Update your BIOS from Ubuntu (or really, without windows)

OK - so in the process of mucking around to see what's killing my system, I decided a BIOS update might be a good idea -  I was using A01 and they'r eup to A06 these days.  One small hitch - the update comes as - you guessed it - a EXE file.

What to do?  Virtualbox is a no-go, because of course the hardware that the guest see is *virtual* (duh).  Make a small partition for XP?  Hell no.  Simlple solution - remaster a DOS boot disk with the BIOS update.

Step 1 - download your BIOS update.  BE SURE THAT IT WILL OPERATE IN DOS.

Step 2 - download a DOS boot image:
http://www.bootdisks.us/ms-dos/5/ms-dos-bootable-cd-images.html

I chose DOS 6.22.

Step 3 - install isomaster (sudo aptitude install isomaster)

Step 4 - open the DOS iso in isomaster, add the BIOS update, do CTRL-S to save the new image.

Step 5 - burn the ISO to disk.  Don't just copy the ISO to disk - burn an image.  But you knew that already ;)

Step 6 - boot from the new CD.  At the prompt, switch to the CD (drive R: if you used DOS 6.22).  Run the BIOS updater.  Dance around on one foot while sacrificing a chicken.

All done :)  While technically you are not using Ubuntu to update the BIOS, you're not having to nstall windows either so count your blessings!