Virtually all BIOS Flash utilities have a way to backup the current BIOS.
As far as settings within the BIOS, I am not sure that these utils will store your settings along with the BIOS Code. I'm not sure it works this way, but in my head it would be like a Windows EXE (code) vs the Registry (settings) and backing up the code doesnt mean you get the settings. The easiest way to test this would be to change a very specific setting, make a backup of the BIOS, change the setting to something else, then restore the previous BIOS Backup, reboot and check the setting.
Now as far as flashing goes, restoring your BIOS after you failed a flash, requires you have a working BIOS to get the machine booted up. So depending on where the flashing fails, its quite possible the machine is rendered unbootable which means there is no SOFTWARE solution. The flip side to this is some machines now ship with "Dual BIOS" where you have a backup if the primary fails. And some higher end boards have the BIOS Chip in a socket as opposed to soldered straight into the mobo. This means if a BIOS flash fails, you just have to buy and pop in a new chip rather then pitching the entire motherboard.
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