tazforky
May 16th, 2009, 12:12 AM
Just posting how I updated the Dell Vostro A90 BIOS from factory shipped A03 to A04 without using a bootable USB key.
Assumes: Dell Diagnostics partition still exists in /dev/sda1 and Ubuntu is installed on /dev/sda2
Risks: Completely at your own, but these steps worked for me
Download Dell BIOS A04 (STA04DOS.EXE) from support.dell.com, specifically: http://support.dell.com/support/topics/global.aspx/support/downloads/en/downloads_splash?c=us&l=en&s=gen&~mode=popup&file=306454
sudo su -
mount /dev/sda1 /mnt
cd /mnt
cp autoexec.bat autoexec.save
echo "C:\COMMAND.COM" > autoexec.bat
You probably could just "C:\COMMAND.COM /C STA04DOS.EXE", but it seems safer to just goto DOS in case you forget to undo the autoexec.bat file.
cp (download_path)/STA04DOS.EXE /mnt
cd /
umount /mnt
reboot
Press "0" to stop at Dell's Boot Menu
Select "Diagnostics" which boots the Dell Diag partition, the modified autoexec.bat and drops you to a DOS shell.
Make sure the AC plug is powering the Vostro
STA04DOS.EXE
Wait for the program and the auto-power down / reboot that occurs
At this point you can either boot back to the Diagnostics DOS prompt and move back the autoexec.save to autoexec.bat or boot to Ubuntu, mount /dev/sda1 and do it from there.
Enjoy.
Assumes: Dell Diagnostics partition still exists in /dev/sda1 and Ubuntu is installed on /dev/sda2
Risks: Completely at your own, but these steps worked for me
Download Dell BIOS A04 (STA04DOS.EXE) from support.dell.com, specifically: http://support.dell.com/support/topics/global.aspx/support/downloads/en/downloads_splash?c=us&l=en&s=gen&~mode=popup&file=306454
sudo su -
mount /dev/sda1 /mnt
cd /mnt
cp autoexec.bat autoexec.save
echo "C:\COMMAND.COM" > autoexec.bat
You probably could just "C:\COMMAND.COM /C STA04DOS.EXE", but it seems safer to just goto DOS in case you forget to undo the autoexec.bat file.
cp (download_path)/STA04DOS.EXE /mnt
cd /
umount /mnt
reboot
Press "0" to stop at Dell's Boot Menu
Select "Diagnostics" which boots the Dell Diag partition, the modified autoexec.bat and drops you to a DOS shell.
Make sure the AC plug is powering the Vostro
STA04DOS.EXE
Wait for the program and the auto-power down / reboot that occurs
At this point you can either boot back to the Diagnostics DOS prompt and move back the autoexec.save to autoexec.bat or boot to Ubuntu, mount /dev/sda1 and do it from there.
Enjoy.