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I needed to run a BIOS flash utility that was only available for DOS. To complicate matters, the server I needed to run it on doesn’t have a floppy or CD-ROM drive. I figured I’d hop on the Internet and download a bootable USB flash drive image. Right? Wrong.

I found a lot of instructions for how to make such an image if you already have a running Windows or Linux desktop, but they weren’t very helpful for me and my Mac. After some trial and error, I managed to create my own homemade bootable USB flash drive image. It’s available at http://www.mediafire.com/?aoa8u1k1fedf4yq" if you just want a premade ready-to-download file.

If you want a custom version, or you don’t trust the one I’ve made — and who’d blame you? I’m some random stranger on the Internet! — here’s how you can make your own bootable image under OS X:

Relax!

There are a lot of steps, but they’re easy! I wanted to err on the side of being more detailed than necessary, rather than skipping “obvious” steps that might not be quite so easy for people who haven’t done this before.

Download VirtualBox and install it

1. Download VirtualBox. I used version 4.1.4. The version available to you today might look different but should work mostly the same way.
2. Open the “VirtualBox-[some-long-number]-OSX.dmg” disk image.
3. Double-click the “VirtualBox.mpkg” icon to run the installer.
4. Click “Continue”.
5. Click “Continue”.
6. Click “Install”.
7. Enter your password and click “Install Software”.
8. When it’s finished copying files, etc., click “Close”.

Download FreeDOS and create a virtual machine for it

1. Download the FreeDOS “Base CD” called “fdbasecd.iso”. Note: the first mirror I tried to download from didn’t work. If that happens, look around on the other mirrors until you find one that does.
2. Open your “Applications” folder and run the “VirtualBox” program.
3. Click the “New” button to create a new virtual machine. This launches the “New Virtual Machine Wizard”. Click “Continue” to get past the introduction.
4. Name your new VM something reasonable. I used “FreeDOS”, and whatever name you enter here will appear throughout all the following steps so you probably should, too.
5. Set your “Operating System” to “Other”, and “Version” to “DOS”. (If you typed “FreeDOS” in the last step, this will already be done for you.) Continue.
6. Leave the “Base Memory Size” slider at 32MB and continue.
7. Make sure “Start-up Disk” is selected, choose “Create new hard disk”, and continue.
8. Select “File type” of “VDI (VirtualBox Disk Image)” and continue.
9. Select “Dynamically allocated” and continue.
10. Keep the default “Location” of “FreeDOS”.
11. Decision time: how big do you want to make your image? The full install of FreeDOS will take about 7MB, and you’ll want to leave a little room for your own files. On the other hand, the larger you make this image, the longer it’ll take to copy onto your USB flash drive. You certainly don’t want to make it so large that it won’t actually fit on your USB flash drive. An 8GB nearly-entirely-empty image will be worthless if you only have a 2GB drive. I splurged a little and made my image 32MB (by clicking in the “Size” textbox and typing “32MB”. I hate size sliders.). Click “Continue”.
12. Click “Create”.
13. Make sure your new “FreeDOS” virtual machine is highlighted on the left side of the VirtualBox window.
14. On the right-hand side, look for the section labeled “Storage” and click on the word “Storage” in that title bar.
15. Click the word “Empty” next to the CD-ROM icon.
16. Under “Attributes”, click the CD-ROM icon to open a file chooser, select “Choose a virtual CD/DVD disk file…”, and select the FreeDOS Base CD image you downloaded at the beginning. It’ll probably be in your “Downloads” folder. When you’ve selected it, click “Open”.
17. Back on the “FreeDOS — Storage” window, click “OK”.

Install FreeDOS

1. Back on the main VirtualBox window, near the top, click “Start” to launch the virtual machine you just made.
2. A note about VirtualBox: when you click the VM window or start typing, VirtualBox will “capture” your mouse cursor and keyboard so that all key presses will go straight to the VM and not your OS X desktop. To get them back, press the left [command] key on your keyboard.
3. At the FreeDOS boot screen, press “1” and [return] to boot from the CD-ROM image.
4. Hit [return] to “Install to harddisk”.
5. Hit [return] to select English, or the up and down keyboard arrow keys to choose another language and then [return].
6. Hit [return] to “Prepare the harddisk”.
7. Hit [return] in the “XFDisk Options” window.
8. Hit [return] to open the “Options” menu. “New Partition” will be selected. Hit [return] again. “Primary Partition” will be selected. Again, [return]. The maximum drive size should appear in the “Partition Size” box. If not, change that value to the largest number it will allow. Hit [return].
9. Do you want to initialize the Partition Area? Yes. Hit [return].
10. Do you want to initialize the whole Partition Area? Oh, sure. Press the left arrow key to select “YES”, then hit [return].
11. Hit [return] to open the “Options” menu again. Use the arrow keys to scroll down to “Install Bootmanager” and hit [return].
12. Press [F3] to leave XFDisk.
13. Do you want to write the Partition Table? Yep. Press the left arrow to select “YES” and hit [return]. A “Writing Changes” window will open and a progress bar will scroll across to 100%.
14. Hit [return] to reboot the virtual machine.
15. This doesn’t actually seem to reboot the virtual machine. That’s OK. Press the left [command] key to give the mouse and keyboard back to OS X, then click the red “close window” button on the “FreeDOS [running]” window to shut it down. Choose “Power off the machine” and click “OK”.
16. Back at the main VirtualBox window, click “Start” to re-launch the VM.
17. Press “1” and [return] to “Continue to boot FreeDOS from CD-ROM”, just like you did before.
18. Press [return] to select “Install to harddisk” again. This will take you to a different part of the installation process this time.
19. Select your language and hit [return].
20. Make sure “Yes” is selected, and hit [return] to let FreeDOS format your virtual disk image.
21. Proceed with format? Type “YES” and hit [return]. The format process will probably finish too quickly for you to actually watch it.
22. Now you should be at the “FreeDOS 1.0 Final Distribution” screen with “Continue with FreeDOS installation” already selected. Hit [return] to start the installer.
23. Make sure “1) Start installation of FreeDOS 1.0 Final” is selected and hit [return].
24. You’ll see the GNU General Public License, version 2 text. Follow that link and read it sometime; it’s pretty brilliant. Hit [return] to accept it.
25. Ready to install the FreeDOS software? You bet. Hit [return].
26. Hit [return] to accep the default installation location.
27. “YES”, the above directories are correct. Hit [return].
28. Hit [return] again to accept the selection of programs to install.
29. Proceed with installation? Yes. Hit [return].
30. Watch in amazement and how quickly the OS is copied over to your virtual disk image. Hit [return] to continue when it’s done.
31. The VM will reboot. At the boot screen, press “h” and [return] to boot your new disk image. In a few seconds, you’ll see an old familiar “C:" prompt.
32. Press the left [command] key to release your keyboard and mouse again, then click the red “close window” icon to shut down the VM. Make sure “Power off the machine” is selected and click “OK”.

Convert the VirtualBox disk image into a “raw” image

1. Open a Terminal.app window by clicking the Finder icon in your dock, then “Applications”, then opening the “Utilies” folder, then double-clicking “Terminal”.
2. Copy this command, paste it into the terminal window, then hit [return]:

/Applications/VirtualBox.app/Contents/Resources/VirtualBoxVM.app/Contents/MacOS/VBoxManage internalcommands converttoraw ~/"VirtualBox VMs/FreeDOS/FreeDOS.vdi" ~/Desktop/freedos.img

This will turn your VirtualBox disk image file into a “raw” image file on your desktop named “freedos.img”. It won’t alter your original disk image in any way, so if you accidentally delete or badly damage your “raw” image, you can re-run this command to get a fresh, new one.

Prepare your USB flash drive

1. Plug your USB flash drive into your Mac.
2. If your Mac can’t the drive, a new dialog window will open saying “The disk you inserted was not readable by this computer.” Follow these instructions:
   1. Click “Ignore”.
   2. Go back into your terminal window and run this command: diskutil list
   3. You’ll see a list of disk devices (like “/dev/disk2”), their contents, and their sizes. Look for the one you think is your USB flash drive. Run this command to make sure, after replacing “/dev/disk2” with the actual name of the device you picked in the last step: diskutil info /dev/disk2
3. Make sure the “Device / Media Name:” and “Total Size:” fields look right. If not, look at the output of diskutil list again to pick another likely candidate and repeat the step until you’re sure you’ve picked the correct drive to complete eradicate, erase, destroy, and otherwise render completely 100% unrecoverable. OS X will attempt to prevent you from overwriting the contents of drives that are currently in use — like, say, your main system disk — but don’t chance it. Remember the name of this drive!
4. If your Mac did read the drive, it will have automatically mounted it and you’ll see its desktop icon. Follow these instructions:
   1. Go back into your terminal window and run this command: diskutil list
   2. Look for the drive name in the output of that command. It will have the same name as the desktop icon.
   3. Look for the name of the disk device (like “/dev/disk2”) for that drive and remember it (with the same warnings as in the section above that you got to skip).
   4. Unmount the drive by running this command: diskutil unmount "/Volumes/[whatever the desktop icon is called]"
   5. This is not the same as dragging the drive into the trash, so don’t attempt to eject it that way.

Copy your drive image onto the USB flash drive

1. Go back to your terminal window.
2. Run these commands, but substitute “/dev/fakediskname” with the device name you discovered on the previous section: cd ~/Desktop; sudo dd if=freedos.img of=/dev/fakediskname bs=1m
3. After the last command finishes, OS X will automatically mount your USB flash drive and you’ll see a new “FREEDOS” drive icon on your desktop.

Add your own apps to the image

1. Drag your BIOS flasher utility, game, or other program onto the “FREEDOS” icon to copy it onto the USB flash drive.
2. When finished, drag the “FREEDOS” drive icon onto the trashcan to unmount it.

Done.

1. You’re finished. Use your USB flash drive to update your computer’s BIOS, play old DOS games, or do whatever else you had in mind.
2. Keep the “freedos.img” file around. If you ever need it again, start over from the “Prepare your USB flash drive” section which is entirely self-contained. That is, it doesn’t require any software that doesn’t come pre-installed on a Mac, so even if you’ve uninstalled VirtualBox you can still re-use your handy drive image.

I read a nice newspaper story a while ago about Abe’s Detailing in Norfolk, NE. When I wanted to have Jen’s minivan detailed as a present, I thought I’d give Abe’s a try and made an appointment for the $45.99 “express detail”. When we picked it up later, the van looked nice, but they wanted to charge us for the $159.99 “presidential detail” that they performed instead.

I told the employee that I’d ordered the cheaper package. He said I must have talked to his brother and that his brother wrote it down wrong, and still wanted me to pay the full price for the wrong job.

I will never darken the doorsteps of Abe’s Detailing in Norfolk again. If you choose to do so, I highly recommend you get a written estimate in advance.

It snowed!I went outside today and played! bet I would have stayed out there if it had snowed more and if my feet didn’t freeze, I would have stayed there longer!

I was at grandma’s house last weekend, and there was a power outage.Turns out, it was a squirrel chewing on the power lines, and got electrocuted.We found out when my Uncle Brian came in saying,“There’s a dead squirrel that was chewing on the power lines.“When I heard that I fell on the floor laughing!That squirrel is nuts!Or at least was nuts…

While waiting for Jen to return from a conference, I thought about calling her to get her estimated time of arrival, or her ETA. I realized she might be might be pretty far away still and thought I better ask for an estimate of the accuracy of the estimate, or meta-estimate: her META. Hey, neat! META can be a recursive acronym for “meta-ETA”, so it also references the nature of the acronym itself, sort of making META a meta-acronym, which truly makes it both meta and META.

Grandma and Grandpa got here yesterday!My camera is working again to!I took a picture of a mirror,and when I saw the picture I saw me and my camera flashing!Anyways,I am very exited!They’re staying 2 weeks!

As of mid-August, I can’t watch the local ABC affiliate TV channel over my satellite dish because they tried to jack up the rates they charge Dish Network for carrying their channel. Never mind that their advertisers pay them by the number of viewers, regardless of whether that’s by antenna, cable, or satellite. Dish Network could almost get away with asking KCAU to pay them for the task of handling all the transmission details. Anyway, here’s a letter I wrote to KCAU’s president:

As you mentioned on your website, I could watch your programming over-the-air for free. While your position regarding Dish Network makes sense on the surface, it falls apart quickly. They are redistributing your signal at no cost to you while you still collect money from advertisers. Frankly, they’re doing you a favor by handling your broadcasting. Imagine that you could still get the same advertising revenue without having to pay for transmitters and the associated electricity and personnel. Nice, huh?

Since you’re not directly paid by viewers regardless of whether they watch by rabbit ears or by satellite dish, you can hardly claim to be losing money with the latter. In the mean time, your viewership is lower by the number who can no longer receive your signal (and you’re crazy if you think I’d downgrade from a crystal-clear satellite signal and DVR to a snowy analog antenna). The other local network affiliates must be rubbing their hands together with glee as you throw away your audience.

Finally, consider that a five-minute Internet search returns downloadable versions of current programming. While I personally don’t (yet) consider that a viable option to local programming, as of today that would be the easiest course for a lot of your viewers who have been cut off.

Please allow Dish Network to resume broadcasting your signals at no charge to you so that I can go back to watching “Lost”. Thank you.

Sincerely, Kirk Strauser

I have no particular feelings for either company, but Dish Network’s position in this one case seems by far the most reasonable of the two.

We took a trip to Grandma’s house on Thursday last week, and on Saturday we went to the lake.A couple hours before we left we went boating.It took a long time for me and my friend to get off the tube. And when I did get off the tube I asked the boat driver if we could stop the boat and swim fora while. When we left the lake it was a long drive back to grandma’s house, and I almost fell asleep!I had half a hamburger and went to bed.

This is kind of a hard review to write. Short take on the music: it’s brilliant. If you like Irish folk or punk, you’ll like “The Meanest of Times”. However, I just can’t get past the awful recording quality, and by awful, I mean truly, utterly terrible.

As though the music industry didn’t have enough problems to deal with, such as the string of lawsuits against its customers, the major labels have been busy with something called the “loudness war”. The thinking is that the louder music is played, the better most people will think it sounds. In an effort to make their CDs sounds better than their competitors’, the companies are recording music as loudly as possible. There’s nothing inherently bad about turning up the volume, but they try to squeeze out a few extra decibels by smoothing out the sound so that even the quietest sounds can blow out your speakers.

“The Meanest of Times” is a sad example of this. You’d think that a bunch of angry Irish punks would rattle your fillings, right? Nah. The music is painstakingly compressed until you can tell that someone’s playing the drums, but can’t quite make out the kick or snare.

Track 8, “(F)lannigan’s Ball”, starts with an aggressive bass line. After the first two notes, you know it’s going to be noisy. Too bad the drums kick in then, and the total sound of the bass line and the drums would have been too loud because the sound engineer already had the volume up all the way, so the compressor kicks in to mute both of them. Instead of THUM—THUM—THUM, we get THUM—THUM—splut.

So, there you have it. The music is wonderful, but the sound quality is horrible. “The Meanest of Times” could have been the soundtrack to a riot, but it’s been successfully tamed for the “Matlock” crowd. If your grandpa ever asks what punk music is, give this to him.

We already suspected that Warner Music Group hates their customers, and this just proves it. Go see Dropkick Murphys live if you can and buy lots of their stuff, but don’t bother with this album.

Hi! You’re the guy who sat behind me at my 8-year-old daughter’s teeball practice. I thought you’d want to know that you were talking loudly enough for everyone to hear you, including the coaches. I mean, we could all tell that’s why you were bitching so loudly the whole time, and I figured you’d be happy that you were heard.

Now, I’m sure you’re an expert in the game. You definitely sounded like it from 30 feet away! Still, I thought perhaps you might appreciate a few clarifications:

• When our daughters were sitting on the ground talking to their coach, she was explaining terms like “offense”, “defense”, and “sportsmanship”. I know you thought she should have been teaching them how to play baseball (because you said so firmly and repeatedly), but I’m certain she meant well.
• You were rather bothered that the coach didn’t teach the girls how to bat by lifting their front foot to swing harder. Rest assured, should our daughters advance beyond the first week of girls’ 8-year-old teeball, their future coaches will show them this technique.
• Although you and I are past our athletic primes and the bases seem farther apart than they used to, I don’t think it really takes fifteen seconds to run from each base to the next. In fact, I’m fairly positive I could hop that fast with a broken ankle. I only mention this specifically because you sounded quite authoritative as you explained this to your son and everyone else on our bleachers, and may wish to update your calculations.

While I’m sincerely honored to have been the recipient of your shared wisdom, I respectfully request that during future practices you endeavor to please shut up and watch our little girls play. Thanks!