General question about dumping current BIOS

[smirk]

Hi, I have a general question about dumping a BIOS to a file. A couple years ago I updated my BIOS with the latest version available. I'm about to flash it to a newer (hacked) version, but before I do that I want to back up my current BIOS.

So I did that with the AWDFLASH /pn /sy command, and on a lark did a binary compare of that BIOS with the one I *think* I had originally flashed it with... and the two didn't match.

So I guess my question is this: should the BIOS I dumped using AWDFLASH be completely identical to the file that it was originally flashed from two years ago? Changing BIOS settings doesn't affect the dumped image, right? And AWDFLASH doesn't store anything in the dumped file like the date you did the dump, does it?

I just want to make sure I have a valid and working backup of the BIOS I'm running before I overwrite it with a new one. It is interesting that my current BIOS doesn't seem to match the original file it came from.

Thanks!

 

[smirk]

Can anybody answer this? If you flash your BIOS, change some BIOS settings, and then dump the BIOS out to a file, will the new file be identical to the original one? Changing BIOS settings won't affect it, and the BIOS flash utility doesn't embed any metadata, does it?

Thanks!