AW18 1-beep BIOS Flash Question

Hi,
I posted this on another forum, but someone there suggested the fishing might be better over here on an old beast like this.
For clarity, this a circa 2013 model P19E, which I'm assuming is what folks refer to as the Alienware 18.
Keyboard/logo lights up, no video/POST, eventually a beep every second or so continuously. This seems to have occurred spontaneously, during normal use, NOT a CMOS settings or h/w change.

I sincerely believe I've tried every permutation of the standard bricked BIOS procedures, ie removing batteries, ram, cpu, gpus, power button 30 seconds, shorting CMOS battery, hot swapping one SODIMM during the reboot window, etc.

What I HAVEN'T tried is a different CPU, don't have one.

The mobo isn't completely dead, ie the core logic knows whether there is ram, a cpu, etc installed and beeps appropriately.

.
Here's the questions:
Assuming this actually is a firmware issue rather than a h/w failure:
Has anyone successfully resurrected one of these with the steady beep every second symptom by either a blind USB/internal SATA flash, or attaching a CH341A to the BIOS chip and flashing it?
There's just not much info out there on this model. What I tried:
Main battery removed.
VAS10A05.fd (extracted from the Dell A05 download)on an 8g FAT32 USB Stick
Held down END while plugging in AC
Fans full speed,
Power switch fading in-out while blinking steadily.
After a few seconds, started seeing some activity on the USB stick's LED, was hopeful.
No beeping of any kind.
After a short time, USB LED was solid & stayed that way.
After about 10 minutes of zero apparent activity, held down power switch to turn off.
Reboot, still 1 beep every second or so, no video.

The FD file was only about 9 meg, thinking that was not the BIOS image I need, but no idea where to find it.

Conversely, any value in buying one of the 'pre-flashed' BIOS chips from ebay and soldering it on?

Is there anything less drastic anyone can suggest before I get medieval on this thing?

There so much more info out there on the M18 series, P19, not so much. I hate to give up on this beast.



Thanks for reading.

 

I was hoping that someone here had some experience with a 1-beep error on the 18 for you but maybe they haven't.
The .fd file should be the correct one but you do need to rename it to an .hdr before putting it on the bootable USB. I'm just not sure if what you rename it is important or it's good just as long as it ends in .hdr
For example when you rename the .fd file for the M17x R4 it needs to be M17R4.hdr
I haven't tried calling it something else, just in case it causes a brick.

EDIT: This post should be able to help you. It looks like you do have to name the file something specific but the software will tell you what it is.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/bios-recovery-in-case-you-brick-your-m17x-r3.601701/

EDIT: It looks like you can use an .fd file but it has to be renamed correctly using Phoenixtool

https://www.win-raid.com/t4444f16-G...sing-PhoenixTool-Updating-to-new-RST-ROM.html