Clevo W860CU - nvflash blindflash of Nvidia 280M ?

If this is posted in the wrong thread, please move it to the right one.

I guess I have played a bit too much with nibitor and nvflash, my Clevo does not show any signs of live except two beeps after alt-ctrl-del so I would have to blindflash back the stock ROM.

My question is how to do that using an usb-stick? It contains everything needed as I have used it to flash all ROMs before and the 280 M has no hardware issues.

Does it still boot and can you still type commands? If so, when? If I start it up, it does not say or do anything. If I restart it using alt-ctrl-del, it beeps twice. I tried typing the nvflash commands after both.

nvflash -5 -6 *.rom and nvflash -4 -5 -6 -a -y *.rom did not work.
I have read tutorials in which you would have to use a spare pci graphics card. That will not be easy using a laptop.

Any help on this would be greatly appreciated

 

Specifically, what values did you change in NiBiTor? There are a few options in NiBiTor that can bomb a card dead and unrecoverable even with forced flashes.

 

Thanks for your reply, I almost thought nobody could help.

I have changed almost everything regarding voltages and clock but not the RAM timings.
According to a post of you, I have lowered the clocks and voltages in 2D and increased them in 3D:

2D->120/300/120, 0,85V
Thrtl->160/400/201, 0,85V
3D->383/767/301, 0,85V
Extra->640/1600/1020, 1V

Core threshold: 90C

It did run very well with those settings (I did it step by step) without artefacts and went a bit cooler.

In the end I thought I could have it as a 285M so I changed the Device ID from 060A to 060F. And that's it; since I flashed it with the 060F ROM and after rebooting when the update had finished, I got the problems stated in the first post.

Changing the Device ID to a 285M could not brick a 280M, am I right? Please say so

 

So you just edited the device ID of the GTX 280M 060A BIOS to 060F? You did not have a genuine copy of the GTX 285M 060F BIOS? No version of NiBiTor as of this post has the 060F BIOS readily included. Because of this, NiBiTor doesn't know what 060F is. Only by reading a genuine 060F BIOS will NiBiTor know how to handle it as it isn't simply the name of the card that is different; from comparing the checksums between the two BIOS's, there are numerous minor changes, and I believe I covered this before. One of the most notable changes is the looser memory timings on the 060F BIOS. The others will not be disclosed to keep readers safe.

In short, what you have done was shortcut an attempt to get a GTX 280M born card to a GTX 285M just for the sake of having the name. Unfortunately, there isn't any way to restore the card through conventional or force flashing. I remember making this mistake before on a salvaged old school desktop FX 5700. The situation is the same as not having a VGA in the slot; the beeps indicate that there is no card or no recognizable card. As I see it now, you just killed your card. But in the meanwhile, as this thread fills up with potential restore attempts from other users, I will also look into possibly reviving "Lazarus," though I don't think it's possible by the end-user.

 

Ok I just tried to open the 060F ROM and got the NiBiTor error. I had none when saving it. I have no extra clocks and 3D, Thrtl and 2D are set to 21860?! Shader and memory are still the same but voltages are left blank.

I knew about the memory timings from your post but I thought just renaming it would be no big deal. You could flash a 9800GT with a 8880GTX ROM...?

What did go wrong, does the W860CU not recognize this 280M / 285M hermaphrodite or did the core clock with 21860MHz?

I could get the 285M ROM Clevo uses. I just did not want to bother my source just for this reason. What would be necessary to have a try reflashing it? I have got a spare 280M but if there are any chances, I would like to try. I could have access to equipment if needed.

... would it be possible to reflash it using a mainboard with a MXM 3B slot and integrated VGA or PCI VGA (if this exists)?

 

A 9800M GT can be flashed with the 8800M GTX BIOS because NiBiTor already has the BIOS included. In your case, NiBiTor has the GTX 280M BIOS but not the GTX 285M, meaning that just by changing the device ID from 060A to 060F will do nothing as NiBiTor doesn't know what 060F is. When you refreshed NiBiTor after changing the device ID to 060F, it could not read the various values of your 060A BIOS. People that have the genuine GTX 285M 060F BIOS are able to fool NiBiTor into correctly reading it by using the GTX 280M BIOS, or other G92 BIOS's that are already included in NiBiTor, to properly read the GTX 285M values, then set the device ID back to 060F before saving it.

I'm assuming that before saving your modded 060A BIOS, you changed the device ID to 060F without refreshing NiBiTor and checking the BIOS values if they are readable. Unfortunately, you just did this after you attempted the fateful flash. Again, simply by changing your device ID the short way, it rendered your card unrecognizable as the device ID as well as the improperly read values were saved and flashed.

Your spare GTX 280M (assuming MXM 3.0b) will not help you in restoring your dead original GTX 280M. Your dead card is simply unrecognizable to your system BIOS at POST. Nothing can read a scrambled GPU BIOS.

 

Ok so the card has got unreadable values saved and the device ID is unrecognizable for the W860CU, is that right?

I know that the spare one would not help me much in this situation, I just wanted to point out that I do not need a fast solution.

What did you do with your FX 5700?

There are methods of soldering the BIOS chipset on Mainboards, would that be possible with VGAs?

Would my suggestion with an integrated VGA work?

 

Yes, your card now has a corrupt GPU BIOS that is incapable of passing POST.

I salvaged an old tower from a electronics recycling booth during Earth Day a few years back. It had an FX 5700 that I fooled around with, and I made the same mistake you made by changing the device ID by hand rather than pulling it from the drop down list. However, I input the incorrect ID, which probably represents some other card, rather than the one I intended to put. It was a fatal user typing error.

Like I said, the card cannot be restored by the end-user. Your suggestion of pulling the BIOS chip from the GPU daughterboard and replacing it with a BIOS chip that has the original GTX 280M BIOS already flashed on it will work, but it is very difficult to obtain the chip with the BIOS already on it; a blank chip will also fail to get the GPU to POST. With motherboards it's easier since there are backup chips and (desktop) motherboards are easier and cheaper to acquire compared to more niche hardware such as mobile GPU's. Integrated VGA's are the same as any other VGA in this case. They cannot assist you in restoring the original BIOS onto your GTX 280M. They would only allow you to see your screen so that your jaw can drop when you see that your card doesn't exist to the system (unrecognizable).

 

I did this with my Asus G1S, I was trying to flash the 8600M GT GDDR3 to the 8700M GT used in the G2S. However, I was able blind flash it back, because NiBiTor should have had the info for the 8700M GT, and it must've updated the values accordingly.

 

Haha, my jaw has already dropped in your second post

I could use the BIOS chip of a faulty or of my spare 280M (no 260M because of the pipelines, correct?). Do you know where on the PCB it is located at? How could you flash a blank chip (I would have access to Clevo's repair site)?

If nothing helps, I would have to contact something like them
bios-repair.co.uk/bios/solbios.htm .. I guess replacing a 0 with a 5 is not always the cheapest thing to do

.. how did your FX end? In the trash or did you try something?

 

A possibility for reviving the card might be to put it in the daughter slot of an sli motherboard (M980NU/x8100/future x7200), thus booting off a working card in the main slot. If you try this make sure you flash the correct card though.

 

If you still get the backlight then blind flash will be ok. If the screen backlight didn´t on then you need a SLI Notebook or a programmer. I have done many times VGA repair flash before with or without backlight, both without screen display.

 

As far as I understood from what Soviet said, even a SLI Notebook will not help, as the GTX 280M with the faulty bios simply does not exist to the system and Nbitor. You probably would need to mod the system or nbitor so that it can correctly recognize your 060F device id, but good luck with that...

 

Hmm, I don't if this helps but here it goes.

Some years back, when I first got this laptop I had a 9800M GTX inside. I was also fooling around with Nibitor and in order to properly see the values of the 9800M GTX I had to change the device ID to something else (the one of the 8800M) -> then refresh Nibitor -> edit the new values -> then change the device id back to the original one (no refresh was needed) -> save the new BIOS. It worked every time.

However, at one point I forgot to change the device ID from the one of the 8800M to the original one of the 9800M. I flashed the bad BIOS and... bricked my laptop.

I tried for about a full day to blind flash my vBIOS and it seemed like the laptop would not want to boot from the USB stick or anything else. Eventually, after a lot of struggle what I did was to remove all drives and only leave the CD-rom. This time it booted from it and I was able to blind flash my card.

 

The BIOS chip on our cards is the small chip with four thick solder leads on both sides. Atmel is printed onto the top of the chip. I forgot the rest of the code; I will need to take a look at it again. You would need to pull this sucker off and resolder a new one onto it from a different card (which would be stupid since it would render the other card useless). Or you can pull it off and reflash it using an EEPROM programmer, which is also on the expensive side in both monetary and skill/labor. One of my professors has the COM1 version of this Willem, http://www.mcumall.com/comersus/store/comersus_viewItem.asp?idProduct=4219. I don't consider this end-user serviceable because you would need background knowledge in mounting the chip onto the programmer which is different since not all chips are the same, as well as configuring the software to match the jumpers on the chip adapter. I haven't fried an expensive card before so I never got around to attempting this. It should be fairly simple though. Then again, with all due respect, I suggest that you're better off just replacing the card. You can score a brand new GTX 285M for $400 or a MR 5870 for $350, each with a shiny new heatsink, though shipping and tariffs to the UK will juke that price up. Now that I think of it, even buying the Willem would be costly for you.

Sending your card to a certified BIOS repair center like the one you mentioned is a much better option if you still wish to revive your card. They are essentially going to do the same thing I just explained above, but with the exception that they (assuming well) actually know how to do it. I would probably go this route if I were stuck between flat out buying a new card or repairing my card.

My FX 5700 is sitting in my junk bin along with a bunch of other old computer parts that I keep for sentimental value. The damn thing is so ancient that it's probably not even worth $20, nor worth my time and effort trying to revive it so I just set it aside.

 

It's a good chance for you to upgrade to 5870MR IMO.

 

i guess you were a little bit lucky

theriko, that sounds very interesting!
But what do you guys think, could it work if the slave card would not be recognized at POST?
How could you choose the second card running nvflash?

Damn, I just switched to my spare 280M before reading, I am not 100% sure but I think there was no backlight at all. How would you proceed? SLI would be a basic requirement i guess?

this sounds dumb, but did you set the BIOS booting from CD first before the flashing of your vBIOS went bad?

I always wanted to ... but it would be interesting to wait for the 480M. If it is being recognized and if I would not be able to use my keyboard as a BBQ, I would rather save the money to have this expensive try.

By the way, could you modify the ATI BIOS regarding voltages, clocks and thresholds as easy as the Nvidia ones? Would the changes apply without any driver mods in Windows?

Having a quick look, I could not spot the Atmel-chip. Do you know where it has to be located at?

Even if playing with the Willem and soldering would be fun, you are right as the postage and those marvellous custom fees would not sum up to an attractive price overall (I am not from the UK but overseas). Buying a new card would nor be an option for me as it would not for you; the professional service would only be 8% of the cost of a new one so I would go for this if the SLI method leads to no success. ...heatsink should not be the problem as there are plenties of them laying around.

In the end (as I know me - it has to say 285M), how could you have it as a 285M safely and without modifying nv_opencl everytime?

I know what you mean, I still own two well working Amigas and two Riva TNT 2 M64 for sentimental reason.. but not only M64 but M64 Pro
Those ancient things are like a modern teddy without any eyes, arms and legs left

 

From the picture's orientation, the chip is above the bottom left mounting post. Disregard the image title and the colored highlights as this pic was meant for a different purpose.

Hmm, sorry if I mentioned you being from the UK; I probably confused you for another person. Nonetheless, anything outside domestic comes at a hefty price.

The only way to truly get your GTX 280M to be recognized as a GTX 285M is to flash it with a genuine GTX 285M 060F BIOS, period.

 

I think you got confused because of the .co.uk. link.
Chip says Atmel 910[...], should be easy to solder if you would own a Willem. What do you think about the SLI way?

Stock Clevo 285M ROM. The RAM timings would not be a problem or would you suggest using the 280M timings?

 

Again, it depends on how the card's BIOS has been corrupted. If the card can pass POST and your computer continues to boot into Windows, as indicated by audible sounds such as the welcome sound and whatnot, then your card is just incapable of displaying your screen and is eligible for a proper force flash. In your case, you are getting the POST error beeps; two beeps, on Phoenix BIOS's, usually means you are missing a critical component needed for the system to POST (ie. CPU, RAM, VGA, etc), or your system memory is bunk. Inserting the bad card as a slave in an SLi notebook would work for the former scenario, but not the latter. The card simply isn't communicating with the system. It is just there leeching on power.

You can safely flash the GTX 285M BIOS onto a GTX 280M. You can change the timings on the GTX 285M BIOS to match the GTX 280M's, though that takes away a bit of headroom for pushing the memory clocks just a bit further, which is better than tightening the timings. http://forum.notebookreview.com/6023663-post370.html

 

Obviously yes.
Why it worked this way, I have no idea, also it didn't work from the first attempt I tried it this way. I actually tried several times until it suddenly decided to boot from the CD.

 

Just got the card back, stressed with several tests and got nothing else to say but it works like it did before
Thank you for localizing what went wrong