phoenix BIOS by entering the BIOS, where it should be stated outright. Or you should be able to see the BIOS manufacturer and version briefly onscreen during a boot. Or you should be able to get the info with a program such as Speccy or HWInfo that take an inventory of the parts in your PC.

I'm not sure how you enter the BIOS on an HP, but it's usually with a keystroke during boot, maybe delete, maybe F2, etc.

Although it can be done, BIOS modification is typically not done by consumers.

You can change the BIOS by "flashing" to another BIOS (typically a newer one obtained from the motherboard manufacturer), but it's not to be taken lightly as if it goes bad for any reason, you may have to replace the board or at least the BIOS chip on it. BIOS flashing is recommended ONLY if you have a strong reason to believe it will fix an outstanding issue. Motherboard manufacturers try to provide info on what new BIOSes are designed to fix, but they don't necessarily do a good job of it.

It takes only a few minutes and the standard recommendation is to NOT do it from Windows, but a lot of people do. And a lot of people flash in hopes it will cure something, with no evidence that it will.

I typically flash all of my BIOSes from within Windows. That's kind of a misnomer, as the actual flashing isn't done within Windows. If you watch the process, is loads the new BIOS into a temporary area, and upon reboot, actually performs the flashing...just like boot or DOS-based processes. Dell only releases "windows" BIOS updates, for example. Another reason I like these methods is that Dell, for example, checks and confirms the BIOS's compatibility and the revisions before flashing.

Aside from that, on a production system, I don't flash the BIOS just because it's new. You couldn't be more correct there. I have often encountered systems that were working fine, and then started having strange issues AFTER a new BIOS version was applied.

Ok, thanks...

I was thinking that it was some kind of cool modding thing people do to change how there computer loads (like instead of the 'starting windows' logo, there's something else there) or instead of the hp screen for instance, you can change it to your name or something, that's why i posted here to make sure.

I saw some posts about fixing issues, and that's what got me confused...

Thanks again...

There is such a thing as modding a BIOS. I believe some video cards can be modded to turn on features that may have been disabled in budget cards, etc. However, anytime you do that, you run the risk of rendering the card useless....and the manufacturer won't issue a replacement for something you did on purpose.

System BIOSes generally are to add support for new hardware or fix stability issues. For those of us who build computers, a BIOS update might allow a motherboard to properly handle a brand new processor type.

For Exemple,

You can mod a Bios if you have two graphics cards installed like an Intel & ATI (for laptops in general).
At this point many manufacturer make easy the ability to switch between card in the Bios settings "Switchable", but those drivers are customized by the Brand Mfg.

Therefore when you're on your desktop or switching from wired powered cable to battery powered. You can either switch yourself between the two cards or it does itself.

Some asking for modded Bios because of the need to update drivers for a preferred card, in general in this kind of config it could be INTEL onboard card. Then they Mod the Bios to have a config like "Intel Only".

Installing a Modded Bios is at your own risk and could void warranty and Brick the computer.
Therefore a modded bios can be also reverted by installing through USB Stick the original one (Care well of Recovering the Bios Instruction in that case).

Some also modding their Bios to have a new tab "Advanced" to access hidden settings or locked settings to overclock their CPUs.

Hope this clearing a little your needs.

That's at the OS level and so far, asfaik no ones been able to replace it with a different animated version.

You can disable the 'Boot logo' to get rid of the HP screen and show the BIOS POSTing instead. Not quite the customization you're after though.

To mod a BIOS you need the tools and knowledge. Unfortunately it's not as easy as modding a GPU BIOS.

Are you talking about this?? (I've uploaded a clip of my Boot animation)
I'll link the web pages to the program and a few animations.(None of it is my work)



Coder for Life - Project - Windows 7 Boot Updater:

Collection Of Animated Windows 7 Boot Screens

Yeah that's what i was wondering about...