Updating Dell XPS 600 BIOS

[James O Grady 904153]

I just bought new RAM recently, but I'm having problems with it in that when I have the 2x2GB modules in together(they work fine when put in separately) I get very crackly sound which disappears altogether after a few minutes. I've been told by crucial to update my BIOS as my current BIOS version might not be able to handle more than 2GB of memory. But after downloading the latest BIOS version from Dell's website and trying to run it from the desktop as instructed on their website, I get the following error:

 

Windows Configuration Error

An error was encountered trying to configure Windows to allow flashing, please reboot and try again. If this error re-occurs, please contact technical help.

 

Does anyone know a way to fix this problem? Could it be the BIOS update was designed for XP and just doesn't work on Windows 7? Theres no answers available on Dell's website and I can't ring them up for support as the warrantys up, and I didn't buy the computer from them.

 

Any help appreciated.

 

Cheers,

 

James

[Darrol Larrok 1140797]

Did you run as administrator?

 

See if there is one that runs outside the OS, like one that boots from a CD, USB stick or even (gasp!) a floppy.

[James O Grady 904153]

Yeh I'm running it as an administrator. I tried booting it from a USB stick via command prompt, but just got the same error.

[Darrol Larrok 1140797]

Try booting the computer from the USB stick. If the USB stick is capable, enter BIOS setup(usually pressing DEL or TAB during boot), and instruct the computer to boot from the disk. You won't get that error this way, since you'll be byp[Mod - Happy Thoughts]ing windows entirely.

[Richard Gerrish]

Looking at the age of the BIOS you might already have their latest bois installed. double check the current version you have before pulling your hair out too much further the one they offer is A11 published back in 06.

[James O Grady 904153]

Try booting the computer from the USB stick. If the USB stick is capable, enter BIOS setup(usually pressing DEL or TAB during boot), and instruct the computer to boot from the disk. You won't get that error this way, since you'll be byp[Mod - Happy Thoughts]ing windows entirely.

 

I don't get what yeh mean. How can I boot the computer from a USB stick?

 

Looking at the age of the BIOS you might already have their latest bois installed. double check the current version you have before pulling your hair out too much further the one they offer is A11 published back in 06.

 

Yeh I'm on A09 atm, wanting to update to A11.

[Darrol Larrok 1140797]

It's quite possible to boot from USB. Found a good guide for it here. Basically, you instruct the computer to first attempt to boot of an attached USB device before loading the OS on the hard drive. If the flashing software you downloaded is bootable(probably), this should work. EDIT: Post the link to the update, please.

[James O Grady 904153]

Cheers I'll give that a try.

 

EDIT: Post the link to the update, please.

 

http://support.us.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=gen&releaseid=R135806&formatcnt=0&libid=0&typeid=-1&dateid=-1&formatid=-1&source=-1&fileid=181059

[Darrol Larrok 1140797]

Looks like that won't work.

 

Given that were a bit past the era where one could grab a dos floppy...interesting.

[James O Grady 904153]

Yeh thought as much. From reading this topic it seems its a proprietary issue in that because Dell only sold the XPS 600 with XP or Vista, the BIOS update can only be installed on those OS's. So my only option now might be to reformat onto XP, install the update, and then reformat back onto Windows 7.

[Darrol Larrok 1140797]

You could also install XP onto a partition and dual boot it. Or use a virtual machine.

[Erhan Atesoglu 1050499]

Are you sure there isn't a write protection for the bios inside the settings?