Help needed with HDD (137 GB) limit

[VictorVictor5]

Greetings all,

New to the forum and new to modding BIOS! Apologies if this is in the wrong sub-category.

There are 3 machines total that I would like to mod. But the first one I'd like to try is a Dell Inspiron 2200. I've done some research and it seems like I can get rid of my BIOS limit. Yay But since I'm new at this, I need to defer to the experts. Currently I have Dell BIOS revision A07 on the system. But I don't know what to do first.

Can one of the experts here please provide guidance? Also, is there anything else I can do with BIOS modding on a laptop, such as increase the RAM, CPU, etc?

Thanks!
VV5

[edwin]

Being a laptop, being a Phoenix bios and being a Dell are 3 factors that make is near impossible to patch/crack/enhance the bios. I do not know of any custom bioses for this thing.
The stock A07 bios will support disks up to 120GB (160GB is too big for the 137GB limit) and that is it.
RAM-wise the limit is 1280MB (you can add a single 1GB module maximum).
It will take up to a Pentium M 765 (2.1GHz/400MHz FSB). Intel "Core" CPUs are not supported. No P4 support either.

[VictorVictor5]

Edwin,

Thanks for the response. I just have 4 quick questions.

1.) How do you know it's a Phoenix BIOS? When I turn it on it doesn't say PhoenixBIOS or anything (even when I enter the BIOS settings). Sorry, just a bit confused, and new to this whole concept.

2.) Are laptops, by default, hard to crack? Why is that? I thought a BIOS is a BIOS.

3.) Along that same line, are Dell's just a pain to crack?

4.) Also, just curious, and random - what is a "SLIC" request? I keep seeing that.

Thanks!
VV5

[edwin]

1. Experience and this one has been requested before, we already tried to disect it.

2. Because there are more stringent limits to what hardware you can put in the limited space of a laptop both heatwise and power-wise. As a result most laptop bioses have been very limited in their tweaking options by the manufacturer (e.g. what is not in there in the first place you cannot activate).

3. some series are, usually the consumer/budget series.

4. Stolen from elsewhere:

SLIC (SYSTEM LICENSED INTERNAL CODE) 2.1 is the Software Licensing Table added to the BIOS on OEM PCs that come pre-installed with Windows 7.
It is used in concert with a Matching OEM Certificate and Key to Activate Win 7.
So by adding it to a BIOS and installing the Matching Certificate and Key, Win 7 will see your PC as a licensed OEM PC.

A more technical explanation is here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BIOS#Identification