BIOS Update for lenovo laptop

[iamdman]

BIOS Update for lenovo laptop

My painful experience detailed a bit further to hopefully help others

Summary of problem:
Not able to update BIOS using Lenovo BIOS Update Utility for Windows in Windows 10.  I have an older laptop e420 and new Lenovo BIOS update Utility for Windows 10 is not compatible.  With tool I get a blue screen warning.  Laptop reboots and BIOS is not updated.  Lenovo bios ISO file is in El Torito format which most Windows Apps cannot extract and Rufus tool cannot create a bootable USB from this ISO due to this format.

General idea is to create a bootable USB with your BIOS update files on this USB stick.

1) Download and install ISO Buster
https://www.isobuster.com/install.php
2) Download and install PowerIso
https://www.poweriso.com/download.php
3) Download you ISO file which is typically created in LINUX El Torito format.  For me I went here https://support.lenovo.com/do/en/downloads/ds014969 and downloaded 8huj17us.iso  (You will need to search for your specific Lenovo BIOS files but process should be similar to steps below)
4) Use IsoBuster to open 8huj17us.iso file.  Look under Bootable Disc folder you should see a file with extenstion .img for me the file was named NERO BURNING ROM.img
5) Extract the .img file to your desktop and rename it to BIOS.img to make it more obvious
6) Find your BIOS file that you want to flash to.  For me I used a modded BIOS file to remove the white list.  You may however simply be trying to update your BIOS from Lenovo BIOS file on Lenovo site.  For me my original BIOS is here: https://download.lenovo.com/ibmdl/pub/pc...uj03us.exe which I downloaded for back up purposes incase the modded BIOS had issues (highly recommended if you are flashing a modded BIOS).  My modded BIOS was here: https://www.bios-mods.com/BIOS/index.php?dir=Whitelists%2F&download=8huj04us_NWL_ByCamiloml.exe.  These both work for BIOS ID = 8HET34WW.  Again you would need to find the BIOS version from Lenovo that works for your Lenovo laptop.
7) Open BIOS.img with PowerISO tool.  PowerISO lets you add files to the .IMG file.
8) Extract your Lenovo BIOS file (and Modded BIOS file if you have it), typically they get extracted to: C:\DRIVERS\FLASH
9) Using Windows Explorer and since my BIOS ID is I then find the 8HET34WW folder under C:\DRIVERS\FLASH\8huj04us and C:\DRIVERS\FLASH\8huj03us folders, the former be my modded BIOS and the later being the Lenovo original backup BIOS.  I drag and drop each of these 8HET34WW folders to the FLASH folder in PowerISO.  If you have a modded BIOS as you drop each folder rename it right after (e.g. for me when I dropped my modded folder 8HET34WW I renamed it to 04_8HET34WW, then when dropped the original BIOS folder with the same name 8HET34WW I renamed it to 03_8HET34WW.  After each dropped I have to click SAVE in PowerISO otherwise it would crash some times.
10) Now extract .IMG file to a windows Temp Folder
11) Download Rufus https://rufus.ie/downloads/.  This tool will allow us to create a bootable USB called FreeDOS
12) Insert a spare USB Key 1G is best but can go higher if that is all you have.  Use RUFUS to create FreeDOS bootable USB.
13) When done open USB in Windows Explorer and navigate to Drivers folder
14) Create a folder called FLASH
15) Inside of FLASH folder copy all the files you extracted in step 10.  For me my 03_8HET34WW is now located at \Drivers\FLASH\03_8HET34WW
16) Your bootable USB is now ready, reboot and for me my BIOS is already set to check for USB key on boot and load it.  I think hitting F12 on startup will also do this for most people, if not google is your friend.
17) Now time to flash bios, execute the following from the FLASH folder:

PFLASH /sv /sd ./[BIOS_FILE_FOLDER]/[BIOS_FILE]

note for me this was the command:

PFLASH /sv /sd ./04_8HET34WW/$0A8H000.FL1

Heard some beeps and once DOS progressbar hit 100% was all done.

Hopefully some or all of this is useful to others.