Upgrade HDD Firmware without Floppy? Using CD-RW=no go

[JHaislet]

Ok, I'm pulling my hair out here. I'm trying to upgrade the firmware on the HDD in the T43, Hitachi (HTS541080G9AT00) 80GB, 5400rpm, the stock HDD from IBM that came with the T43.

Anyways, I'm trying to go from firmware A5BJ to A60A and have booted into the flash program using Dr-Dos from a CD-RW.

After running FW.exe in Dr-Dos and selecting #2 to flash the drive, it keeps asking for a floppy in "Drive A:", FWHD3414.

The Dr-Dos image takes up letter "A" and kicks the flash program and firmware image to either "B" or "Z" depending on which version of Dr-Dos you use (I've tried alot of them). No dice, it won't let me update it.

Finally, I found a very small bootable .ima file and injected all the needed firmware & flash files into this file, then created a new bootable cd. This made the flash program & image accessible under drive letter "A" and I manually changed the image volume to FWHD3414 before burning it.

HOWEVER, the flash program says the SAME [censored] ERROR about sticking in the floppy titled FWHD3414 in Drive A

Anyone have any ideas or recommendations? I'll be dang if I'm gonna spend $50 for a USB floppy drive. I've updated motherboard bios's for years using these bootable CDRW images, yet I can't get the stupid IBM program to work!

BTW, I've got two different USB Jumpdrives (bootable from bios) and CD-RW & DVD+RW's if anyone has ANY way around using the [censored] floppies!

Thanks!

[hoya]

I'll second that request - I'm literally thinking of just buying a USB floppy to flash the firmware on a drive, but I would sure like to use a CD-RW image instead.

any ideas are greatly appreciated1

[kyrotech]

you need a floppy to update the firmware.

buy a cheap $20 usb floppy drive

[briank]

Just curious, why do you want to upgrade the firmware on your hard drive?

[sugo]

This worked for me last time I updated HDD firmware in a t42:


Get virtual floppy
http://chitchat.at.infoseek.co.jp/vmware/vfd.html

Download the floppy version of firmware update program

Run the program so that it writes a floppy image to the virtual floppy drive.

Burn the floppy image to a CD.

The CD should then boot and starts firmware update program automatically.

[rocky01]

i went through this some time ago and tried several of the suggestions (after the thread got long enough). sure you can jump through hoops. after buying a usb floppy i realized being cheap and stubborn about it was silly. i've used the usb floppy over an over and it's paid for itself several time over in saved aggravation, especially after you realize you need for yet another firmware for one of your drives, as well as normal floppy usage. stop complaining to yourself that ibm shouldn't realease ANY dos based firmwares. get one used off ebay or on sale at local computer chain when they give instant savings like i did. come on, get on with it.

[JHaislet]

Well I finally broke down & ordered one from zipzoomfly. I picked up a black Sony USB floppy, so at least it will look decent.

[Zeitgeist]

This worked for me last time I updated HDD firmware in a t42:


Get virtual floppy
http://chitchat.at.infoseek.co.jp/vmware/vfd.html

Download the floppy version of firmware update program

Run the program so that it writes a floppy image to the virtual floppy drive.

Burn the floppy image to a CD.

The CD should then boot and starts firmware update program automatically.

How could you extract the firmware software to the virtual floppy disk? I get an error message. Can you give more details?

[T42-4WU]

For new models like your T43, you don't need to update HDD firmware. You can check your HDD firmware version over IBM/Lenovo website. You will see that your HDD firmware is mostly updated. Don't waste ur time and money.

[GomJabbar]

For new models like your T43, you don't need to update HDD firmware. You can check your HDD firmware version over IBM/Lenovo website. You will see that your HDD firmware is mostly updated. Don't waste ur time and money.

I imagine if you bought one of the early T43 models, with the earlier BIOS that didn't give the 2010 error, that T43 might have a hard drive without the firmware update as well. If you updated the BIOS you would get the 2010 error, so you would have to update the hard drive firmware as well to get rid of the 2010 error.