Changing BIOS Boot Logo - IBM Thinkpad T41

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AssPenny · #16 Post by **AssPenny** » Wed May 26, 2004 8:03 pm

Yes the T40 is bootable from an USB key. It shows up as a harddrive in the bios, you just have to place it first in the pecking order to boot from it.

G-Man · #17 Post by **G-Man** » Wed May 26, 2004 10:37 pm

Thanks A**Penny.

I have this IBM USB Memory Key for more than a year, but never tried booting from it. I'll give it a try.

Regards,
G-Man

dcdomain · #18 Post by **dcdomain** » Thu May 27, 2004 12:03 am

AssPenny wrote:Yes the T40 is bootable from an USB key. It shows up as a harddrive in the bios, you just have to place it first in the pecking order to boot from it.

Woah so you are saying that any USB key can be made bootable? What type of system files need to be on it? The usual ones from any boot disk?

G-Man · #19 Post by **G-Man** » Thu May 27, 2004 1:07 am

dcdomain wrote:What type of system files need to be on it? The usual ones from any boot disk?

Here is the link for downloading files to make your IBM USB Memory Key bootable.

Regards,
G-Man

souka · #20 Post by **souka** » Thu May 27, 2004 10:49 am

AssPenny wrote:Yes the T40 is bootable from an USB key. It shows up as a harddrive in the bios, you just have to place it first in the pecking order to boot from it.

Press F12 during boot up...it will create a list to pick from for just that boot. If you don't see your USB Device, go into the BIOS under Boot Options and make sure it's "Allowed"

Also, I've played around with my bois a bunch... currently running a 100k Department of Defense logo...heheh. Kinda wierd...the BIOS Diskette says 10k limit.... wierd....

dcdomain · #21 Post by **dcdomain** » Thu May 27, 2004 3:02 pm

G-Man wrote:
Here is the link for downloading files to make your IBM USB Memory Key bootable.

Regards,
G-Man

So it has to be an IBM usb key? Or can any generic one work? I wonder what would be in the IBM key that would set it apart from the others.

JohnV · #22 Post by **JohnV** » Thu May 27, 2004 3:09 pm

Any USB storage device should work fine.

n3il · #23 Post by **n3il** » Thu May 27, 2004 4:06 pm

souka wrote:the BIOS Diskette says 10k limit.... wierd....

10k limit is the *compressed* size (after using the LOGO.BAT file).

I believe they state that 100k is an ideal size (or perhaps maximum ideal size) for the uncompressed bitmap file...

souka · #24 Post by **souka** » Fri May 28, 2004 10:26 am

JohnV wrote:Any USB storage device should work fine.

IBM Software that's linked above will ONLY work for certain IBM keys.... I tried....coms back with "NO IBM Key Found"

I happend to have a 32mb IBM Key....when I tried that it said something like "Unsupported IBM USB Key"

Paul S · #25 Post by **Paul S** » Sat May 29, 2004 6:39 pm

Has anyone successively customized the BIOS logo screen?

What graphics software was used to generate the 4 bit colour bitmapped file? Windows Paint seem to be rejected by chkbmp.

#26 Post by **erik** » Sat May 29, 2004 7:37 pm

Paul S wrote:What graphics software was used to generate the 4 bit colour bitmapped file? Windows Paint seem to be rejected by chkbmp.

try paint shop pro. you can download a free demo from jasc.com. it's only about $80 if you decide it's worth buying.

-erik

Paul S · #27 Post by **Paul S** » Sat May 29, 2004 11:44 pm

Have you tried paintshop pro? It doesn't work for me.

souka · #28 Post by **souka** » Sun May 30, 2004 1:03 am

Paint Shop pro works great.

I took a 1mb digital pic of my dog, scaled it down to 200x100 (approx) and pasted it on a 640x480 16 color background.

Look kinda lame, but hey...it works!

akerman · #29 Post by **akerman** » Wed Jun 16, 2004 6:48 am

just bumping this thread.. I don't want it to be deleted because it wasn't updated in 10 days =)

benz · #30 Post by **benz** » Wed Jun 16, 2004 7:56 am

Good idea. The information from this thread is gonna go in the new FAQ that will be a sticky, we just have to compile it first.

jephhy · #31 Post by **jephhy** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 8:43 pm

How do you extract the BIOS diskette files onto your USB key? I tried it and it gives me an error message. I am attempting to extract it from a directory without a space in its name...

Jeff

akerman · #32 Post by **akerman** » Mon Jul 12, 2004 7:27 am

You sure your USB key isn't write protected? You can also try formatting it as FAT..

jephhy · #33 Post by **jephhy** » Mon Jul 12, 2004 3:54 pm

akerman wrote:You sure your USB key isn't write protected? You can also try formatting it as FAT..

Yes, I'm pretty sure it's not write protected...I can put other files on it just fine. Maybe I'm not entering the drive letter correctly - the extraction utility asks for a floppy drive letter and I just enter in E:\ and it doesn't seem to like that. Thoughts anyone?

Jeff

kilago · #34 Post by **kilago** » Mon Jul 12, 2004 5:12 pm

n3il wrote:From the README.txt file on the BIOS update floppy diskette:

NOTES ON CUSTOM START UP IMAGES
THIS VERSION OF THE FLASH UPDATE PROGRAM GIVES THE OPTION OF REPLACING (OR ELIMINATING) THE DEFAULT "IBM" IMAGE THAT IS DISPLAYED DURING SYSTEM START UP.
THE USER CAN SUBSTITUTE A 16 COLOR WINDOWS BITMAP (.BMP) TO REPLACE THE DEFAULT IMAGE.

1. LOGO.BAT (ON THE FLASH DISKETTE) WILL ONLY WORK IN A MICROSOFT (R) OPERATING SYSTEM DOS WINDOW.
2. PREPARE YOUR IMAGE BY NAMING IT 'LOGO.BMP'.
3. PLACE THE LOGO.BMP FILE ON THE FLASH DISKETTE
4. GO TO THE DOS WINDOW AND SWITCH TO THE DISKETTE DRIVE WITH THE FLASH DISKETTE. RUN LOGO.BAT TO COMPRESS AND PREPARE THE BITMAP FILE FOR FLASHING. LOGO.MOD IS THE RESULT.
5. UDATE ACCORDING TO INSTALLATION INSTRUCTIONS

AFTER YOU UPDATE THE BIOS ON YOUR SYSTEM, YOUR LOGO WILL APPEAR ON THE STARTUP SCREEN.

SOME GUIDELINES FOR THESE IMAGES INCLUDE:

1. THE COMPRESSED IMAGE FILE SIZE LIMITED TO 10KB.
2. SIMPLE DESIGNS (THE IMAGE WILL BE COMPRESSED AND COMPLEX IMAGES DON'T COMPRESS WELL...)
3. AN IBM LOGO IS USED BY DEFAULT, BUT A 16 COLOR 640x480 WINDOWS .BMP FILE CAN BE USED INSTEAD.

HTH

Am I the only one confused about where these files are? I can't find a link anywhere in this post...could someone help me?

Thanks!

n3il · #35 Post by **n3il** » Mon Jul 12, 2004 5:28 pm

As I mentioned in the post you quoted, they are on the BIOS update floppy diskette....

http://www-306.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-50275

HTH

n3il · #36 Post by **n3il** » Mon Jul 12, 2004 5:30 pm

jephhy wrote:...the extraction utility asks for a floppy drive letter and I just enter in E:\ and it doesn't seem to like that. Thoughts anyone?

Jeff

The BIOS flash diskette will only extract to a Floppy - try extracting it on a machine with a FDD and then copy the files to the memory key. Still not convinced/sure if it'll work with the memory key....

HTH

Neil

jephhy · #37 Post by **jephhy** » Mon Jul 12, 2004 8:17 pm

Hmm...well that would be a problem since i don't have a floppy drive for my Thinkpad! ..and no easy access to a floppy drive either...

Jeff

Leon · #38 Post by **Leon** » Tue Jul 13, 2004 11:38 am

there's GOT to be another way.... can someone post the file somewhere?

n3il · #39 Post by **n3il** » Tue Jul 13, 2004 3:21 pm

It isn't just one file - that is the problem. The logo change option is only available WHILE "flashing the BIOS" - the logo info resides in CMOS too. I use a TP 600 Floppy drive connected to the Port Rep II - but any (not necessarily IBM) USB floppy drive will work...

On the other hand - I reckon it may work by burning the files onto CD (but u'd have to use another computer with a floppy drive to extract the files)

Just a thought...

Leon · #40 Post by **Leon** » Tue Jul 13, 2004 3:39 pm

still confused

IF someone got the files onto a CD, then they could post the files somewhere and people could download them and put them on another cd?

mhouston · #41 Post by **mhouston** » Tue Jul 13, 2004 7:17 pm

If someone can post or send me a zip file, I can put it up on the web for people to get. Then those of us without a floppy drive (honestly, who uses them anymore when there are USB keys...) can play with this.

Everytime I've tried to extact the files with my desktop Dell, the disk cannot be read by Windows/DOS, so I can't move the files to a bootable usb key.

Has anyone successfully changed the picture in the bios yet? I have my Windows boot and login screens modified, it would be nice to modify the bios screen to match.

It would be great to post a guide once we have it figure out. I can handle posting that as well if people would like, but we should probably make it a forum sticky.

-Mike

Leon · #42 Post by **Leon** » Tue Jul 13, 2004 9:20 pm

and... if you put on hd, bios, & admin passwords, changing this screen with return information may be the only way to get back a stolen or lost TPAD...

s0larian · #43 Post by **s0larian** » Thu Jul 15, 2004 6:13 pm

I tried to change the bootlogo with an IBM usb-diskette drive. I createt the bmp file with 16 colors 640x480, compressed it with the logo.bat file of the bios update diskette which created the logo.mod file correctly. But after I installed the Bios update the original logo still was there, no replacement with my own logo.mod. Did anyone have success with the procedure as explained in the readme of the diskette?

mhouston · #44 Post by **mhouston** » Thu Jul 15, 2004 7:50 pm

S0larian was nice enough to send me a zip file of the bios disk so that we can all play.

http://graphics.stanford.edu/~mhouston/IBM/ibmbios.zip

I'll see if I can have better luck tonight. If we figure this out, can one of the admins make this thread or a new one a sticky thread ?

-Mike

G-Man · #45 Post by **G-Man** » Thu Jul 15, 2004 8:50 pm

Yeah, we can do something with it. Just let us know how it works. I'm too tired now to play with my IBM USB Memory Key...

Regards,
G-Man

Changing BIOS Boot Logo - IBM Thinkpad T41

Custom Thinkpad Logo Screen

Re: Custom Thinkpad Logo Screen

Custom Thinkpad Logo Screen

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