How to Enable Intel VT on a Montevina SR,FW,AW Vaio laptop with AMI Aptio BIOS

You can try using VT with some VM host (Microsoft Virtual PC, VirtualBox, VMWare), if it doesn't work then it is not enabled.

 

Is that registry hack for ATI or NVIDIA?

 

Sony-VGN-FW373J has got ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3650 graphics (2280 MB total) . therefore it's for ATI

 

Works with my ATI, sir

 

Levicki, you've done a great job! I read your resume and you have a lot of great skills and achievements! I'm sure that you know, but an interesting GPGPU technology is offered by nVidia named CUDA. The syntax is similar to C and it utilizes the CUDA ISA so that C code can be used without the complicated "hacks" that traditional GPGPU need (ie, you don't need to model an algorithm like graphical data).

Anyways, wanted to let you know that your VTPATCH worked on the following:
Model: VGN-FW378J
Bios: R2050Y0

 

Igor Levicki: thank you so much!!!
I just successfully patched my BIOS. Everything went smoothly.

Model: VGN-SR39VN/S (P8600: 06:17:A)
BIOS: R2070Y1
DOS: HP USBDOS Win98
Patch location: 001D5A4A

I made photos (with a camera) for documentation purposes - if someone has use for them, I can send them to her/him.

daniel@mayo ~ $ sudo modprobe kvm-intel && echo 'HURAY!!!'
HURAY!!!

Igor: I tried to send you a PM for snail mail address, but the forum won't let me

 

As for CUDA I know about it but I don't like NVIDIA. It's the most arrogant company out there and they have been doing a lot of PR spins lately including launches of rebranded chips, chips that fail, etc.

You are welcome.

Try harder

 

Hi. I just want to inform everyone I was successful in applying Igor's patch, and am extremely grateful for his efforts. Please include me among the happy geeks who now have VT enabled in their Vaio machines.

I have a VGN-FW290E with BIOS v. R1090Y0 as shown in the AMI Aptio Setup Utility. I booted Win98 DOS from USB which I created using the utility in this same forum. I moved Igor's files over to it, booted from USB and ran PATCH.BAT. The rest is history... grin

No errors or warnings were encountered. Can't describe my anxiety before and the joy after when I saw the message that flashing was successful.

THANKS AGAIN, IGOR.

 

You are welcome.

 

Another successful patch applied here.

Model: VGN-SR290P
BIOS: R1120Y1, 1/7/09
DOS: HP USBDOS Win98SE

Verified with Sun Virtualbox that VT was enabled. Thanks so much!

 

Thanks a bunch levicki!

"Booting paravirtualized kernel on bare hardware"

Model: FW31ZJ (FreeDos, no errors)

This Sony stuff is a lot of hassle, i already had to disassemble the DSDT as well to get screen brightness to work on linux.

 

Hi @ all

My first post here...

I have a german Sony VAIO AW11Z/B with Bios version R1052Y2. Must i uninstall the Fingerprint software (Protector Suite QL 5.6) bevor i can patch the bios to enable VT? This fingerprint software installs a bios extension to protect the system.

I have other VAIO software installed on my Vista 64bit.

-VAIO Control Center
-VAIO Energie Management
-VAIO Event Service
-VAIO Launcher

Must i uninstall one or more of this VAIO applications?


sorry for my english.

Mane

 

Mane,

I believe that there is no need to uninstall the software, you should just disable TBX (ToughChip Bios eXtension) option if enabled, and re-enable it later.

However, be sure to backup your data before making any configuration changes to Protector Suite settings.

Since the patch is done from clean DOS environment there is no need to uninstall Sony applications but if you are using disk encryption and/or BIOS passwords, those should be disabled/cleared before patching/flashing, and re-enabled later.

Once again, take extra care to backup important data -- patch will most likely work without problems (it has been reported as working on that particular model), but if you have any security features enabled before flashing it may make your data inaccessible.

By the way, that doesn't have anything to do with the nature of the patch itself but with the flashing procedure because it involves flashing of NVRAM -- those are Sony's instructions which you can find on any BIOS update download page.

 

I think you shouldn't hijack someone else's thread to ask an unrelated question. Start a new thread.

Gary

 

Noted. I'll do as instructed.

 

Hi @all

I patched my german VAIO AW11Z/B yesterday and Intel VT is enabled now! The Patch works perfect and it was very easy to use it.

@levicki:
Thank you so much!

Mane

 

You are welcome. I think this thread deserves a sticky?

 

I've sucessfully patched my VAIO box without any VAIO utilities uninstall first. levicki, thank you so much!

Model: SR27TN/B
BIOS: R1120Y1

 

Another success story:

Model: VGN-AW17GU
BIOS: R1052Y2

Thank you very much levicki!!

 

You are welcome.

 

Maybe I've missed something.

I used VPATCH 1.1 on my Vaio FW31M (BIOS R2050Y0) and it flashed it without a problem.
According to CrystalCPUID VT is enabled (not grayed out anymore).

If I check with Virtual PC or VMWare it still says VT is disabled.
I'm running on Windows Vista 64bit.
What have I missed?

Funny thing is MSR Editor says 0x3a is 0x9 (instead of 0x5 or 0xD as specified by the readme)

 

Hello, I have a sony vaio VGN-Z21XN/B. Thanks for your patch. I 've run it successfully but VTPATCH.exe always returns 1.

ERROR: Unsupported flash ROM Size (1572864 bytes)

I think your patch is not compatible with my Z series bios, Could you please update ?

If you want I can send you a rom dump with afudos utility.

My bios is R2165M3


Thanks.

 

Has anyone tried this on a FW-180D at all, I was thinking of trying it on mine.

 

The Z uses a whole different kind of BIOS (EFI) and it is made by another company. Nothing in this thread works with the Z. You will not be able to unlock VT with the Z.

 

0x9 = 8 + 1 = undocumented bit + locked register but VT is not enabled. Your flash seems to have done nothing or you would have 0xD. Upload your original bios dump somewhere then send me a link in a private message and I will take a look when I get home.

You are right, my patch isn't compatible with Insyde H2O bios and it will never be.

 

I might be off here but....

I have a Z690 and I can use VMWare without any issues? I dont know what this patching would do but i've run workstation and currently use server 2 and can do local and remote VM's.

Are you guys talking about something else here?

Oh and I haven't patched anything or done anything special to make it work, it just does.

 

Have send you a msn message. Thanks for taking a look.

 

I run VMWare just fine on my Z; you can't run 64-bit guest VMs. So if all of your VMs are 32-bit, it's not a problem. We're specifically talking about the ability to use 64-bit guest OSes.

 

ah ok, thats the part i wasnt getting then.

 

Wow, amazing work on VT patch. When I started reading the old posts I was very fearful and ready to send by VGN-FW390J back to Sony in the 30 day return period. But the last posts have given me confidence to proceed. Has anyone patched VT on a FW390? Thanks in advance, Chris

 

AMI APTIO BIOS R0250Y0 ver.2.4
Followed instructions in the VTPATCH 1.1 readme.
used system restore to make a restore point.
uninstalled notebook utilities (had to look on website for download to see what
programs that involved since it was not just one uninstall on my notebook)
reset bios to default settings, changed bootup sequence, saved and rebooted
with bootable usbkey in first usb port.

Ran Patch

watched it run, hoped to god I was not making a mistake
it finished, i removed power cord, powered off and then removed battery for a couple of minutes.

reconnected everything and powered on.
Worked perfectly.

Microsoft Virtual PC now reports VT is enabled. Also I used a tool by the guys who made spinrite and shields up called SecurAble ( http://www.grc.com/securable.htm ) its free and tells you right away whats enabled.

Just a fyi I tried that crystalcpu app someone recommended and it was reporting vt was enabled when it really was not before I patched the bios (Ms virtual pc reported negative as did vmware, and securable reported negative as well before the patch)

All I can say is levicki thanks again thats amazing what you have done!!!

THANKS
Michael

 

Igor you did a great job! Thanks a lot. It worked perfectly with my VAIO AW11XU. Well done.

 

I own a sony vaio FW170/j. I want to do this to be able to try the new xp mode from windows 7. I have my sony set up with windows vista as the primary os, Win 7 setup as an option from the dual boot screen. I want to make the virtualization run. I am new at this however. Can someone tell me where to get the files and how to make my PC do a pure DOS boot from the flash drive. I have tried a couple of different things, and I have done a boot to the C:\ per this thread's method.

http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/191416-dos-usb-boot-drive.html

not sure if this is the proper method. Also, do i load the vtpatch folder onto the same jumpdrive that i will be booting from. I just want to make sure that this works correctly. Don't want to "brick" my laptop as it were.

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

Worked fine. Thanks ... you are a star. Now running Windows 7 with Windows Virtual XP where without this I couldn't have. Since I use Virtual Machines a lot I can only thank you. I have owned Sony Laptops for years but the next laptop will be a deal breaker if Sony doesn't get this fixed. There is no reason to have this option removed from the BIOS or run without this.

 

Not trying to sound pushy...please forgive me if I do. I just really want to know how to fix my PC so that I can use this feature of my CPU. I am really excited about getting this to work. Please see my quote above for what I need. Thanks in advance for any and all help.

 

The recent discussion on the MSI laptops has been move to the MSI forums. Please continue the discussion in the below thread.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=379144

It is best to try and keep these threads on topic for those Sony laptops mentioned above in the thread title.

 

While I understand your intent, I am not sure I agree with moving those messages out of this thread. Yes there was a discussion of the MSI laptop, but ONLY in the context that the BIOS was the same type as in the Sony machines being discussed in this thread. The things being discussed was still applicable to the Sony users, nothing in those messages was in any way specific to the MSI machine. Now with the thread fragmented in this way Sony users coming to this thread will most likely never see anything about this possible new development in unlocking the VT settings in this BIOS.

Gary

 

It was not applicable to SR, FW, and AW owners with the AMI BIOS as they have a working solution for their Sony laptops.

The question was answered that Igor could not help as MSI owners with the AMI BIOS situation is slightly different and it was acknowledged by those looking for advice. Any further ongoing discussion (as there will need to be) trying to look for a solution i feel is better served in the MSI forum in a dedicated thread where MSI owners can come together to try and find a solution to their problem. There are various other threads on this board in different forums about the same thing.

Leaving the thread wide open can also cause confusion in the long term.

 

Sorry, you are right, I was mistaking that thread for the one where folks still had not been able to unlock the VT bit. I have been following all of the VT related threads and didn't read backward thru the thread to realize which one we were in. Mea culpa. Mea maxima culpa.

Thanks for your efforts!

Gary

 

I am sorry that this is my 3rd post about this. I just really do not want to get passed up and would like my questions answered. Please do not misunderstand this for impatience. I just do not want my simple questions to get buried in this thread. Thanks again in advance for any and all help.

 

Hello, I'm new to this topic and have a FW378J. I stumbled upon this thread and was disappointed since I purchased the FW for the great resolution and plan to use it for VMs amongst other things. At any rate, I was glad to see there is a fix for enabling VT. Before patching my bios I took a peak at what Crystal CPUID had to say. Am I reading this right? VT enabled out of the box?

Thanks

 

burgeke if you see my previous post Crystal CPUID reports it incorrectly
try a tool by the guys who made spinrite and shields up called SecurAble ( http://www.grc.com/securable.htm ) its free and tells you right away whats enabled.

regards mike

 

I download and ran the program too. I am new to the forum and have been trying to figure out how to do this to my bios. I get that I do have hardware VT but there is an option to click and see more. When I click it it tells me that vista 64 cannot run the 32 bit kernel and that my bios could have this feature switched off. We already know this because sony switches it off. Anyway, thanks for this post.

Also, i am still seeking instructions for a place to find the dos files i need to boot from my memory stick. For everything that I am looking for please see my post. It's barely a page behind this post.

Thanks in advance for any help. I can't wait to turn VT on. Shame on sony for doing this. Here, here to everyone that has put so much time and energy into this thread.

 

Hi! I downloaded and ran SecurAble and it did report "YES". However, similar to the other poster's comments I am running 64Bit Windows so SecurAble may be reporting incorrectly. Any advice to properly determine if VT is enabled or not? I assume not based on everyone's comments here

Thanks!

 

Indeed no VT. I installed Virtual PC and it reported no VT.

The patch worked perfect! VGN-FW378J w/ bios R2050Y0

Thank you for providing this patch!

 

burgeke,
Can you tell me where and how you obtained the dos files for jumpdrive boot to dos so that you could apply the patch. I really want to get mine working and haven't gotten an answer to this question. Thank you in advance.

 

Google is your friend. Click here: Was that so hard?

Gary

 

Okay, I know how to search google. Thanks for the demo. Although, I'm not sure it was necessary. Here is one link I found. CLICK HERE. Do you think this one will work. And me second question is do I add the patch to the USB drive or do I burn it to a CD and after booting dos with the USB load the patch from CD. Also, the first time that I tried this dos to USB and boot i get not a valid drive designation every time i try to maneuver to a drive letter other than the one that the USB stick boots to.

 

You kept asking over and over again where to find them. You never once, until now, asked "will these work" or "is this set of instructions correct" so we were, or at least I was, left to assume you hadn't looked or couldn't find anything.

The link you provided appears to be overkill for what you want to do, the Windows 98 files it has you load are just a bunch of extra stuff you don't need FOR THIS TASK. I am pretty sure the ISO mentioned on the first link on the Google page I sent you to, will do the trick.

Trust me you do NOT want to mess around with trying to get a CD drive to operate under DOS. It can be done, but requires extra stuff in the IO.SYS configuration. That is why you kept getting the "invalid drive" message when you tried to switch to another drive. (I also think that's why YOUR link used the Win98 stuff. At a quick glance it does appear to try to make a bootable DOS with CD-ROM support.) But again you don't NEED that for this task. Just put all of the patch stuff on the bootable DOS USB stick. That way you don't need to switch drives at all.

Gary

 

Thanks! I will try this as soon as I get home. Will reply once I have got it through the process.