Where is the feature to create a bootable DOS CD or USB stick in order to flash motherboard BIOS/FW or expansion card controller BIOS/FW? Please, I know how to google, what I don't know is why the OS doesn't seem to provide a one-click option to create what's needed for BIOS flashing. I shouldn't have to spend hours and hours to make some bootable CD/USB using any number of 3rd party utilities which may or may not work. DOS is MS legacy, support it since it's still needed. Doesn't matter whether the OS doesn't use that code anymore, clearly a number of critical applications rely on DOS and (gasp!) floppy disks. It's on MS and the manufacturers really, I can already imagine the replies in here saying it's Adaptec's problem that they put out a flash utility that requires DOS to flash their controllers...

On startup you can enter safe mode with a DOS prompt.Newer motherboards allow you to flash the bios by pressing a key combination at start upsuch as <alt> + <F2> then you can browse a USB memory key for the flash file without having to boot into DOS first.

Hello "The German", I agree that a feature to make a USB stick bootable may be a nice fearture for the Windows operating system. But unfortunately there isn't, and I fear that this will not change in future. Did you already tried the HP USB Disk Storage Format-Tool? It's as easy as formatting a volume in Windows Explorer (all you'll aditionally need are the DOS files COMMAND.COM, IO.SYS and MSDOS.SYS): http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file/fid,64963-order,4-page,1-c,peripherals/description.html This tool may give your USB stick boot capabilities. I assume you'll wonder about the meaning of "MAY give". Well, keep in mind that boot capability of USB sticks hardly depends on brand of computer (both the computer that makes the USB stick bootable and the other that tries to boot it) and USB stick. I just tried three (3) different brands of USB sticks using the tool mentoined in before. One of them (a FreeCom FM-10) worked fine, the other (unknown brand) don't. Hope I could help, with Regards Willi K.