FReeper Computer Question

Free Republic | 12/15/2005 | EEE

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

I'm planning on reformatting my hard drive early next year. Do I have to update the BIOS beforehand?

[HairOfTheDog]

I'm not sure updating the BIOS will make it any better, or worse, as a boat anchor. ;~D

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

Do I just leave it alone then?

[SpaceBar]

Short answer: no.

[Keith in Iowa]

Screw that...

Get a Mac.

Well, someone had to say it... :)

[NJ_gent]

No, and you probably shouldn't unless you have a specific need to do so (such as a BIOS bug fixed in a later version that's causing a problem for you). Messing with the BIOS is never a good idea. While newer boards do a somewhat better job of handling BIOS updates than older boards, there still remains the possibility of rendering the mainboard useless if something goes wrong.

If you're using Windows XP, simply boot from the XP CD and follow the instructions. :-)

[RS]

If everything was working as you want it to - I'd leave it.
No sense taking a chance on something going strange when you are operating on such a critical part.

[HairOfTheDog]

I have bad experience with reformatting computers.

[PetroniusMaximus]

No. But research first.

Try Google groups:

http://groups.google.com/grphp?hl=en&tab=wg&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official_s&q=

[djf]

My recommendation:

No. Leave it as is. Depending on how computer savvy you are, bios updates can be a nightmare. Depending on the type of system you have, if you blow the bios, you can't boot.

If you decide to update, make darn sure you go here,
http://www.wimsbios.com/

download a copy of UNIFLASH, and use it to make a backup copy of you current bios.

Uniflash has saved my keister a couple times.

[DustyMoment]

No. The BIOS and the hard drive are not inter-related that way. When you first turn the computer on, it is as dumb as a bucket of hair. The BIOS, loaded in static RAM (called a PROM or, more likely, an EPROM or EEPROM) is a "bootstrap" loader that tells the computer about its memory, hard drive(s) and peripherals so that it can detect these devices and load the operating system.

The BIOS is not stored on the hard drive, so re-formatting it will not affect the BIOS.

[MD_2_BE]

Updating the BIOS is a good idea if there is an update available for your chipset. It is not necessary, however, especially if your computer was running fine before hand. Also note that it is not necessary to reformat the harddrive at the same time. The BIOS can be updated without a reformat.

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

Thanks. You guys rock.

[Fire_on_High]

They're unrelated issues. BIOS updates can definitely be playing with fire, so unless you have something that would necessitate the BIOS update, like a known bug, compatibility issue, or planned upgrades that would need it, leave it alone.

That said, I've done 1 and consider it a smashing success as it allowed my machine to use a hard drive considerably larger than previous, but I've heard an awful lot of horror stories.