Insyde hacking - New Vaio Z - Advanced menu in BIOS

There you go...

 

Wow man thanks for this. Worked like a beauty for me. Cheers

 

No man, it's in right place. The 1 is at 0x3549FA. The F0 is at the start of the line.

 

Holy crap. With the hacked BIOS, I got the fan to stay off while in Windows. I changed pretty much every single setting so later I need to find out which one is doing it. Note: The fan didn't turn on even when the CPU temperature was approaching 100C, so I need to figure that one out as well.

I think found out which temp is being checked now. It seems that instead of checking the CPU temp, it's now checking the nVidia GPU's temp. This would explain why the fan did not turn on when I was in Stamina mode.

 

Will this BIOS work on the SVZ1311?

 

No, this particular BIOS mod is only for the Vaio VPCZ1.

 

I'm not convinced. The GPU and CPU are tied to the same heatsink; their temperatures should track very closely - within a few degrees. What was the GPU's temperature when the CPU reached 100 deg C?

 

So...what do you think, should I try to flash it or not? In the unfortunate event that something goes wrong, I understand that the machine will turn into a light and expensive brick. So, in this case...is there anything one can do, or the only way is to send it to Sony for a reflash? By the way anyone who knows how much Sony charges in this case?

 

Well, I personally would try it. Consider if you have more than one computer and such, but everything seems ok.

Also, if success, it will prove 2 things:

- That it was patched where we supposed it to be patched
- That reverse patching works as well as direct one, so you don't need to have the "original" rom. Isn't that great?

 

Few many other computers, so not a prob.

Well, it is great, yes, BUT, what if NOT success? What, comes after...? Anything I could do to reflash it meself? A rough estimate of Sony charges?

 

No idea about what to do if it does not success man. The first idea I come up with is to get the chip where the bios is physically placed and reprogram it externally, but probably in this computer it's just soldered on the motherboard or something more complicated. No idea of repairing costs.

 

It is definitely soldered on the motherboard, so the only way is the Sony way...ouch this is gonna hurt!!!

 

If I remember correctly, it was around or just above 75C. I have never seen my GeForce 330M go higher than about 85C (with FurMark or similar).

So far, I haven't been able to make the fan turn on while in Stamina mode. Not that it's been very useful for me - idles around 85C and load temps shoot straight up to 100C. I haven't repasted my CPU, but I will avoid doing that due to the horror stories I have heard.

 

Just an idea...what if downgrade my current hacked bios with R3030C3 (the sony flash application should allow it) and then upgrade normally with R3031C3? Problem is where to get the old R3030C3 file! Any ideas?

 

You can get the R3030C3 in this link

http://dlv.update.sony.net/pub/vaio/download/EP0000229132/EP0000229132.exe

You can see the executable contents with Uniextract.

 

YEAAAAHHHH!!!! OK, I can confirm that my last minute idea WORKED!!!

I fisrt run R3030C3, which successfully downgraded my BIOS. Then it allowed me to execute R3031C3 which upgraded my BIOS to the latest one!

I can now send my VAIO to Sony for service without loosing (hopefully) my warranty!

Many many credits and thanks to Paloseco for pointing out the download location for R3030C3!

 

Hi everyone,

I need help. I just recently set my Vaio vgn-z 590 bios to Advanced mode. After advanced mode was enabled I rebooted into Windows twice, the second time to unistall the nVidia drivers prior to setting the video switching to Static and then installing the latest drivers right from nVidia.

Once I switched the setting to Static, I rebooted first in stamina mode which was fine, and then with the switch as Speed mode and now my screen is just showing white vertical lines. The laptop is also stuck in Speed mode and will not light stamina mode regardless of what the switch is set at. I know the laptop is booting even though I can't see what's happening because I can hear windows boot. I think if I can restore bios defaults and get the setting back to "Auto" it will probably pick up Stamina mode and restore my video. Can someone post instructions on the exact keystrokes needed to reset the bios to default and then reboot?

Thanks!

Update: After pulling the battery and waiting about an hour, when I started back up it recognized the Stamina mode and enabled the screen again. In case anyone else needs to know, for the VGN-Z series (and maybe all Inysde H20 bioses), defaults can be restored after the bios screen loads using:

Right arrow exactly five times
Down arrow once
Enter 4 times (the last enter will exit bios and reboot machine)

 

Quick question when trying to flash the bios hack on my z1390x I get ERROR: IHISI 15h fail. iNTERNAL error 20 FFC00000 FBTS permission is denied by user. It say this message 3 times and then takes me back to command prompt C:, but I backed up the bios successfully and when trying to flash the hacked bios it loaded 100%. Any help is well appreciated! I followed the simple installation posted by Cowboy.

Here's a screenshot.

 

Hello,

Is there any news about hacking BIOS on the new vaio SV-Z ?
I it needs, I can post a dump of my BIOS

Cheers

 

Hi,

I have a sony VPC-Z13V9E, with bios problems.

on boot always gives error; “ME FW UPDATE FAILURE,PLEASE TRY AGAIN”

On Bios, Serial number,service tag and product name(VPCZ129FX) is all diferent
from computer original sticker.

On Bios ME VERSION is unknown.

I tried updating the Bios but already have last update R3031c3.

Computer boots fine( with error message) all drivers installed, the fan is always
working and after 40/45minutes the laptop turns off.

i would like to know if there is any way of solving this problem

Many thanks

 

I found the 24 56 53 53. How to convert to offsets?

 

Looking for some assistance...

I successfully flashed the BIOS on my VPCZ1390S. I changed from RAID to AHCI mode and then did a fresh Windows install. During this time I was restarting multiple times to do Windows updates and had no problems.
I did a full-disk encryption using TrueCrypt and did a pre-test to make sure it worked. Encryption completed; I then shut down.

Now, when I try to start up the laptop, I'm stuck at the "VAIO" boot screen, and cannot enter BIOS settings or do anything at all. I tried booting from USB stick and CD but I'm always stuck at the boot screen. I'm really not sure what to do because it seems I can't access anything at all.

Can somebody provide help? I don't care about the contents of the SSD, I'm also fine with flashing my BIOS back to its original state. Thank you!

 

Am really afraid that something went bad and you've bricked your vaio! Let's wait to hear what other have to say.

 

From your explaination I cant tell what could have gone wrong. So this is what I would do:

This is a common issue if you set ahci to ide mode. The controller hangs during ssd init. Have you waited long enough? Does the hdd led blink? If you cant get it to run, I suggest to open your laptop and temporarily disconnect the ssds from the motherboard to get back into bios. This always helped z users with hacked bios and hang at the Vaio logo.

 

Isn't the SSD soldered directly on the motherboard? At least I have a Z1

 

Just to be clear, I changed it from RAID to AHCI mode and then reinstalled Windows.

I gave it only a few minutes; I could try it for longer. The HDD LED blinks only once. During hang the fan usually spins up to max as well.

I will most likely need to do this. Do you know if anyone has provided opening instructions for the Z13? I tried looking around and found a great guide for the prior model, but not this one.

Do I need to use RAID mode? The only reason I switched to AHCI mode was because I couldn't get TrueCrypt full-disk encryption to work on my machine; during pre-test the laptop would hang at the "Loading Windows" screen - I figured since I was no longer using the SSDs in RAID mode, I could switch to AHCI.

 

Could you explain the reason why TrueCrypt didn't work on your computer with default settings? It's important to me as well because I have a RAID system too.

For encryption matters, you could use the Windows 7 Ultimate built-in Bitlocker encryption, couldn't you?

 

Short answer is that I have no idea why. When I first got my VPCZ1390S I was able to do full-disk encryption with no problems - and then in the past year I haven't been able to - upon pre-test it hangs at the "Windows Loading" screen. Recently I decided to tackle the problem more, and I asked fruitlessly on the TrueCrypt forums and IRC channel (EVERYONE associated to these two places are USELESS). I thought it may have been my BIOS being updated but I couldn't confirm because I couldn't remember. Then I tried flashing the BIOS and changing to AHCI mode which seemed to work, but I also wiped the second SSD which was fully-encrypted. Possibly, the fact that I was trying to do full-disk encryption while another disk was also encrypted could've caused a problem...? I can't confirm. >_<

I could, but TrueCrypt seems to be the best solution around; it's been fully-audited and is open-source, too. Edit: I should add that Bitlocker is only good for users of Win 7 Ultimate.

If you have more questions about it I can respond to you in PM - I don't want to take this thread too much off-topic

 

So what's the problem, don't you have Windows 7 Ultimate?

 

I resolved the problem! I removed the SSDs, successfully changed the BIOS setting from AHCI to RAID, then reinstalled Windows.

Furthermore, I now have TrueCrypt working - I had to make sure I had video drivers installed first, otherwise it was doing a variation of the problems I explained earlier.

My question now is, why must RAID mode be always selected and not AHCI mode? Also, what kind of settings can be taken advantage of with this unlocked BIOS that would improve/enhance operation of my VAIO?

Thanks for the help!

 

hi all
please help me i want to try this this procedure to get more option available in bios menu
i have vaio vpcz115 with bios r3031c3
but i am confuse about :
perform "Fla dump.rom /g" process to extract the rom
- perform "Fla new.rom /f" process to write back the patched rom
the questions are where i can find that file, i mean fla and rom files?
any help will appreciate
thanks all

 

fla is flash-it (remove the dash)

You dump the rom file from your laptop, use python and the script to patch it and then write back the patched file. The python script "advanced_menu.py " is in "advanced_menu.zip" at the bottom of the first post.

 

thank you namaiki
i already have followed the procedure Do the patching:

- Reboot the Z to the USB key.
- Choose default boot options
- Switch to drive C: (cd C - this is not your hard drive but FreeDOS ramdisk
- perform "Fla dump.rom /g" process to extract the rom
- copy the dump.rom file to the App directory in the Python folder
- Reboot to Windows
- Switch to command prompt on the USB key, in the python directory and do the "python advanced_menu.py dump.rom new.rom" command

after do the "python advanced_menu.py dump.rom new.rom" command
i got error message " syntax error on line 10 "
in advanced_menu.py i see line 10 is "PATCH_VARIABLE = u"Setup"

what is the sollution?
thanks

first of all i want to thank for all especially psyq321 and namaiki
finally i succes in mod bios thanks again
@edit 2 - For even more advanced options (Overclocking, undervolting!!!) it is needed to disassemble setup executable to figure out where are those items stored. They are definitely inside the setup, but are not accessible even with this unlock.
and i want more experience with overclocking and undervolting
it is needed to disassemble setup executable

which file should be disassemble?
any help will be appreciated
thank you

 

Just in case, I open successfuly the Advanced Menue on Sony VGN-TT (rom R3061M4) using the instructions from the first page. The parameters are the same as for "old Z": VSS_OFFSET = 0x3b0048, PATCH_OFFSET = 0x25a

 

Hello out there to everyone who like me owns a Sony Vaio. I recently purchased a ViDock 4 Plus and am hoping that because I have InSyde H20 Bios that this Bios hack will work for me despite my Vaio being of a lower model and is not a Vaio Z. I have the VPCS132GX Laptop. I've been looking all over for solutions and from what I can tell I need a hacked bios similar to this one to fully disable my iGPU and allow the detection of my eGPU. I have a nVidia 560ti 448 Cores mounted into the ViDock 4 Plus and have already installed nVidia Optimus and PhysX. I also paid for and downloaded Setup1.x hoping that would detect my eGPU but so far it does not. Is there any chance that this Bios hack will work on my Sony Vaio since they are both InSyde H20 Bios? My computer currently still detects the ViDock 4 Plus as a Generic USB HUB rather than a VGA Display Adapter.

 

Hello everybody,

Looking for a hack of the new vaio SVZ BIOS.
I've dumped my BIOS and anonymised it.
You can download it from here : www.flyover.fr/DUMP_anonymised.ROM

Maybe pyro can do something ?

Thanks.

 

Quick question...is the latest Fla utility the one on page 9 of this thread? Downloaded it but looks like it was created in 2009 so wasn't sure if there was a later version.

 

Hi,

this worked perfectly for me.

- Added FreeDOS with YUMI to my Multiboot USB
- Dumped the original BIOS (newer version)
- Edited it with PortablePython and the script from the first post
- Flashed the resulting file to BIOS

Mostly straight forward. Lots of hardly understandable options. I severely changed the fan settings to stop it from altering the fan speed all the time, doesn't work too well but it's far better than before. All in all I'm absolutely pleased with the results.

Thanks guys!

 

HELP!

I have successfully patched the BIOS off my VPCZ1390X using the instructions at http://computercowboy.com/VAIO/VPC-Z1/BIOS_Hack/ and changed the settings in the Advanced menu to match the three images on this page.

However I am attempting to install the latest NVidia drivers for this card 306.97-notebook-win8-win7-winvista-64bit-international-whql.exe by first modifying it with the Patch.exe 3rd gen downloaded at http://forum.notebookreview.com/sony/602497-latest-vpc-z1-330m-drivers-bios-hack-people.html.

The driver files seem to be successfully changed. When I begin the install the NVidia driver no longer quits before it starts going saying that a compatible device hasn't been found. It actually gets to the first part of the driver installation and goes for maybe 5% of the progress bar before the install screen stops and the installation quits.

I am running Windows 8 Enterprise Edition on the Sony VPCZ1390X.

Right now I am downloading the 285 Beta drivers from the page with the bios hack referenced in this article to see if that will load.

Any help getting the latest 306.97 driver to install is much appreciated.

Thank you!

 

Just a wild guess but in Windows 8 you need to reboot with signature enforcement disabled before you can install the driver (because you've modified the inf).

 

Thanks to psyq321 and others who contributed, I was able to get the advanced menu unlocked. My main motivation was to get faster boot speed, so it was a little disappointing to find that fast boot, quiet boot or EUFI boot options are not available. I did disable legacy USB, but can't really tell if the boot process is actually faster.

Some details:

VGN-Z17GN, running Windows 8 Professional
BIOS version R2171M3
Had to edit advanced_menu.py:
VSS_OFFSET = 0x3B0048
PATCH_OFFSET = 0x25A
Had trouble booting from the USB key - the Default boot options did nothing - had to select fdos then safe boot option.


Didn't see any errors so went ahead and flashed new.rom. :thumbsup:

 

psyq321,

If I wanted to try out Quick Boot, etc, how would I go about finding the right value for PATCH_OFFSET? I noticed that different BIOS versions have different $VSS offset values - I found $VSS using a hex editor, but can't see "Boot" anywhere, perhaps the strings are encoded? Thanks in advance

 

I'm trying to flash my VPC-Z226GG (south east asia mdoel) linux way but i dont get this

" 2. Insyde Fla utility (replace 1 with i in the fla, as this forum has very strong filter)"

where do i find this?? i just don't see it.


apart from what i mentioned above will I need to make some changes to advanced_menu.py?

thanks in advance

 

The name of the utility is Flash-it.exe without the '-'. The forum doesn't like it when the two words are run together as the last 4 letters of the name then become a disallowed word. Other people have tried to explain it by writing F-l-a-s-h-i-t.

 

OK i used parted magic to "python advanced_menu.py old.rom new.rom" without error and my new.rom was created

i then did a

fla.exe new.rom /all /c

downloaded from http://forums.mydigitallife.info/threads/529-Bios-Tools?p=476033&viewfull=1#post476033

which succeeded..... however there were absolutely no changes in the bios menu. whats wrong?


backup.rom:

new.rom:

i did a comparison between backup.rom and new.rom and there's a part that was 00 which is now 01

what could be wrong?

 

Hi all,
Sorry to bud into this thred.
Has anybody tried to this on a Vaio Z 2012 SVZ13 yet? I want my Bios to be free as well. I want to change some items in the Bios. I have read that if you want to boot UFI from a USB Drive you need to specifty that in the BIOS
I tried to Fresh Install Windows 8 in UFI mode but my system does not want to boot from the USB installtion disk. Anybody has any suggestions?

 

actually if there's an advanced menu, but just a few options -- AHCI options, is there something that i need to add?

 

The BIOS patching worked great for me on a French Sony Vaio VPCZ13A7E. Thanks a lot.
Sebastien

 

Just discovered this thread - this looks pretty awesome. Are there suggested mods to do? I see C7 being enabled, hyperthreading turned off; is there any real-life benefit to this? Have people seen significantly improved battery life with those two settings?

I also see AHCI becoming available: does this help with the TRIM situation on the SSDs (use software RAID in Windows after?) - or better leave it alone?

Thanks!

 

This won't bring significant batt life improvement nor performance improvement.

Leave the ahci setting alone it will break your raid array, if you activate ide mode you will brick your laptop (need to disconnect the ssds to get past bios screen). I have done a new hack that activates trim in raid, still testing, will release in the next few days.