I'm not sure if this is the right section on the forum so bear with me if it's in the wrong place. I have the above laptop that had the overheating issue which I think I've solved by the copper shim modification which has changed the "blank screen blinking LED error code" from a single blink (CPU error) to a double blinkING (BIOS corrupted) error according to HP's website. Because I have a blank screen and not able to go into the BIOS or Windows to flash the bios HP are telling me that I need to spend £500 for a new motherboard because there is no way of reprogramming the EEPROM via an external USB hard drive as this model of laptop doesn't support "HP_TOOLS UEFI boot usb stick" or any other external drive in a DOS environment. I just want to know whether this is in fact correct, is it possible to reflash this EEPROM (which I believe is a Insyde bios, but I'm not 100% sure)? How can I determine exactly what the type of BIOS is, Insyde or otherwise? Regards
Thanks LatinMcG, Just need to home-in on where to go next on the forum as a novice to use your info. "BIOS Recovery procedures" seemed a good place to start but I couldn't see the wood for the trees so I came back here. Can you guys confirm which steps / method on the "BIOS Recovery procedures" pertain to my 3045.fd LatinMcG kindley provided? Thanks PS. Okay guys I made some progress, I've downloaded the latest BIOS from the HP website, "SP46499.EXE", unzipped it to a folder of the similar name and can now see the correct file that LatinMcG told me to rename from "3045F25.fd to "3045.fd". Can you guys confirm that it just a case of following these instructions, "Undocumented INSYDE BIOS recovery method.-Use..........." in this forum, that is to say I need to copy the renamed file "3045.fd" to a USB or floppy drive formatted in FAT32 and follow the standard Windows key + B instructions for rebooting the laptop to initiate the flash procedure? Cheers PS. CD is being read but Floppy and USB are not. It's immaterial as CD method hasn't been successful. I'm sure I read somewhere on these forums that I had to remove any Windows 7 cracks like DAZ but I can't for the life of me find the thread. PS. Okay I found it it was "VOATK" to remove cracks on this thread "How to Use New Phoenix Bios Mod Tool to Modify Phoenix/Dell/Insyde/EFI Bios Files" but all the links have disappeared, can anybody point me in the right direction for download of "VOATK"? PS. Can I try other Phoenix Bios methods even though mines a Insyde Bios?
voatk has nothing to do with bios recovery.. it does reset activation for vista and 7. in your case i think its best to get spi USB bios programmer and desolder chip. read chip, make backup.bin then upload to compare to the .fd with hexeditor. then finaly flash back proper bios.bin
thanks LatinMCG for your suggestions but I can report that everything is up and running today after a couple of other forums recommend re-seating the RAM modules which had somehow not been seated properly or had been put in in the wrong order, either way this baby is up and running again but who knows for how long. I've installed Speed Fan and you can bet I'll be keeping an eye on the temperatures with it. I would like to thank you all for your help on this forum as you gave me the confidence to know that information HP was giving me about not being able to sort out the BIOS was bogus but they just wanted my £500 for a quick fix with a new motherboard & GPU. Regards