Will the BIOS flash program work thru WINE?

[DaveS]

I need to upgrade the bios on my laptop. Natch, the upgrade program is a Windows exe. Do you think this will work thru Wine?

[ETP]

I need to upgrade the bios on my laptop. Natch, the upgrade program is a Windows exe. Do you think this will work thru Wine?

Not unless you wish to dice with death

Sound advice is to be found here:
http://www.pcworld.com/article/187437/h ... _bios.html

[DaveS]

Hmmmm.... maybe I better leave it

[Amgine]

I need to upgrade mine too. I was wondering if making an XP live CD would work?

http://www.instantfundas.com/2007/11/ho ... ve-cd.html

I think there are trial versions of Windows you can download.

[Semme]

Dave- you'll find more articles like this one.. they're plentiful..

[Burn_IT]

If there is a floppy based solution, you can use a USB or a CD instead of the floppy. Both work fine. That is the way I do them.
Any DOS based or one with DOS tools recovery CD/DVD/USB or whatever boots will work. You just need the files from the floppy, which you can get using an extract program.

At worst, borrow the use of a DOS/Windows PC to create them. There are DOS/Windows based Virtual Floppy drives (free) or just create a floppy image and extract them.

[postfs1]

Will the BIOS flash program work thru WINE?

Some programs such as "ImgBurn" or "createburniso" are able to see CD-Rom device.
Maybe some program for BIOS is able to see BIOS.

To install needful version of BIOS i use "FreeDOS Live-CD", i.e. this file: "fdbasews".

[Flash]

This open-source project might be an option.

[Burn_IT]

Do NOT under any circumstances try WINE


It is dangerous enough doing it under Windows.

The only way it SHOULD be done is with a clean boot directly into Either the BIOS or DOS.


Note the mention of BIOS there. Some of the very latest DO have update functions built in.

The important thing is that the update does require UNINTERUPTED direct low level access. It only needs another task to interrupt it and you will have an expensive door stop.

[DaveS]

Thanks for all the replies. It seems to me that there is too much risk and too little gain here, so I am going to leave it alone

[Burn_IT]

It is, and has been, always the case that you only do a BIOS update if the newer one gives you something you need or fixes bugs - and that means reading all the updates between the version you have and the one you're looking at applying.
Some also have undocumented features - like the one I use with this laptop.
It allows 2Gb memory when the official figure is only 1 Gb which allows me to run Windows 7 nicely as well as Puppy (I am an ex MS MVP so do a lot with Windows as well)

Strangely, once you've done a few, the fear goes away and is replaced by a healthy caution.

I have done hundreds and have only ever bricked 1 machine when the BIOS itself was faulty.