Is Bios Upgrade Anything To Worry About

[Harry]

I just bought a slot 1 600e mhz processor for $10. I remember a few years ago when this processor alone was going for $200. I want to upgrade from my optiplex gx1 266mhz. I have already downloaded the appropriate bios software of A07 but I'm nervous about doing this bios upgrade since I have never done one before. Should I make a backup of everything before I go through this. What worries me most is that this might in some way destroy my master boot record where I will no longer be able to get access to any of my partitions.

[Markoman01027]

You only need to do a BIOS update if you are experiencing problems with your PC, and the BIOS update specifically fixes THAT type of problem you are having.

You can also flash the BIOS if you want it to support newer CPU's, aswell as any other hardware.

Your motherboard manual should walk you through how to flash the BIOS and how to make a back up copy of the BIOS incase something happens while flashing the BIOS.

Flashing the BIOS does not alter the MBR or any of your partitions. But if the flash goes bad, you may not even be able to boot up at all or even start the PC.

[DragonNOA1]

Nothing to worry about. I guess you already have instructions from the BIOS utility on how to install it, so as long as you have a good back up (just in case) then you should be fine.

It won't mess with the HD's MBRs, even if your mobo fails to update.

[Harry]

Thanks,

Yeah, it's like you say, I am going to flash the bios to allow faster processor to work.

[kittyfire]

Staying on the upgrade path with BIOS is very important. Especially on the generation processor you're talking about. There were a lot of changes to the way hardware and software were able to interact with each other that was addressed by BIOS updates. Specifically, power management completely turned around and many computer manufacturers were scrambling for BIOS fixes to correct a lot of issues between '98 and the hardware. Granted, we're way past '98 but subsequent OSes kept those same changes implemented with '98 so it's going to be important that the BIOS is up-to-date.