Hi, I hope this is in the right section. Last night I decided to update my bios, using an auto update program made by my manufacture, after it was done updating it said to restart my computer so I did, and that is when problems started occurring, it could no longer detect my hard drive, I got my slave drive working and I tried the same thing on my master drive but it comes up with the error that it cannot recognize the partition I selected. However you can delete the partition and create one on the resulting unpartitioned space.
My MAIN questions:
1. Can I set up a bootable CD with the autoexec.bat and work the same as a bootable floppy, if so how would I go about doing that?
2. If I delete the partition will I lose my information on that hard drive?
3. If so to above, how can I save my information on my hard drive?

I believe that is everything I would like to know. If there is any information about my computer you need to know please respond back. Also please tell me any other suggestions you might have to solve this problem without risking the data.

I use Windows XP.
my answers
2) If you delete the partition..... (sorry to say) you will lose your data.

3) The only way I can thing of to save your data is to connect your hard drive to another bootable computer and transfer/copy your information to another storage device.

Or you can install an operating system on your slave and make the slave the master. Then transfer/copy your information to another storage device or onto the slave made into the master.

hope this HELPS and makes senseThese occorunces happening right after a BIOS flash are not a good sign...why did you need to flash it ? ?Well, my computer kept making beeping noises, there was no sound, and it kept crashing and restarting. I was thinking maybe if I just make sure everything is up to date it will stop crashing and all problems dissappear.

And I recently bought some data recovery software so I just used that to get my necessary data off, so I will just reformat it and make it workable again.Understand that the BIOS is totally seperate from the operating system...it controls all the functions of the motherboard itself.
This is why caution should always be exercised before a BIOS flash.
Best case scenario...it still works.
Worst case scenario...you have produced a doorstop.

Check back with the manuf. site to see if you can reverse the process if need be.Their site only either tells me to get a new bios chip, or make a bootable floppy and reflash it. Also I think my problem has always been with the motherboard. I mean I used to always get these stop? errors, well problems where I replaced the graphics driver and it still doesn't fix it. So I THOUGHT it was interaction between the motherboard and the graphics driver, before I even knew what the bios did.

All the fixes say to update things.

It seems like it still works, just I need to make a new partition and reformat I guess. Bright SIDE is I have an updated bios even though it took around 2 days to get the computer to running speed again. Right? I mean really asking a question here, my bios still has that update information so I wouldnt need to ever do this again?Whose site? ?
What flash file ? ?

All we know is you are running XP and you flashed the BIOS and now things are wonked...I went to my motherboards manufacturers (MSI) website and they have this thing called MSI live update online. It appears to search your drivers and bios and then searches for updates for them.

I dunno about it though after I got my hard drive working again I decided to use it again to install the other updates I need, and more problems occured after installing updates for a ATI system driver. I.e computer wouldn't start up. I could start it up in safe mode, so I just did that and uninstalled the program.

Anyone know of any good programs that can do a good job at finding the most current needed updates for your computer if the problem is infact with the live update manager?I think you need to start over...

Remove the CMos battery for 10 minutes with the power unplugged.
Then install XP, SP2.
Then the MBoard drivers.

Before installing anything else check the system to see if things are stable.

If so install all your protection apps.

Then try the vid card.

I'm still not convinced the BIOS is healthy after that flash.I wont need to reflash it? Removing the battery would just reset the bios right? Because before everything sorta does seem stable. I mean I downloaded everything except a system driver which caused problems when I downloaded it.

Or what does this do exactly? Trying to learn about these problems incase they ever occure again. Maybe there is a book somewhere.

But I did remove the battery and I waited 10 minutes, but last night I already reformated and downloaded drivers etc thats all though should I rereformat and reredownload the drivers again? After I removed the battery and started up the computer it started up normally and my cmos changes stayed the same.Editing both your posts and the topic just LEADS to more confusion...is the machine running properly and are you sure you are installing the proper drivers ? ?

We still have no idea about the components of this machine except it's an MSI mainboard.Sorry I edited it yesterday the 7th post thing.

I don't mean to keep it secret it's just I dunno what you wanna know.
MB: MSI RS480M2
Graphics driver: Radeon X1300

Uh I think thats all thats pretty much all I been working with in upgrading/updating it.

Right not the machine is running fine, except I think the clock is running slow, not sure if it was just the time I removed the battery for or if its loosing milliseconds. Lastly I am downloading the drivers on the manufacturers site when searching for most recent ones.I was unable to find a BIOS flash for that board at MSI's site...

But i would replace that CMOS battery.