Old Dell Inspiron 1150 - Unlock Hidden Options

[wizoomer95]

Hello,

I'm trying to mod the bios on an old Dell Inspiron 1150.  I'm trying to Hackintosh it with an old version of Mac OS X (either Tiger, Leopard, or Snow Leopard), but the main problem is the only video modes are basically 8-bit depth with no higher resolution than 800x600.  According to the OSx86 wiki, the solution is to go into the BIOS settings and increase the video buffer size from 1 MB to 8 MB.  The problem is there is no such option in the BIOS to change that, and I'm on the latest BIOS from Dell (version A07).

From what I've read, Dell BIOSes are a tough nut to crack for BIOS modding.  I would assume that there must have been some progress as it's now 2020.  I was able to extract the ROM file with the /writeromfile option, but the resulting file can't be opened in Phoenix BIOS Editor (No BCPs found).  However, I managed to open the BIOS with the Phoenix Tool version 2.57.  I'm attaching the DUMP folder, together with the .exe and .rom file, winzipped.  I was following another PDF tutorial (which I'm also attaching in the zip file), but I can't find a .wph file to open, just a bunch of ROMs, and I don't know which one (if any) to open.  I would think I would have to modify something manually and then repackage the BIOS with the Phoenix tutorial, but I don't know how to do that.  Any help would be appreciated.

Dell BIOS direct download link: https://dl.dell.com/bios/1150_A07.EXE
Dell BIOS Update download page: https://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/...id=r103929