Don't think you need any software in order to enter the BIOS setup.
It's normally F10, F12, F2 or DEL when turning the machine on.

Good thing to note with these old Compaq systems is that they store part of the bios in a folder on the hard drive, which is really stupid. If the system came with any backup diskettes or anything like that give those a try.

brostenen wrote:

Don't think you need any software in order to enter the BIOS setup.
It's normally F10, F12, F2 or DEL when turning the machine on.

I can enter the bios with F10, but I can't get to any settings to change.

I have read that the menu to change settings is called 'setup' but the BIOS crashes when I do that. It uses a special diagnostic partion on the HDD for that, I will try to reinstall it. http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/product?cc … =94444&sw_lang=

A little searching....

http://support.hp.com/us-en/document/bph07110

ODwilly wrote:

Good thing to note with these old Compaq systems is that they store part of the bios in a folder on the hard drive, which is really stupid. If the system came with any backup diskettes or anything like that give those a try.

Never knew that. Thanks for the info. 😀

Got it fixed. I installed an update that fixed a known setup bug in the BIOS when windows 95 is installed.

Patch can be found here: http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/softwareCa … &sw_lang=&#N879

That link also provides a diagnostic/boot file, so you can run SETUP from a diskette and still change system settings that way.

For some reason, I can't find '7210' anywhere, the 7212 seems to be next to identical however.

Cheers

Yeah... They pretty much had a zillion versions of the same stuff. Just the way apple did it too, IBM, and a lot of other big players.
I remember it as something like, a brand new model (they allways said something like that) and it was allways like an "old wine on new bottles" approach.
Basically speaking. You just had a basic model number (7000, 8000, 9000 and so on) and all they did was just something like selling the same machine.
Just with a TNT2 card, instead of something like a Voodoo3 card. Or the other way around. Well... I think you get it. 😉

Another reason to do it was to placate retailers: you have a model configuration number that's basically sold in one store, so you can't price match it. Walmart is selling a Power Macintosh 5200CD, but Circuit City is selling a Power Macintosh 5204CD? Too bad.