How do I access Compaq BIOS?

[DaveJH]

Can anyone suggest how to access Compaq BIOS?

The machine I have (a Deskpro 2000) proceeds immediately to the memory count and then tries to boot from the A: drive.

I need to access BIOS to change primary boot device.

Have tried F10 and F12 and Delete keys to no avail.

Please, need help.

[Sterling_Aug]

Press F10 as soon as you turn on the computer. Keep pressing it repeatedly until it goes into the BIOS.

Compaq's use F10 only. There is no other way to get in.

[tumbler]

DaveJH

Compaq BIOS resides on the hard drive, was your drive clean before you got the PC, if yes you can download from Compaqs site.
This softpaq you will have to load onto 3 floppies which can be loaded at startup to allowyou access to the BIOS if it does not reside on the hard drive.

Hope this helps :)

[Anonymous Luser]

Technically speaking...
Press F10 when the cursor is blinking on the top right hand side of the screen. Since when does a BIOS reside on a hard drive? That's funny.

[tumbler]

I was speaking from my experience with my current machine:
Compaq Deskpro 2000
233mmx(P1)
Matrox Millenium 4Mg
etc.

When I was gifted this machine 2 years ago the hard drive was wiped. therefore the F10 at bottom right was not there. my method of accessing the BIOS was to download the softpaq - make three disks out of the softpaq and insert disks in order during boot-up.
One of the functions on the Diagnostic disk is to increase the partition size(I assume this is a partition on the hard drive - apologies for any error).
Later when doing a re-install of windows I loaded the disks prior to loading windows, now I have the F10 function for BIOS access.

Reference Guide Sect 1-5 System BIOS

"Contained in a flash memory device on the sysyem board, the BIOS provides the POST and the PCI and IDE auto-configuration utility". DUUUH

"The system BIOS is always shadowed. Shadowing allows any BIOS routines to be executed from fast 32 bit on board DRAM instead of from slower 8 bit flash device" DOUBLE DUUUH

Back to the issue, DaveJH may not be seeing the F10 prompt, that is why I suggested the option of using the disks on start-up.

Again Apologies for my HDD "foxes paw"
shadowed

[deadkenny]

My experience with Compaq business machines is that F10 takes you into a Compaq 'utility', which isn't quite the same thing as the BIOS (although I suppose the Compaq utility does allow you to affect some of the BIOS settings).

[herosrest]

Any insight's to Compaq bios would be appreciated.

[Eve]

DaveJH,

Im my compaq i use the key F10 !

If not work, try to use alternate keys , F1, F11, Alt+ESC, Alt+F1, del ...

Good Luck