How to > HP BIOS MiniPCI Fix- nc6000/others

[semi]

@sugark,

where exactly is your problem?

To patch the Nc8000 is one of the easiest.

These two rom files's Additive Checksum are not equal! Could it be the problem?

Yes! THIS is THE problem!!

The green and the red color are selfexplaining!
Green = Good = Checksum Byte is fixable
Red = Bad = Checksum Byte is not fixable

In my opinion, this could not be, that you flash your
bios, boot two days your engine and Zonk, the bios crashed!

There are some steps you dont post and/or you dont understand and
so you think its not worth mentioning. if there is only one byte or bit that
is not equal to the checksum's routine, the engine will not boot. if
you flash in DOS mode, the rompaq.exe wont flash your corrupt bios
file. If you flash in windows, with a patched HPQFLash, it will flash your bios.
in this case, you shut down your engine, and will never boot it again.
And now, if you flash it in windows, and you go in hybernate, put your
mini pci card in, windows will detect it. and if you go once again in hybernate mode,
it will wake up next day, and next day... BUT, if you shutdown it, it will crash on the next boot!

@Nando,

this is a nice feature, what is the primary source of "your" HP BIOS RECOVERY Hot keys?
Could you explain me please how it works? How could this be? There is no OS, but you can set a filepointer from a flash
routine that is build in?! I cant understand it, sorry. But if this works, it would be a great and save method to reactivate your engine.

Cheers Semi

[sugark]

Hi semi,

Thanks your reply.

I have flashed the modified ROM file with DOS Rompaq.exe without problem. I will try to correct checksum.

Bye,
Krisztian

[nando4]

@Nando,

this is a nice feature, what is the primary source of "your" HP BIOS RECOVERY Hot keys?
Could you explain me please how it works? How could this be? There is no OS, but you can set a filepointer from a flash
routine that is build in?! I cant understand it, sorry. But if this works, it would be a great and save method to reactivate your engine.

Yes - for the purposes of the patching of the bios the Emergency Bios Recovery is important as a fallback mechanism. Confirmed to work on a HP 2510p and 6910p So long as your patching does not alter the bootblock code. If you accidentally patch that, well then the system will bootup, bootblock code run and "have stack pointer to infinity" to quote Semi. S

Source: from here , here and here.

Method for a HP BIOS RECOVERY:
Prerequisite:
The BIOS recovery procedure requires a USB diskette drive and a formatted diskette.
USB pen ----> doesn't work

Download you BIOS from HP, please note the model 68xxx

Copy the bin file of the BIOS on the diskette. eg:68YHV.BIN and not ROM.BIN

Press the 4 harrow keys (up, down, right, left) on the keyboard and power ON. Win+B key can also be used.

Wait ~2, 3 seconds an release the keys.

Wait the end of the process ( 2 minutes)

[RaStiScaR]

Hello !

i have downloaded The tutorial in video, and the tools, but i dont manage to ad my new device ID into the whitelist. i'm scared about made a mistake and broke the laptop. and my english is not verys good so i don understant all that stuff sorry
The problem is that at the moment when ADDCC2 find the ID in the white list, all the caracters are not present theres is not 100% accuracy, and there are operation to do with the correction system, and operation with the paritys bits that i dont understand, so i cant edit any ID to adapt-it to me new's device ID

is possible to some one to fix my bios ? the laptop is an compaq nc6400 with BIOS 68YCU.BIN
my bios is there 3 times W dot byoc dot org/docs
(i cant post URL until 10 post limit reached)
my email and messenger
rastiscar at byoc dot org

and there all the devices IDs :

actual broadcom working in the laptop
PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4311&SUBSYS_1364103C

other broadcom that works with the laptop
PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4312&SUBSYS_1361103C

new intel 5300 i want to use in the laptop
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4235&SUBSYS_10018086

thank very very much !

[sharky]

To summarize:
You could shutdown the laptop and boot it again and it worked? Did you see the BIOS screen during these boots?

Then you removed all power (battery etc.) and tried to boot again, but it didn't boot anymore. Right?

Yes it was so. After flashing computer it was booted up properly with HP logo, etc. than I have installed WinXP and used the computer for 2 days with several reboots/shutdowns.

Same situation on another 3x nc8000 :(

Ah yes. Definitely the Embedded Controller.

If yes, this sounds like the embedded controller (which handles powerup on laptops/notebooks) doesn't like your new ROM.

This EC thing sounds logical. So you think the problem must be on ROM checksum verified by EC? :?: If it is so than it means

- semi's ADDCC_V2 calculates checksum wrong?

- or I have made a mistake during semi's method?

- or there are some other checksums in BIOS which is verified by Embedded Controller and find out there is an error in BIOS?

The following things could have gone wrong:

• There could be a second ROM checksum hidden somewhere which is checked by the EC.
• The checksum could be incorrect (broken tool, incorrect usage, ...)
• The code of the EC could have been damaged during flashing.

I do not know what exactly went wrong (never used ADDCC), but is seems the only way to recover is to somehow start the laptop with the original ROM. Emergency disk etc. probably will not work, so you have the following choices:

• Replace the ROM chip with a pre-flashed one you buy online (not sure if such chips are available for your laptop)
• Hot-flash your ROM chip in another machine (doesn't have to be a laptop) with a working image (if you have a backup of the old ROM contents, that can work)
• Try to use something like top hat flash (not sure of that works on your machine)

Either way, you will have to open the laptop and find the ROM chip. If it is in a socket, you win. If it is soldered, you can either desolder it or try the top hat flash method.

Good luck!

[nando4]

Confirmed workaround for HP mPCIe whitelisting on a 2510P

Got my wifi to work after booting past the bios *without* it in the mPCIe slot. This is effectively the same as if a whitelisted card is installed.

This was originally done for the DIY ViDock project since having to install whitelist compatible wifi card to pass bios, then install my mPCIe-to-pcie adapter to detect my HD4670 card was a PITA and causing too much wear on my mPCIe slot. Yes - this allows my HD4670 to work without needing to have the bios first see the wifi card on boot

Here's how I did it.

1/ Tape pin 20 on the wifi card. This is important. That's an active low pin that the bios sets *only* if a whitelist compatible card is found. If you don't do this then the radio won't come on and your wifi card won't work. Mine now has cellophane tape on there permanently.

SIDEFFECT: The touchpad wifi disable button no longer works. Can still use Windows 'disable' instead.

2/ booted to my custom anti-whitelisting bootloader which saves a snapshot of the PCI-e configuration space with a whitelist compatible wifi card installed, then on subsequent loading will use this snapshot to allow a non whitelist compatible card to be seen on the system.

It's all integrated into my bootloader so not too inconvenient. While this works for a 2510P, it didn't work with a DV2000. It's provided so you can do your own further investigation. If you don't have a 2510P, you'll need to customise whitelst.bat below, commented to make it easy.

Then run grub (part of the package) to chainload your bootloader.

Code: Select all

@echo off
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:: Steps to overcome HP mPCIE whitelisting
::
:: This batch file creates a PCI Extended Configuration space snapshot with
:: a valid whitelist compatible wifi card. The snapshot then enables the mPCIe
:: port so a non-whitelisted wifi card can work, or my external HD4670
:: mPCIe-to-pcie adapter. This works with the 2510P, but in my brief testing
:: with a Pavilion DV2000 was not successful.
::
:: NOTE: ensure you put cellophane tape over the wifi card's pin20 otherwise
:: the wifi card will be detected but radio won't come on.  Pin20 is some sort
:: of hardware control that turns the radio off, which the bios does when
::
:: This script has two modes of operation. It's initial run will create a 1MB snapshot
:: file. It's subsequent runs will use the snapshot file to undo HP whitelisting.
::
:: USER DEFINED PARAMETERS
::
:: * MCFG - your PCI Extended Configuration Memory Space location. R-W
::          Everything Win software can tell you. Refer to MCFG tab in ACPI/DSDT.
:: * size - found anything less than 1MB did not work on the 2510P.
:: * FNAME - a unique filename indentifier for your snapshot file
::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:: HP 2510P parameters
set MCFG=0xF8000000
set size=0x100000
set FNAME=2510pcix

:: DV2000 parameters
:: set MCFG=0xE0500000
:: set size=0x100000
:: set FNAME=dv2pcix

if EXIST %FNAME%.exe goto UNDO_WHITELIST
echo *************************************************************************
echo [ whitelst.bat ] Entering snapshot mode
echo.
echo WARNING: No %FNAME%.exe file found.
echo.
echo Ensure system was booted with whitelist compatible mPCIe wifi card installed.
echo Press any key to taking PCI Memory Configuration space snapshot now...
pause > nul
echo Creating RAM disk for dump space...
xmsdsk 4096 E: /y
echo Saving E:\%FNAME%.dmp with MCFG@%MCFG% size=%size% bytes.
pt MEM readtofile 1 %MCFG% %size% E:\%FNAME%.dmp
echo Saving as SFX file to save space...
arj a -je1 %FNAME%.exe E:\%FNAME%.dmp
echo Please reboot without whitelist compatible wifi card and run whitelst.bat
echo to see if this overcomes your whitelisting.
echo *************************************************************************
:loop
goto loop

:UNDO_WHITELIST
echo [ whitelst.bat ] Undoing mPCIe whitelisting
echo Using 4MB ramdisk to speed up the process
xmsdsk 4096 E: /y > nul
%FNAME%.exe E: > nul
pt MEM writefromfile 1 %MCFG% E:\%FNAME%.DMP
if errorlevel 0 goto DONE
echo [ whitelst.bat ] Unexpected ERROR!!
pause
:DONE
echo [ whitelst.bat ] Completed successfully.

Anti-whitelisting bootable image/files with all the tools to try this

If want a complete framework to try this apply DIYVDOCK.TXT instructions instructions relating to creation of the USB/floppy using using RAR or IMG file.
The only component file of interest in the package is whitelst.bat, so disregard 2510P.bat/DV2000.bat and talk of the VIDock stuff.

mPCIe snapshot with WWAN card installed??

Could someone volunteer the output of
* pt PCI probe
* pt PCI map
* a snapshot of their PCI configuration space with WWAN card installed

I'm curious if the WWAN slot can function as a mPCIe slot so the wifi card can be put into it?? I've read that the WWAN card is USB, and WWAN (HS2300) appears as USB in Device Manager but I've probed the mPCIe pins and the two USB pins are coming up high resistence, like they are not connected. Either it's using the mPCIe pins and has an onboard mPCIe<->usb bridge or it's USB. .

[Shef]

Hello,

I know it was discussed a lot but I need a help with nc6000 and unsupported card.

I followed both your video tutorials with bad result - I never was able to correct the checksum. So I flashed the bios without correcting checksum and bricked it. I put a socket so I can take out and in the bios IC easily and flashed with programmer - so I put there original bios and the notebook worked.

Then I used already patched bios from Semi and changed exactly the place and exchenged the TI card for my new atheros. It worked! But unfortunately only for a week. Now if I use the same file or I try to patch some other place the bios is not working (blank screen hdd light flashing continuously) but with original or patched bios it still works.

Please help me to patch if and if you can send a small howto (which place you patched and where you corrected by what)

My atheros card to add in whitelist:
PCI\VEN_168C&DEV_0023&SUBSYS_2071168C
model:nc6000

Thank you very much,

Petr @ Shef

[RaStiScaR]

Confirmed workaround for HP mPCIe whitelisting on a 2510P

Got my wifi to work after booting past the bios *without* it in the mPCIe slot. This is effectively the same as if a whitelisted card is installed.

This was originally done for the project since having to install whitelist compatible wifi card to pass bios, then install my mPCIe-to-pcie adapter to detect my HD4670 card was a PITA and causing too much wear on my mPCIe slot. Yes - this allows my HD4670 to work without needing to have the bios first see the wifi card on boot

Here's how I did it.



mPCIe snapshot with WWAN card installed??

Could someone volunteer the output of
* pt PCI probe
* pt PCI map
* a snapshot of their PCI configuration space with WWAN card installed

I'm curious if the WWAN slot can function as a mPCIe slot so the wifi card can be put into it?? I've read that the WWAN card is USB, and WWAN (HS2300) appears as USB in Device Manager[/url] but I've probed the mPCIe pins and the two USB pins are coming up high resistence, like they are not connected. Either it's using the mPCIe pins and has an onboard mPCIe<->usb bridge or it's USB. .

i have an nc6400 with an WWan mini PCIex port. You are right it is only USB not PCIex because no wifi card works there. i have tested.

[nando4]

i have an nc6400 with an WWan mini PCIex port. You are right it is only USB not PCIex because no wifi card works there. i have tested.

No guarantee that it's not pci-e. I'm using a PE4L with external USB and pci-e and neither works in the WWAN slot. the WWAN card must be one or the other. The pci-e only works in the wifi slot if I boot it up with the HP supplied wifi card OR I do the workaround posted previously. HP are doing something screwy to effectively disable the ports unless a card of their choosing is installed which I'd like to reverse on the WWAN slot.

It would help if you could look at the pinout of the WWAN card to see if the USB (36/38) and/or pci-e (23/25/31/33) lines are connected. If not sure, perhaps just mask the pci-e pins and see if it continues to work.

[RaStiScaR]

dammmned the problem is thaht i dont understand very well waht you say my english is soo bad ... :s
it seems to be very interesting !!

When i take the original wificard of my nc6400 an them i put to the WWAN mini PCIex port the card is not detected not listed in the perif manager

I have 2 broadcom whitelisted cards that works with my nc6400 but they dont work when i put then in the WWAN port
i speak better in french or spanish

[Phyxius]

I tried to edit my HP 6710b F.15 (68DDU) ROM but unfortunately all without success. I am beginning to thing that it is not possible.

I have used the following tools; ADDCC v2(with plug-ins), HPFlash tool.
Watch the tutorial movie of ADDCC v2 and read the ADDCC v2 document.

This is my request for assistants. If you have the time and would like to help, here is all the info I have;

HP 6710b F.15 rom;
tiny.cc/p5BjF (copy+paste)


Original WIFI mini-pci card;
Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network Connection
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4222&SUBSYS_135C103C

Replacement WIFI mini-pci card;
Intel(R) WiFi Link 5100 AGN
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4232&SUBSYS_12018086

Thank you in forward.
Phyxius

[nando4]

I tried to edit my HP 6710b F.15 (68DDU) ROM but unfortunately all without success. I am beginning to thing that it is not possible.

I believe this solution posted here applies to pre Santa Rosa systems. I modded the 2510P bios but did not solve the whitelisting. What I did get was some parts of the bios menu freezing up.

Worth trying the mPCIe configuration register dump/reload method I posted earlier, taping pin 20 of the mPCIe wifi card. Works on the 2510P. Can be integrated nicely with grub bootloader if using Linux.

[MiXAL]

Confirmed workaround for HP mPCIe whitelisting on a 2510P

Got my wifi to work after booting past the bios *without* it in the mPCIe slot. This is effectively the same as if a whitelisted card is installed.

Do you know if there is a way to do this on pure Windows system?
I have HP NC6400 and would like to use Broadcom BCM94321 card with it while it provides 802.11n.

[RaStiScaR]

Confirmed workaround for HP mPCIe whitelisting on a 2510P

Got my wifi to work after booting past the bios *without* it in the mPCIe slot. This is effectively the same as if a whitelisted card is installed.

Do you know if there is a way to do this on pure Windows system?
I have HP NC6400 and would like to use Broadcom BCM94321 card with it while it provides 802.11n.

hello

i have same problem than you
lap top HP nc6400

and there all the devices IDs :

actual broadcom working in the laptop
PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4311&SUBSYS_1364103C

other broadcom that works with the laptop
PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4312&SUBSYS_1361103C

new intel 5300 i want to use in the laptop
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4235&SUBSYS_10018086

i try with ACCD2 i watch the videos, but i dont understand about the CRC issue, and i'm not shure that the ID Hexadecimal strings i find in my BIOS are parts of the whitelist, and also if they are ID numbers,
in fact i dont understand nothing jejeje
is someone can edit my bios i can pay him throught paypal

[Phyxius]

@nando4

I don't think this will apply to my situation.