[Henry7212]

My dad handed me a compaq laptop, said the new ram he bought for it does not work and when he called the company they said the laptop requires a BIOS update. For some reason he thinks I'm a computer expert because I built a desktop, but I'm not, so I thought you guys would be able to help since I've gotten great help here before. When I put in the ram myself the laptop does not start so there is definitely a problem, but the bigger problem is I have no idea what so ever how to upgrade a BIOS, and thats why I thought you guys might be able to teach me or at least enlighten me on how to do this. The laptop is a compaq presario 2100 but other than that I don't know much about it. Any information thats needed I can try to find out though. Thanks in advance for any help

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The "2100" is a series number, of which there are many. (See this page). Is there a model number, (starting with "21"), on a sticker on the bottom of the laptop?

[SpywareDr]

The "2100" is a series number, of which there are many. (See this page). Is there a model number, (starting with "21"), on a sticker on the bottom of the laptop?

[Henry7212]

The sticker says 2195US, looks to be this one http://h10025.www1.h...n&lang=en&cc=us

[SpywareDr]

Then on that page, select your Operating System (XP or 2000) and click the red Next button. When I selected XP it showed two downloads under BIOS. If possible, I'd use the latest version available.

According to Crucial, "Each memory slot can hold DDR PC2700 with a maximum of 512MB per slot." (1024MB max).
http://www.crucial.c...o 2100US Series

[Henry7212]

Well, I've run into another problem, the BIOS upgrading program tells me to insert a floppy disk, I don't have a floppy disk, so I tried a normal DVD-R but the disk drive in the laptop doesn't seem to work, are there any other ways of doing this?

[SpywareDr]

External USB floppy drive?

HP mentions it on this page:
http://h10025.www1.h...=374028&lang=en

Newegg.com has a couple for $23 (USD), including shipping:
http://www.newegg.co...ICE&PageSize=20