Lenovo Y580 / Y480 'unlocked' BIOS versions

[parmdhoot]

This is all okay, you have write access. Make sure you type the flash command correctly. Check the first post.

You are right, It was a error when i was typing in the commands. But now here is a complete overview of the issues.

Update:

I am able to update the bios with the V801fix.rom once the update is completed I run into boot up problems. The only way I can boot up is by holding the power button down for 30 seconds and removing the battery.

This is what happened:

I made the backup of the current bios

A applied the fix to my backupbios.bin

I flashed the new file that was created (V801fix.rom) to my bios.

I CTRL + ALT + DEL my system to restart and set defaults in the bios (last time I did not do this the system did not boot up)

Once the system starts to boot I entered the BIOS screen. I set the bios to default setting and then reviewed all the settings to see if they were correct. Then I saved and exited the bios and got the system to boot. Everything is good so far. Then I shut the system down and ran into the same problems

I booted the system and it worked! Then I knew that I should attempt to shutdown to see what would happen.

I shutdown the computer and then attempted to boot it back up. This is when the problem kicks in. The keyboard lights up, the CD-rom drive makes some noise, the screen does not light up at all. Last time this happened I attempted to connect to a external monitor and that did not work either.

What works is placing the USB dos drive that was created into the same port when you flashed, then removing the battery, and disconnecting the power.

Then I pushed the power button for 30 seconds, while continuing to hold the power button I connected the power supply for 30 seconds. I got a Lenovo screen for a few seconds and immediately pressed F12 to boot back into DOS and restore the backupbios.bin that was created.

I can send you my backup bios to see if their is something wrong with my original bios.

[En-TACT]

Hey guys, I've been out of the loop for awhile from this site and reading some of these last posts there's a working whitelist BIOS for the v8.01???? ..I'll have to go back several posts ad catchup!

[svl7]

I have no idea, if your system booted up well after flashing, then it can't really be related with the bios image. Do you have any 3rd party hardware running in your system?

[parmdhoot]

I have no idea, if your system booted up well after flashing, then it can't really be related with the bios image. Do you have any 3rd party hardware running in your system?

It only boots as long as i dont shut the system down completely. I sent you a PM-Email that contains a BIOS Dump if you want to look at it. Otherwise its ok. I just sucks how it works for everyone else lol.

Thanks for everything so far!

- - - Updated - - -

I do have a SSD installed?

[svl7]

I'll look at it, but it will take a while, as mentioned here previously, need to get my main system back running.

Seeing that the mod and procedure seems to work flawlessly for everyone else I'm a bit lost... that's why I was asking about the hardware. But since I didn't change anything related to Sata a 3rd party SSD shouldn't really matter. You flahed v8.01... I assume you had stock v8.01 pre-installed, right? Else that could be the cause of your issues.

[parmdhoot]

I feel so stupid. I had bios version V8.00 5DCN89WW .

How do i get V8.01?

Thank you,

[svl7]

Well, here we have the reason... I assume that v8.01 uses a different EC which apparently is necessary. Since we currently can't flash the EC without any hardware mods you can't get v8.01 until Lenovo posts an official update on their driver site. (I described all this somewhere at the beginning of the first post I think). I can unlock v8.00 if you send me your original backup. But it will take a while until I get to mod it, as explained previously.

[parmdhoot]

Thank you SVl7,

I have sent you my original BIOS Dump via email. Thank you so much.

Take care,

[elcaballo]

Thank you very much svl7 for the Error 104 fix and the BIOS mod. I didn't flash my BIOS yet, but I was able to back it up with no problem (after disabling my anti-virus) with the fix.

I will flash my BIOS after the week-end probably and will get you some beers for sure =)

Good luck with your SSD, I hope Intel will replace it even though it will not bring your data back.

[Tmsmith]

You need to disconnect all storage cables except dvd/pendrive and ur ssd.

Yea, I remove my 2.5" drive every time I try to attempt an install.

I was able to do this in the original BIOS. All you need to do is under Boot you change Boot Mode from UEFI to Legacy Support. You also should change Boot Priority from UEFI First to Legacy First

Yes, I've tried this too. Legacy or UEFI, my msata does not boot. I have no clue what to do about it. I've been working on this since mid-december and I can't boot to msata on my windows 8 y580. Trust me, name it I've tried it. I've got no reason to believe I need to RMA the drive and at the same time, I'm not interested in trying to send my laptop to lenovo for a month on top of the fact I don't have a clue what specifically to tell them is wrong. I've been using the windows 8 iso on both usb and cd. I clean and convert to gpt in diskpart. Installer partitions and installs on my msata but loops back to cd/usb on boot. I remove the CD/usb, and modify the boot order so that I boot legacy on my SSD because it doesn't show a UEFI boot option AS IT SHOULD. Attempting to boot results in a black screen. No blue screen, no OS logo, nothing. I reinstall and reboot my 2.5" drive and the msata drive shows system partitions and system files installed.

[En-TACT]

Yea, I remove my 2.5" drive every time I try to attempt an install.

Yes, I've tried this too. Legacy or UEFI, my msata does not boot. I have no clue what to do about it. I've been working on this since mid-december and I can't boot to msata on my windows 8 y580. Trust me, name it I've tried it. I've got no reason to believe I need to RMA the drive and at the same time, I'm not interested in trying to send my laptop to lenovo for a month on top of the fact I don't have a clue what specifically to tell them is wrong. I've been using the windows 8 iso on both usb and cd. I clean and convert to gpt in diskpart. Installer partitions and installs on my msata but loops back to cd/usb on boot. I remove the CD/usb, and modify the boot order so that I boot legacy on my SSD because it doesn't show a UEFI boot option AS IT SHOULD. Attempting to boot results in a black screen. No blue screen, no OS logo, nothing. I reinstall and reboot my 2.5" drive and the msata drive shows system partitions and system files installed.

Thank you svl7 for all your hard work into this! I'll def. buy you a beer.. but I can't flash it! I'm having a similar issue too booting to USB. Because I get Error 28, I have to run PRR in DOS. Placed all files in USB, then the BIOS boot settings;

Boot Mode > Legacy Support

Boot Priority > Legacy First

USB Boot > Enabled

Reboot, and system idles/flickers at the "Lenovo" splash screen. I reboot again hit F12 at Lenovo splash screen and get this:

"System doesn't have any USB boot option. Please select other boot option in boot Manager menu."

jovian, what steps did you take to boot in USB? Does it matter which USB port? What files did you have on your USB stick?

[Tmsmith]

Thank you svl7 for all your hard work into this! I'll def. buy you a beer.. but I can't flash it! I'm having a similar issue too booting to USB. Because I get Error 28, I have to run PRR in DOS. Placed all files in USB, then the BIOS boot settings;

Boot Mode > Legacy Support

Boot Priority > Legacy First

USB Boot > Enabled

Reboot, and system idles/flickers at the "Lenovo" splash screen. I reboot again hit F12 at Lenovo splash screen and get this:

"System doesn't have any USB boot option. Please select other boot option in boot Manager menu."

jovian, what steps did you take to boot in USB? Does it matter which USB port? What files did you have on your USB stick?

I'm not sure why you qouted me. Anyway those settings are fine for booting a usb. Did you format the usb with utility provided in the first post?

[En-TACT]

I'm not sure why you qouted me. Anyway those settings are fine for booting a usb. Did you format the usb with utility provided in the first post?

Format the USB with which utility? I formatted the USB from Windows, and then added the following files: fparts, fpt, prr, v801.rom. How should I do it?

[elcaballo]

Does it matter which USB port?

I don't know if it will solve the problem, but maybe try the USB port next to the power plug. I know that when I was using PING (Partimage Is Not Ghost), I had to plug my hard drive in this port for it to be recognized. It could make sense since it is the only USB 2.0 port.

[svl7]

Format the USB with which utility? I formatted the USB from Windows, and then added the following files: fparts, fpt, prr, v801.rom. How should I do it?

You need to create an USB drive that can boot DOS. There's a tutorial in the first post.

[DeathBringer]

I need to fix the whitelist stuff in the 2.0x bios, there's one more thing I need to tweak. Will do when got my main system working again, my SSD died...

alright then. thanks for the reply. hope you get your main system up and running again soon. SSDs should be quite reliable...

[Edmar]

Hey!

I've recently bought the Y580 and wanted to use the Nvidia card with linux. Due to the lack of support from nvidia for optimus i wanted to disable the intel GPU and let the nvidia the only one available... So i updated by bios with the version linked in the first message of this thread. Everything worked fine. The question was: how can i disable the intel card without messing up the whole system...

I wrote down the key sequence in the bios to do a factory reset (left, 4x down, 4x enter)... then i played a little with the video settings...

In the section Primary Display i switched between SG (switchable graphics) and PEG (nvidia card) but i didn't seem to get the intel card disabled and the nvidia enabled. I selected PCI and rebootet. The system never came up again. I tried to do a factory reset but it didn't respond... seems like i briked it, huh?

i disassembled the top and desoldered the bios battery - no success... this seems to be a severe problem. Does anyone has some hints?

[svl7]

Sorry to hear this... the disabling of the Intel HD has been discussed in this thread, it wont work, that's hardware related. Also I somewhere mentioned that it's a bad idea to choose PCI...

Next thing you should try is the Insyde bios recovery, but I'm not sure whether it is implemented in the Lenovo systems... worth a try though I'd say. If that doesn't work you'll need to send in your system, or replace your bios chip with a new one.

[jovian]

Thank you svl7 for all your hard work into this! I'll def. buy you a beer.. but I can't flash it! I'm having a similar issue too booting to USB. Because I get Error 28, I have to run PRR in DOS. Placed all files in USB, then the BIOS boot settings;

Boot Mode > Legacy Support

Boot Priority > Legacy First

USB Boot > Enabled

Reboot, and system idles/flickers at the "Lenovo" splash screen. I reboot again hit F12 at Lenovo splash screen and get this:

"System doesn't have any USB boot option. Please select other boot option in boot Manager menu."

jovian, what steps did you take to boot in USB? Does it matter which USB port? What files did you have on your USB stick?

After pluggin in the USB stick I then had to go into bios and put the stick up to the top of the boot order. I seem to have to do this every time I remove the stock from the y580.

[En-TACT]

After pluggin in the USB stick I then had to go into bios and put the stick up to the top of the boot order. I seem to have to do this every time I remove the stock from the y580.

Thank you svl7 ..enjoy that beer!

Problem was the USB stick. Bought a new one, format it with DOS, ran PRR from C:> and executed fpt -f... the 6205 is working flawlessly!

[svl7]

Well, what can I say... thank you very much for the beers! Glad to see it working!

[darius456]

I have a very serious problem with my wifi network. I have a router ASUS RTn66u, which gives the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz simultaneously. I have no problems to connect to the router in the 5GHz band, but the 2.4 GHz band can not connect. I have at home a few other devices that use the 2.4 GHz band and I have no problems with their communications. All devices except Y580 connect seamlessly with the router on the 2.4 GHz band. I have unlocked the BIOS version from the first post version 2.06. The problem occurs both with the Intel 6200 and Intel 6300. None of these cards is able to connect to the network at 2.4 GHz. When I tried to connect to the network using 2.4 GHz intel card 2200 (original from Y580) everything was fine. I wonder if any of you have a similar problem. Earlier I do not tried to connect to the 2.4 GHz network so the problem I discovered today. I wonder if there is any chance that it is the fault of the BIOS. I would add that both 6200 and 6300 cards working fine on my second laptop (HP). I will be grateful for any feedback.

Today I tried to connect to 2,4GHz network using intel 5100 wifi card taken from HP laptop. The card isn't broken - 100% fully operational because it is working 2,4GHz and 5GHz on HP.

So there is something wrong... have no idea what.

[Edmar]

Sorry to hear this... the disabling of the Intel HD has been discussed in this thread, it wont work, that's hardware related. Also I somewhere mentioned that it's a bad idea to choose PCI...

Next thing you should try is the Insyde bios recovery, but I'm not sure whether it is implemented in the Lenovo systems... worth a try though I'd say. If that doesn't work you'll need to send in your system, or replace your bios chip with a new one.

Hi,

i did a insyde bios recovery. I used andy's tool to get the filename for recovery. pressed [ fn ]+[ B ] (press it the whole time) connected the ac and pressed the power button... the fan will spin up, the system beginns to beep periodically and after some time (maybe 2, 3 minues) it shuts down. Then the bios is restored.

Thanks svl7 for the hint!

[svl7]

@Edmar: Which keys did you need to press? I assume you put the required key combo in such brackets < >, that's why they don't show up in your post... <fds></fds>

[elcaballo]

Flashed my BIOS yesterday and it went very well. Followed the instructions of the first post and everything went very smoothly. I didn't test yet with my Intel 6300 but will do that very soon. I have no doubt it will work =)

Thank you svl7 for your work =)