Motherboard Help Pages
6. I have been told that
my motherboard needs a flash upgrade to support the Processor/Hard
Drive that I want to install. What should I do?
Before undertaking the BIOS upgrade
you need to be aware of the dangers involved in the procedure.
Because the BIOS is at the basis of the computer itself then
without a correctly functioning BIOS the motherboard is in
effect completely DEAD. When you flash upgrade you in effect
write a new BIOS over the top of the old one, so if the process
is interrupted before completion (by power failure for example)
then the board has no BIOS and it is dead.
(This
dead board may possibly still be recoverable by the process
described on this page but this is much more difficult).
The failure of the flash
process is rare but you should be aware that there is a small
risk of "killing your motherboard"
before you undertake to do it.
Once you have decided to upgrade
then first you need to locate the new bios file itself and
the program for performing the upgrade which will be on the
motherboard manufacturers web site. With these files the procedure
is essentially very simple (though some manufacturers do have
slight variations) in that you boot the system to DOS and
simply run the flash upgrade program. It will normally ask
if you want to save the existing bios (a good idea generally)
so that you can restore it if you prefer, ask you for the
name and location of the new bios, warn you not to switch
off your system until it is finished, and finally write the
new BIOS. Reboot your system and it will start with the new
BIOS (you are likely to need to reset some BIOS settings to
make your system work properly)
**As a final
warning you should also consider that the BIOS is specific
to each and every motherboard so you should make sure you
have one designed specifically for your board since otherwise
you are likely to find the board to be dead in the same way
as if the actual writing of the BIOS failed.**
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