WARNING: Don't do this unless you have access to a EPROM BURNER or a backup BIOS chip handy!
Posted by Tackhead on 04-02-2000 07:57:26 P.M.
[snip]
1) Acquire AWDFLASH.EXE 6.31
- This is the BIOS flasher you'll use to extract your old BIOS image (which will also help you tell if running through the tutorial or letting the unit be "updated" affects your BIOS)
2) Acquire CBROM130.EXE
- This is the utility you'll use to examine the contents of the BIOS ROM dump and modify it accordingly. They were really nice, including a /logo option for changing (ta-dah!) boot logo screens.
3) Boot to straight DOS. In Win9x, will usually mean adding a BootGUI=0 line to your C:\CONFIG.SYS file. You may have to use ATTRIB.EXE to make the file writable first.
4) When booting, hold down the SHIFT key to prevent loading of EMM386.EXE or anything else that ASDFLASH.EXE tells you it doesn't like.
5) Help for AWDFLASH and CBROM in case you get confused:
AWDFLASH /?
CBROM130 /?
6) Extract your old BIOS ROM to a file:
AWDFLASH /Pn mybios.bin
7) Copy your old BIOS ROM somewhere safe:
COPY mybios.bin mybios.bak
8) We assume you already have a favorite .BMP of a penguin or daemon handy. (640x464, 16 colors, Windows BMP)
9) For kicks, examine your old BIOS ROM:
CBROM130 mybios.bin /D
See the various components there? The one we're after is the logo bitmap, by default "welcome.bmp"
10) Rewrite your old BIOS ROM:
CBROM130 mybios.bin /logo penguin.bmp
This overwrites mybios.bin, creating the file for your new BIOS. If your logo is too complicated and doesn't compress well, you may run out of space. You can use CBROM to tell you whether or not your BIOS image with the new logo is "full" or not.
11) Assuming you didn't run out of space, flash your new BIOS and just for paranoia's sake, make another backup.
AWDFLASH mybios.bin /Py oldbios.bak /Sy
12) Reboot - and pray for the best! As usual, don't try flashing your BIOS unless you're prepared to take the risk of turning your i-opener into a doorstop.
Wim's BIOS page http://www.ping.be/bios/HTML1/faq.html
German page, utilz and penguin
http://velociraptor.mni.fh-giessen.de/Bootlogo/
Posted by Mas'Deom on 04-02-2000 08:41:07 P.M.
I found AWDFLASH.EXE 6.31 at site below for the lazy folks (every ver. is there)
http://ic.doma.kiev.ua/pub/award/awd631.exe
Posted by Spanky on 04-04-2000 08:39:35 P.M.
There is a useful primer for a Bios Flash Procedure at
http://www.tir.com/~tcsenter/award2.htm
