Any experiences with eSupport?

sfeet · Tue Mar 29, 2005 10:52 pm

I am thinking about buying a bios update from eSupport for $29.95 and I would like to know if it is worth it or not. Do the updates work? Am I really going to be able to use bigger harddrives than the 8 Gig drives the machine supports now?

If you have any experiences, good or bad, please reply.

Tue Mar 29, 2005 11:09 pm

Maybe there are a free BIOS update for you...
Run BIOS Agent and post back your results please.
http://www.esupport.com/biosagent/

sfeet · Wed Mar 30, 2005 6:34 am

Bios Agent crashed the computer so here's the output from the DOS version. The machine is Olivetti Envision P75, bios version 2.06:

Program: eSupport.com BIOS Detect v1.2 July 21, 2003
BIOS Date: 08/25/94
BIOS Type: American Megatrends
BIOS ID: 51-0200-000000-11111111-082594-VLSI
Chipset: VLSI VL82C594 rev 1
Superio: Unknown
BIOS ROM In Socket: Unknown
BIOS ROM Size: Unknown
CPU Type: Unknown
CPU Speed: Unknown
CPU Max: Unknown
Memory Installed: Unknown
Memory Maximum: Unknown

eSupport.com, Inc.
1-800-800-BIOS (2467)
www.esupport.com

Wed Mar 30, 2005 6:55 am

sfeet wrote:Bios Agent crashed the computer so here's the output from the DOS version. The machine is Olivetti Envision P75, bios version 2.06

BIOS Agent crashed because it's a very old machine.

BIOS Date: 08/25/94
BIOS Type: American Megatrends
BIOS ID: 51-0200-000000-11111111-082594-VLSI
Chipset: VLSI VL82C594 rev 1

Olivetti... OEM board for sure, too difficult to find an update.
Why do you want to update your BIOS?

sfeet · Wed Mar 30, 2005 1:50 pm

Reason for upgrade is to enable larger harddrives. The limit at the moment is around 8 Gb.

Wed Mar 30, 2005 10:11 pm

It's not worth spending 30$ for a Bios on such an old board. Better try to buy a cheap used board with CPU young anough to support bigger HDD.

sfeet · Wed Mar 30, 2005 10:57 pm

Denniss wrote:It's not worth spending 30$ for a Bios on such an old board. Better try to buy a cheap used board with CPU young anough to support bigger HDD.

Well, the problem here is that I'm building an MP3 player from an old multimedia PC and using a modern mainboard would mean I have to find a really small PSU and also make a lot of structural changes to the chassis. Also it would mean buying a new display adapter with tv-out as this one has it built-in and most likely new memory sticks and a CPU. The idea I have is to keep costs as low as possible and then try to sell it using a local eBay variant where people seem to buy this kind of stuff with ridiculous prices.

Here's a link to a website (in Dutch) that might give you an idea what I'm talking about: http://home.hetnet.nl/~wimwubs/