NEW BIOS F.33: HP dv5 (AMD)

Hey everyone,

A new BIOS update has been posted over at HP for all dv5 notebooks with an AMD processor. (You may recall that this current line has been discontinued rather early on.) See the list of compatible products below for specific product information. Please note that I am posting this for informational purposes only.

COMPATIBLE PRODUCTS

Code:

SysId01=0x30F2
SysName01=HP Pavilion dv5
SysId02=0x3600
SysName02=HP Pavilion dv5
SysId03=0x3622
SysName03=HP Pavilion dv5

RELEASE NOTES

Please note that this BIOS update is for AMD versions of the dv5 notebooks as mentioned above.

DOWNLOAD - ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/softpaq/sp43501-44000/sp43683.exe

Feel free to discuss about this BIOS update in this thread.

 

Yep I post this Bios update yesterday in the dv5z owners thread, however the update doesn't add any functionality to the dv5z in anyway.

 

This is a relatively minor update for most users. I don't completely understand why HP has to release a new BIOS update just to support the Boston-Power battery (or adjust the notebook's thermal policy to support it, for that matter).

 

The two are unrelated. In all the BIOS revisions up to this one the ACPI thermal zone code is broken. It actually gives incorrect results on Windows too but Windows usually ignores the errors and accepts the rest. On Linux the errors cause older kernel versions to invalidate the entire module, so there's no ACPI temperature reporting at all. I haven't looked at this BIOS update, but I had to manually patch my ACPI tables to get temperature reporting to work in Linux so far.

As for the Boston battery - I also note that the ACPI code to read the battery info is unreliable in my dv5z with current (I think it.s F.32) BIOS - sometimes it reads the battery as being NiMH (when it's obviously LiIon) and it gets some other details wrong as well. Perhaps this is just a fix to how the battery info is read; no doubt the on-board charger needs to adjust itself for the optimal charging rate of the new batteries.

 

hi, highlandsun.
i would like to have temp reports in linux as well, can you please explain how you patched your ACPI tables for reporting temperatures? btw which distro you use? i currently use Arch and for some reason, ACPI seems not be working properly. sometimes, under heady workload my turion zm82 dv5-1112ea gets too hot and shuts down. i would appreciate your help a lot.
cheers.

 

salo9000: I suggest you just install this F.33 bios. If it fixes the issue then there's no need to manually patch it any more.

 

hi. does it really? i installed it as soon as it came out and i havent got any temp readings. also, my laptop keeps shutting down under heavy workload. it seems to do so only on linux. i have empty thermal_zone directories. how are you getting the readings?
cheers.

 

hi highlandsun,

after passing acpi_osi="Linux" parameter to my linux kernel, i got temperature readings. cheers, you were right.

$ cat /proc/acpi/thermal_zone/THRM/temperature
temperature: 85 C

however, laptop still shuts down under heavy workload on linux. do you know if there's a way for controlling this? what is your experience using your dv5z on linux?

cheers.
salomon.

 

Hi. Well, yes, it seems to be working better than before. The bios now enables ACPI on linux passing acpi_osi="Linux" param to the kernel. Cool!

Just one issue:
Graphic card doesnt seem to work well on 64bit operating systems.

When I use 64bit opengl applications the laptop gets extremely hot and shuts down. Maybe its the graphic card (ATI mobility radeon 4850) what gets hot. It doesnt happens when I run the same applications compiled for 32bit and on a 32bit OS. Also, opengl graphics performance is better (higher fps) on 32bit OS than on 64bit OS (I tried Ubuntu and Archlinux using catalyst 9.4, 32/64bit repectively).

I wonder why this is. Also, my the laptop came with a 32bit windows vista (home premium) even though the processor is 64bit capaable (turion x2 zm-82).

Does anyone has 64bit OS on their AMD pavilion?

 

Correction for my last post:

the graphic card is: ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3450

laptop model is hp pavilion dv5-1112ea

 

Yeah I use 64bit vista business. My dv5z came with 64bit vista home premium but I removed that and installed my copy of vista business. It has been working just fine no isssues. I am glad you spotted your previous error because no dv5 that I know of has a 4850 (but I can dream.. ).

 

I've been running 64 bit Ubuntu 8.10 on mine since I first got it. I removed the drive it shipped with (which has some flavor of Vista on it) and put in a 256GB SSD. I haven't ever booted the original HP drive in it... And yes, the machine runs hot. I've tried undervolting, new thermal paste (ICD7), and also have a laptop cooler. Nothing really makes much difference; I think the heatsink is just too tiny for the amount of heat the chips put out...