Dead Sony Vaio PCG-K415B Bios / KBC / Motherboard

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Mad Professor
BIOS Newbie
Posts: 25
Joined: Tue Aug 16, 2005 3:59 pm

Hi All.

I have been given a Sony Vaio Laptop (PGC-K415B).

I was told that windows would crash and blue screen alot, so the laptop was given to a my mates friend to try and fix the problem, When he got it back there laptop no longer boots.

You get the power led's light up, hdd spins up, and the wifi light on the front powers up, dvd-drive can not be opened, nor does the Cap Lock, Scroll Lock, Num Lock, Lights work, when the key(s) are pressed.

To me this looks like it might be a possible failed bios upgrade, and by reading some other posts it looks like the sony vaio's are very bad at bios upgrades going wrong.

I have taken the laptop apart to find the bios chip.

Sticker On Bios Chip
JE5.2 NX28
R0106X3

Bios Chip
PMC
0431
Pm39F040-70JCE

I have found a data sheet for the above bios chip here:
http://www.edom.com.tw/vender/product/P ... 20V1.3.pdf

It looks to be a 4Mb bips chip, so that’s 512Kb x 8.

I have downloaded the latest bios file for this laptop "R0108X3" and the .rom file is 513Kb.

This bios chip is soldered to the mainboard so I am unable to remove the chip for replacement, as I don't have a Hot Air Desoldering Station.

I do know that with some bios chips there is a trick, that using a pice or two of wire you can access difent blocks of the bios chip, Can anyone please confirm if you can do the same with this one, and if so how.

I don't know for sure if it is a problem with the bios that I am only guessing,

I have also brought a Mini-PCI Post Analyzer Card from ebay, to try and help me narrow down what is the problem with the laptop.

Thanks for your time.

Best Regards.
Last edited by Mad Professor on Mon Jan 15, 2007 10:02 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Mad Professor
BIOS Newbie
Posts: 25
Joined: Tue Aug 16, 2005 3:59 pm

Well this is strange.

My Mini-PCI Diag card turned up today.

So I slaped in the laptop, and get the following codes, FFFF, 7F00, & FF00.

From the lastest version of the bios I have downloaded from sonys web site is seems that the bios is ment to be a Phoenix 4.0 Release 6.0 type.

But looking at Bios Central - Phoenix Post Codes, FF, 00, & 7F, are not Phoenix 4.0 Release 6.0 post codes, So the only thing I can think is that a worng or damanged bios has been flashed.
Mad Professor
BIOS Newbie
Posts: 25
Joined: Tue Aug 16, 2005 3:59 pm

Today I got my 50pin laptop CD/DVD to 40pin IDE adaptor to test the laptops drive.

It still did not work on the pc, so a quick strip down, and rebuild of the dvd drive and it now reads, wrties, and opens.

Is there anyway to do a Crisis Bios Recovery on my laptop, to save me getting the old bios chip removed, and a new one programed?

If not I will order a new programmed bios chip and pcb holder after xmas, from: RecoveryBios, Unless anyone knows of anyone faster / cheeper in the UK.

Thanks for your time.
lamo
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Posts: 7
Joined: Fri Jan 05, 2007 12:19 am

I recommend you to reflash the bios in the hardware programmer with the binary file. AFAIK, there's no crisis disks from sony.
Mad Professor
BIOS Newbie
Posts: 25
Joined: Tue Aug 16, 2005 3:59 pm

Ummmmm.

I had a new bios chip programed by www.bios-repair.co.uk.

The new bios chip has been fitted and the laptop still will not boot, So it's got to be CPU and or Mainboard.

I still get the same as I did before, no change at all.
Last edited by Mad Professor on Fri Jan 19, 2007 10:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Mad Professor
BIOS Newbie
Posts: 25
Joined: Tue Aug 16, 2005 3:59 pm

I am still having no luck with this laptop

I have tested the memory in a friends laptop using a program called goldmemory as that comes back fine.

I have taken out the dvd-rw and connected it to my pc using a adaptor, that reads & writes cd's / dvd's fine.

PSU is pushing out a good 19.5 - 20.0v dc, Battery light flashes showing that the battery is charging, this stops after about 3-4 hours.

I was reading in the other sony post that when the bios upgrade fails this can mess up the kbc, I am not sure if my motherboard has one, and even if it does if there is anything I can do about it.

This model of laptop does not have a built in floppy drive so I don't know if the Crisis Recovery would work with the cd/dvd drive or a usb floppy drive, even if the crisis recovery is designed to work with this laptop.

Here is a picture of the front and back of my laptop mainboard.
Image
Image

If anyone has any advise no matter how small please do, as not having this laptop working is driving me up the wall.

Thanks for your time.
Mad Professor
BIOS Newbie
Posts: 25
Joined: Tue Aug 16, 2005 3:59 pm

I have had my intel cpu tested today, and came back fine.

So it's got to be the mainboard / bios / kbc chip.

Has anyone got any advise where to go from now?
rcwaszak
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Posts: 1
Joined: Mon Aug 16, 2010 8:10 pm

Old post - same problem?

Mad Professor, did you ever resolve this problem? I'm looking at my daughter's 4 year old Vaio and it's acting like the BIOS has been whacked. I'm investigating replacing/flashing the BIOS but not sure if that can be done when one cannot get through the POST routines.

thanks, rc waszak
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