How do I get to the BIOS on a Toshiba Tecra laptop?

I have an older Toshiba laptop, a Tecra, and I want to change the order of boot devices so that it'll try to boot off a USB drive before it looks at the CDROM because I have a corrupt OS disk stuck in it. Problem is, I press f1, f8, f12, and just about every other function key I can imagine and nothing lets me get to the BIOS. Help!

Dave's Answer:

I was recently working on an older Toshiba Tecra laptop computer too and found that it was oddly hard to get to the BIOS, as you have also found.

I mean, really, that's something where it'd be nice to have a standard for all PC laptops, wouldn't it? On most of the ones I've used, it's f1 or f2, as you tried, but for some reason Toshiba decided to make it a bit more tricky.

The key? Well, it's two keys...

That's probably your exact keyboard or one very similar to it.

Here's the trick: reboot the computer with the Esc key pushed. Keep it pushed down until you see:

Check system. Then press (F1) key.

Once you see that, you can release the Esc key and press f1, and you should be in the Toshiba BIOS.

Now that you're in the BIOS you can see the boot order and tweak it as you desire.

While digging around for this answer, btw, I found this cool page: Microsoft MVP Michael Even's BIOS access list. Thanks for compiling that, Michael!

Categorized: Computer and Internet Basics , Windows PC Help (Article 9188, Written by Dave Taylor)
Tagged: bios, laptop, microsoft mvp, tecra, toshiba
Previous: How can I quickly put my Mac to sleep?
Next: How do I change my home page in Internet Explorer?

Subscribe!

Never miss another Q&A article! Click to subscribe:

Comments

I still remember the days when there was no BIOS setup program in ROM. You had to boot from the setup floppy. (Which, hopefully, you could remember where you put it after the last time you ran it 6 months ago.)

I never did understand why some manufacturers tried to hide the setup-in-ROM ability.

Posted by: Ken B at November 30, 2009 10:56 AM

I have something to say, now that you mention it, but ...

I do have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but first I'd like to say thank you for all your efforts on this Web site by buying you a cup of coffee!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!