I know this has nothing specific to do with the XS, but maybe it'll help others, as I spent ages searching around for the solution. Some of us are reusing legacy Dells and those can be difficult to deal with in a Linux only environment.<br>
<br>So just in case other folks are re-purposing old Dell machines as XS's and are in a similar situation in regards to wanting to upgrade the BIOS - you'll need: a Linux box, CD Burner, and 2 CDRs.<br><br>We have a bunch of old Dell Optiplex GX270 boxes to use as XS's. I want to update the BIOS from A04 to the newest A07, but don't have access to a Windows machine nor possess any floppies. I certainly wasn't about to go and buy floppies just for this, let alone install Windows. And I've never been able to successfully boot a USB drive on these boxes, so that's out.<br>
<br>Luckily an OpenSUSE user had the exact same quandary and posted the solution:<br><a href="http://collinpark.blogspot.com/2009/06/more-pain-opensuse-111-on-my-dell.html">http://collinpark.blogspot.com/2009/06/more-pain-opensuse-111-on-my-dell.html</a><br>
<br>I downloaded the LiveCD version of FreeDOS 1.0 and burned the iso to a CD. It's 153M.<br><br><a href="http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/freedos/files/distributions/1.0/fdfullcd.iso">http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/freedos/files/distributions/1.0/fdfullcd.iso</a><br>
<br>Then I got the BIOS update from Dell. Of course it's an exe file which doesn't let me do anything with under Linux. I tried to extract it, but just produced a bunch of errors. Forget that, then.<br><br>I burned the BIOS file GX270A07.EXE to a data CD, which seems kinda a waste of a CD for such a small file (540K). But I've got scads of CDRs and no desire to trot over to Office Depot just for floppies. Besides, I've got a lot of these boxes to update, and I suppose it doesn't feel like such a waste when I think of how many times it'll be used.<br>
<br>I boot the FreeDOS CD and hit enter at the prompt. Then hit 5 for the "FreeDOS Live CD Only" option and after a few seconds, got an A:\> prompt.<br><br>I eject the FreeDOS CD and insert the CD with GX270A07.EXE. **This is important: wait for the CD-ROM drive LED to quit blinking before you do anything.** If you try to access the drive too soon, you'll get an error and have to reboot. I enter DIR X:\ and see the exe file.<br>
<br>Then I simply enter:<br>X:\GX270A07.EXE<br><br>I'm prompted twice to hit y, then cross my fingers and hope the power doesn't go out for a few seconds while it flashes. Yeah, a UPS is probably a really good idea.<br>
<br>It automatically reboots and I hit F2 to get into the BIOS setup. Wow, there's A07! If you happen to be using a similar machine, might I recommend "Power Management -> AC Power Recovery -> Last." That way if the power goes out and the UPS dies (if you're lucky enough to have one), the XS will automagically power back on when power is restored.<br>
<br>Here's the the obligatory: YMMV, the process will likely be different with other models, and be careful otherwise you might brick the mobo.<br><br>Anna Schoolfield<br>Birmingham<br><br>