TPM problem on M570RU

I'm playing with Windows 7 on my early generation M570RU lap and wanted to experiment with using Bitlocker with the TPM. But for some reason it's not showing as available.

I'll swear that I saw TPM options in the BIOS when I first got the machine! I previously updated the BIOS to 1.00.08 and EC to 1.00.09S. I see that there are newer versions (BIOS 1.00.11 and EC 1.00.10) available -- would updating to these versions help? Is there a magic key in the BIOS I need to hit to see the TPM options (they're not on the SECURITY page)? I rather not downgrade to a BIOS without fan controls!

I know they removed TPM from later revisions of this machine, but this is an early model and it's supposed to be there. Can anyone else with an early model verify for me that TPM works with current firmware versions?

Anyone have any ideas? Thanks!

 

When the earlier models were released they were supposed to have tpm. However there was a shortage of tpm chips (as they were new at the time) so most batches didn't have them. If you got one with a TPM chip, you were considered lucky.

 

Interesting. That leads to two questions.

1) Is there any easy way to detect if the chip is actually present? Either externally or when opening up the case (i.e. do we know where it's located on the motherboard)?

2) Is there anyway to add the TPM chip to the existing laptop if it wasn't properly added at manufacturing time (like it was socketed or something)?

It still seems strange that I remember it in the early BIOS version but don't see it now.

 

It was definitely in an early bios, they probably removed it because so many units lacked the chip.

I do not know where the chip is, but the chip number is SLB9635TT if you want to look for it/research it.