Flashing Bios

bigmck · 16 Nov 2009

I have never done this before. My computer is two years old. Is this something that should be done every so often or does it need to be done before I install
Win 7?

seekermeister · 16 Nov 2009

Flashing the BIOS should only be done if you are having a problem with your PC. Generally, by that, I'm talking about hardware recognition or something that is causing a problem booting. It is not something to be done on a schedule, and while flashing a BIOS is simple enough, it is also somewhat risky if anything goes wrong during the flash. Chances are that if you aren't having a problem with booting to XP, you won't have a problem with W7. Bottom line is don't fix it if it isn't broken.

Rather than flashing, I prefer to buy a new chip. It is super easy to install, if your MB's chip is socketed.

bobkn · 16 Nov 2009

In general, updating the BIOS is done to fix bugs, improve compatibility with RAM, etc. There's no general need to do it before going to Win7.

If you decide that you wish to do it, I recommend NOT doing it from within Windows. (It'd probably work, but there is a higher risk of a bad flash if you use a Windows-based utility.) Also, if your motherboard supports a method for recovering from a bad BIOS flash, you'd best prepare that before the update. I've never rendered a system unbootable with a BIOS flash, but it can happen. (I once read of a failed flash by a chap whose dog pulled the power cord in the middle of the flash.)

skunksmash · 16 Nov 2009

how will you go about this BIOS update..?? :)

disc, USB, desktop...??

Warning

DO NOT update your BIOS unless you need to for compatibility reasons, its also an option for overclockers, but please BEWARE!!

bigmck · 16 Nov 2009

Thanks for all of your help on this. I was under the impression it was like updating drivers, it needed to be done once in a while. I will just leave it alone then. Thanks again.

mushroomboy · 16 Nov 2009

It's nothing like drivers, because unlike a failed driver a failed chip just sucks. No really though, you need an external programmer and another computer to re-flash a failed bios attempt. It's not as dangerous as I'd say the people above posted, but it is something that you should double check everything. Like if I'm going to make a floppy disk for flashing, I don't just make the disk I check it a couple times to make sure it boots ok. Because if you get any corruption and the CRC checks out your screwed. It's really like updating DVD/CD firmware, just make sure you do it right cause a bad flash means dead parts. Usually most MB's now have a flash program built in, like when you boot and you see "Hit F5 for AWD Flash Utility". In those cases all you need is a CD or Floppy with just the .bin file of your bios and the rest is "Press Enter". Gigabyte boards have made dual bios boards, just for things like this (I love that option, I think everything should have some form of perm flash backup).

I do agree though that you don't need to update the bios unless you have a problem. My ASRock has a win flash program, I didn't even know it was all automated until I ran it thinking "Oh it'll give me an option to continue". No, it just checked the flash and started flashing which scared the **** out of me. Why? Cause I didn't know for sure if the computer was stable, which it wasn't cause I had unlocked 2 cores and one had a bad L2 cache... I'm lucky this all went well! But you can flash from within windows, it's no different from flashing outside of windows, really the flash still has to be sent to RAM and 8bit sections erased and flashed.