modded Dell bios?

Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
edited May 2005 in Science & Tech
Are there any hacked/modded Dell BIOSes around? I've got this OptiPlex GX110 from Habitat For Humanity @ home (since I broked it yesterday, and now I'm fixing it :rolleyes: ). It's been <24 hours since I stuck it on my desk, and I'm already sick of Dell's BS BIOS. I can't stand it any more... are there any REAL BIOSes for these things?

Comments

  • SpinnerSpinner Birmingham, UK
    edited July 2003
    I not really well versed in how Dell setup their machines, but presumably there is just a normal main stream consumer motherboard under the hood, you just need to find out what it is. Then in theory you should be able to go direct to the manufacturer for a proper BIOS update file, without the restrictions provided by Dell's modded BIOS.

    Just a thought.
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited July 2003
    Spinner; if you'd like, I can give you all the gory details of why Dell is the absolute, flat-out WORST PC MANUFACTURER of all time. But, in short, every... single.... f**king... part... is PROPRIETARY (with the possible exception of the hard drive, optical drive, and floppy, but even that's not always true). The OptiPlex GX110 is an NLX form factor board... AFAIK, none of them were ever sold on the retail market; it's most likely an Intel made board, but it's very heavily customized for Dell.
  • SpinnerSpinner Birmingham, UK
    edited July 2003
    Hmmm, I had a sneaky suspician that that was the case. I guess Dell sucks then:D. However, I'm sure the BIOS can still be modded, all you would have to do is export/save it to disk, and give it to someone who is skilled enough in BIOS modding to try and get a bit more functionalilty out of it.
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited July 2003
    Oh Dell more than just sucks... I've had this thing less than a day, and I've gone from disliking Dells to absolute hatred of the company and their products. I should post a thread in OT to rant and rave about it...
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited July 2003
    Dell uses custom made Intel boards - Dell has their own ICs on the board, and you cannot mod the bios.

    They also use proprietary PSU connectors, but nothing else is proprietary - you can easily swap any cards, drives, memory, or CPUs in them.
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited July 2003
    I've had issues with using floppy drives in dell systems that are not the original drives...

    Also, they were using NLX for a while, which is a form factor that was never on the retail market afaik.
  • SpinnerSpinner Birmingham, UK
    edited July 2003
    primesuspect said
    Dell uses custom made Intel boards - Dell has their own ICs on the board, and you cannot mod the bios.

    What is their reasoning behind doing this? I'm not saying there isn't a good reason, I would just like to know what it is. Any ideas?
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited July 2003
    yeah- you can't tweak stuff, so you can't break it (easily) and you can't upgrade unless you go to Dell. For example, Dell uses a 10x2 pin power supply connector, so it'll fit in an ATX socket. Guess what? all the pinouts are changed and rearranged and stuff. If you plug a Dell PS into an ATX board or vice/versa, you'll fry the board and/or the PS
  • a2jfreaka2jfreak Houston, TX Member
    edited July 2003
    Reasoning: The more they buy from Intel, the lower the prices. If they buy something (like processors) exclusively from Intel they get a bigger kickback.

    So, to sum it up in three words: to save money.
    Spinner said
    primesuspect said
    Dell uses custom made Intel boards - Dell has their own ICs on the board, and you cannot mod the bios.

    What is their reasoning behind doing this? I'm not saying there isn't a good reason, I would just like to know what it is. Any ideas?
  • SpinnerSpinner Birmingham, UK
    edited July 2003
    It always boils down to money, how silly of me to think it might be something else. One of the great things about PC's is their customisability (is that really a word?), configerability and upgradability. Dell, seems to have a very poor understanding about what makes PC's so popular, over that of other desktop computers. I guess we should really class Dell's machines as not really being PC's as such, but as being just another type of personal computer, much like a Mac'.

    Still, I, at least not in recent years, haven't had the pleasure of having any first hand experience with a Dell machine, so I can't really judge. However if what you guys have said is anything to go by...
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited July 2003
    All major OEMs do some sort of customization, there are a lot of pieces that you guys aren't taking into consideration, like inventory control, common platform rollouts, consistency, etc. Yes, of course the reasons are economic, there's nothing wrong with that... If Dell wasn't interested in making money, then that PC on your desk might still cost $6000, because of the giants like Dell and HP and IBM, computers have become commodities. Because they are commodities, they are cheap, and we can all have this really fun hobby now :)
  • a2jfreaka2jfreak Houston, TX Member
    edited July 2003
    Actually, Dell has a wonderful grasp of what makes PCs popular and for that very reason they are the largest manufacturer in the world.

    I won't buy a Dell. I won't buy Compaq/HP, IBM, etc. I like building my own. But Dell definitely does know exactly what they're doing. I would not put them into the same category as Mac, not by a long shot. At least Dells will run the programs I need and will run them fast and lets me keep my arm and my leg.
    Spinner said
    Dell, seems to have a very poor understanding about what makes PC's so popular, over that of other desktop computers. I guess we should really class Dell's machines as not really being PC's as such, but as being just another type of personal computer, much like a Mac'.

    Still, I, at least not in recent years, haven't had the pleasure of having any first hand experience with a Dell machine, so I can't really judge. However if what you guys have said is anything to go by...
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited July 2003
    Actually, Dell has a wonderful grasp of what makes PCs popular and for that very reason they are the largest manufacturer in the world.

    Yeah... they're cheap, and people don't have to think about anything when they're buying one. From an engineering standpoint though, I have serious doubts about their abilities. For example, MaximumPC tested a Dell a few months ago, and they had to shut it down between benchmarking runs because it kept overheating.
  • SpinnerSpinner Birmingham, UK
    edited July 2003
    a2jfreak said
    Actually, Dell has a wonderful grasp of what makes PCs popular and for that very reason they are the largest manufacturer in the world.

    I won't buy a Dell. I won't buy Compaq/HP, IBM, etc. I like building my own. But Dell definitely does know exactly what they're doing. I would not put them into the same category as Mac, not by a long shot. At least Dells will run the programs I need and will run them fast and lets me keep my arm and my leg.

    I guess I just find the majority of the major manufactuers a bit generic. I hate the way people have to send their PC's back to the company in question, just because they've locked it down and tailered it to such a degree no one else but them knows how to fix it. In my experience with brand PC's, they are poorly constructed and un-expertly setup, and when a problem does occur, they would rather just charge the customer through the roof for a replacement or change of device, which in fact they probably don't really need.

    Many years ago, I bought my first half descent PC, it was a Thunderbird 800 based system, and the graphics unit put in, a Geforce 2 MX, if I remember correctly, had inherent incompatabilities with that particular motherboard, which stopped it from running properly. The fact that a computer manufacture wouldn't do enough research, or enough testing to realise this grand scale problem, is enough to put me off big name manufacturers for life.

    I understand people without a lot of computer knowledge need to be spoon fed, when it comes to buying and using a PC, but I find that more often than not companies, like Dell, tend to exploit those people more than help them.
  • NecropolisNecropolis Hawarden, Wales Icrontian
    edited July 2003
    For my sins all I work on every day is Dell's. Ok, fair enough for you or me a Dell aint going to do everything you want, but from a business point of view they do everything you need. Does your standard user who uses it for word processing, email and internet need to benchmark all the parts inside - No they just need it for their word processing, email and internet.

    Also Dell's replacement policy for there premium customers is second to none (yes, we get the best support off them, 50,000+ users across europe ;)). I can ring up Dell in Ireland and say for example "I need a replacement hard drive for machine ***** (as they all come with their code)" Sure enough, next day I have a brand new hard drive sitting in reception for me with a guy waiting to take the old one away.

    I have spoken to god know how many Dell tech support guys in my time here and to be truthful the first tier techs are just reading from a screen but having spoken to their second teir support are excellent. These are some really clued up people who know their stuff.

    So in closing, yes Dell make proprietry machines that you can only really upgrade from Dell (if at all), but for business' they are just what you need. :thumbsup:
  • SpinnerSpinner Birmingham, UK
    edited July 2003
    Necropolis_uk said
    For my sins all I work on every day is Dell's. Ok, fair enough for you or me a Dell aint going to do everything you want, but from a business point of view they do everything you need. Does your standard user who uses it for word processing, email and internet need to benchmark all the parts inside - No they just need it for their word processing, email and internet.

    Also Dell's replacement policy for there premium customers is second to none (yes, we get the best support off them, 50,000+ users across europe ;)). I can ring up Dell in Ireland and say for example "I need a replacement hard drive for machine ***** (as they all come with their code)" Sure enough, next day I have a brand new hard drive sitting in reception for me with a guy waiting to take the old one away.

    I have spoken to god know how many Dell tech support guys in my time here and to be truthful the first tier techs are just reading from a screen but having spoken to their second teir support are excellent. These are some really clued up people who know their stuff.

    So in closing, yes Dell make proprietry machines that you can only really upgrade from Dell (if at all), but for business' they are just what you need. :thumbsup:

    /me still ain't convinced, but he trusts Nec's judgement so will give Dell the benefit of the doubt.:)
  • a2jfreaka2jfreak Houston, TX Member
    edited July 2003
    To address Spinner and Nec.

    Spinner: I am not singing the virtues of Dell. Personally I do not like them. I agree they are not capable machines, compared to what enthusiasts/overclockers demand.

    Nec: I agree with what you said. I will add that businesses are treated much differently than individuals. Calling Dell for tech support on a personal system is almost pointless. Calling Dell for tech support on a business system is much more productive.

    On a side note: Dell probably makes one of the best laptops you can buy.
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited August 2003
    I'm nit picking here, but so be it...

    My personal preference is for Sager's laptops because they're the only real desktop replacements I've found (Sager, Fosa, Alienware, Voodoo, and a number of other companies all use Clevo as their OEM).
  • Borg-Number-OneBorg-Number-One
    edited April 2005
    Hi.


    Talking about DELL BIOS modification:

    "Normal" / usual Phoenix BIOSes use LZINT and Phoenix Server BIOSes use LZARI.
    LZSS and LZHUFF compression methods can be found in different Phoenix BIOSes too.

    However, in most cases DELL BIOSes are Phoenix BIOSes with an unknown compression method in the BIOS modules.

    With the help of someone else I am currently trying to figure out the compression methods.....
  • TheBaronTheBaron Austin, TX
    edited April 2005
    omg why would you bring up a thread thats 800 years old
  • RadixRadix
    edited May 2005
    Hey Borg Number One,

    I'm very interested in finding out more about the work you're doing on bios compressions.

    I'm doing some work with a couple of different bioses and would like to be able to break out the compressed portions before I feed them into IDA.

    Maybe I can help develop a tool/methodology that can help identify and then decompress the code of interest.

    Feel free to drop me a PM if you'd rather communicate that way.

    Thanks,
    Radix
    Borg Number One wrote:
    Hi.


    Talking about DELL BIOS modification:

    "Normal" / usual Phoenix BIOSes use LZINT and Phoenix Server BIOSes use LZARI.
    LZSS and LZHUFF compression methods can be found in different Phoenix BIOSes too.

    However, in most cases DELL BIOSes are Phoenix BIOSes with an unknown compression method in the BIOS modules.

    With the help of someone else I am currently trying to figure out the compression methods.....
  • Borg-Number-OneBorg-Number-One
    edited May 2005
    Hi.

    With the help of many BIOS dumps, which I get by many people it was able that the Author of ABR G2 could figure out the compression methods.


    Now a further important step has to be done:

    Figuring out how the different module works. (except Logo modules or DMI modules. :) )



    If you would like to work together with us then let us know.


    Thanks go out to all the people who helped me and who still want to help me.
  • RadixRadix
    edited May 2005
    Borg Number One,

    Thanks for the info.

    I'll be out of town for about a week, but will get in touch with you when I get back. Maybe we can help each other out on a couple of things.

    Radix
    Borg Number One wrote:
    Hi.

    With the help of many BIOS dumps, which I get by many people it was able that the Author of ABR G2 could figure out the compression methods.


    Now a further important step has to be done:

    Figuring out how the different module works. (except Logo modules or DMI modules. :) )



    If you would like to work together with us then let us know.


    Thanks go out to all the people who helped me and who still want to help me.
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