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14" Dell Latitude E6430 - Performance Upgrades and System Mods


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On 12/28/2016 at 4:27 AM, Oleksii_S said:

I try to flash the same bin files (which i got early). I receive Error 280: Failed to disable write protection for the BIOS space! Error from FPT.

How I can remove this protection?

 

Timohour figured out that it's variable 0x40 in the IFR. You can disable it using the NVRAM editor tool. Once you disable it it stays disabled permanently unless manually re-enabled.

 

If you don't already have the NVRAM editor I linked the post with it below:

 

 

The download link is the link with "brain" in the URL.

 

On 12/29/2016 at 10:03 AM, Oleksii_S said:

Has any one BIOS for Latitude E6530 version A13? Need help. I am stock on A12 ver. I try to re programm bios with programmer and i have got nothing. I have Laptop with nvs5200m.

 

You usually can't directly flash downloaded BIOS files with a programmer. What are you trying to do?

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  • 2 weeks later...

Managed to display the hidden settings by exchanging the address of an existing menu item with the debug form. However, there is nothing new. All settings can already be accessed with the modified GRUB shell.

IMG_20170113_163710.jpg

Edited by xsmile
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  • 3 weeks later...
On 13/1/2017 at 9:15 PM, xsmile said:

Managed to display the hidden settings by exchanging the address of an existing menu item with the debug form. However, there is nothing new. All settings can already be accessed with the modified GRUB shell.

IMG_20170113_163710.jpg


yes but that way it is easier. How did you enable this menu? Maybe there is a way to enable other menus like the core ratio one.

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First of all - there has been a minor bug with the menu visible. The fancy BIOS menu reachable via F2 did not render this section correctly and froze upon saving setting. A manual reboot was necessary but the changes were saved. The textual BIOS menu reachable with F12 didn't have this issue.

 

You are right about the convenience. Settings in this menu display all possible options in a human readable form and you don't have to deal with hexadecimal numbers.

 

Here is a quick walkthrough. I recommend against trying this if you don't have an external programmer for recovery purposes.


You need following tools:
UEFITool 0.21.5 by CodeRush

Universal IFR Extractor by donovan6000

Flash Programming Tool (FPT) by Intel, part of System Tools v8

- modified GRUB shell with setup_var from the first post

- hex editor, e.g. HxD

 

1) With FPT - make a dump of your current BIOS

fptw -D bios-dump.bin -BIOS

2) With UEFITool - find the SetupPrep module containing the menu structure. Ctrl+F and search for unicode text 'SetupPrep'. It should be in module 899407D7. Extract the body of the compressed section in this module to setupprep-body.bin.

3) With IFR Extractor - parse your setupprep-body.bin and let it generate a text file.

4) The menu contains following form references in A18.

0x58669 		Ref: General, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 56 00 57 00 01 00 00 00 FF FF 00 00 80}
0x58678 		Ref: System Configuration, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 64 00 65 00 02 00 00 00 FF FF 00 02 80}
0x58687 		Ref: Video, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 66 00 66 00 03 00 00 00 FF FF 00 03 80}
0x58696 		Ref: Security, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 67 00 68 00 04 00 00 00 FF FF 00 04 80}
0x586A5 		Ref: Secure Boot, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 69 00 6A 00 05 00 00 00 FF FF 00 10 80}
0x586B4 		Ref: Performance, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 6B 00 6C 00 06 00 00 00 FF FF 00 05 80}
0x586C3 		Ref: Power Management, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 6D 00 6E 00 07 00 00 00 FF FF 00 06 80}
0x586D2 		Ref: POST Behavior, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 6F 00 70 00 08 00 00 00 FF FF 00 07 80}
0x586E1 		Ref: Virtualization Support, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 71 00 72 00 09 00 00 00 FF FF 00 08 80}
0x586F0 		Ref: Wireless, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 73 00 74 00 0A 00 00 00 FF FF 00 09 80}
0x586FF 		Ref: Maintenance, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 75 00 76 00 0B 00 00 00 FF FF 00 0A 80}
0x5870E 		Ref: System Logs, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 79 00 7A 00 0C 00 00 00 FF FF 00 0B 80}

For each reference, the last two bytes of the code visible in the curly brackets determine the ID of the form to load. General loads the form at 0x8000 (00 80), System Configuration loads 0x8002 and System Logs loads 0x800B.

 

Scroll down a bit and you find a huge form section with all the interesting settings that are hidden. It has no name but with 0x401 it has an ID, as every other form does.

0x58909 	Form: , Form ID: 0x401 {01 86 01 04 02 00}

 

Additionally search for the variable 'BIOS Lock', find its address and write it down. It should be around 0x40.

0x598A3 		Setting: BIOS Lock, Variable: 0x40

 

5) Now who needs System Logs, right? Open setupprep-body.bin in a hex editor, go to address 0x5870E (of the System Logs reference) and you should see the same byte sequence as above in the brackets.

Instead of referencing the System Logs form, let it reference the nameless form. Change the last two bytes from 0B 80 to 01 04 (0x401).

Save the modified file to setupprep-mod-body.bin.

 

6) With UEFITool - replace the body of the compressed section with your file setupprep-mod-body.bin and save the modified BIOS as bios-mod.bin.

7) With setup_var

Check the current state of the BIOS Lock variable, it should read 0x1 as in 'BIOS Lock active'. Replace <address> with the address you wrote down in step 4).

setup_var <address>

Disable the lock with:

setup_var <address> 0x0

Check the current state again to verify.

 

8) With FPT - flash the modified BIOS

ftpw -F bios-mod.bin -BIOS

9) Reboot and open the BIOS configuration menu (I don't remember the exact name) via F12. Now have a look at the System Logs :)

Edited by xsmile
more details for the hex edit part
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On 5/2/2017 at 2:55 PM, xsmile said:

First of all - there has been a minor bug with the menu visible. The fancy BIOS menu reachable via F2 did not render this section correctly and froze upon saving setting. A manual reboot was necessary but the changes were saved. The textual BIOS menu reachable with F12 didn't have this issue. ...Now have a look at the System Logs :)

 

WoW!!! Great writeup...

 

I linked that to the OP.

Edited by timohour
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hi everyone, i'm still an happy owner of a full overclocked and egpu-modded e6430.. is working great but i got two small problems:

 

sometimes, when i leave my pc without doing nothing for an half of hour, it loses the screen (black screen) the computer remains powered but on internal monitor nothing is displayed and i have to shut donw manually with power button and start another time.

 

the problem occurs both in windows and linux os

 

i've disabled also power saving but the problem sometimes come back.

 

another Small problem is that the boot is too slow for my opinion, from when i push power button until the o.s. starts to go there are many seconds, too much in my opinion for a 4 ghz super laptop, if i disconnect egpu the boot is much faster.. what can i do?

 

Thanks.

 

 

 

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  • 1 month later...

hello,

 

 

I have purchased an used dell E6430U laptop. Problem is that it has bios from E6430 (without U). I have tried the official bioses for U nad non-U versions without any luck. Always after restart nothing is changing. Is it possible to reprogramm the bios chip without removing it from the motherboard?

 

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Are there any benefits of having non U bios in an U E6430?

I can see that bluetooth module is installed but not accessible to the system. Also I can see 4 sata channels where there should be 2 and some additional battery options but there is no hardware for a docking station.

In the system I can also see accelerometer in the device manager (with an error) for free fall security, but it's impossible to install standard magnetic drive in this notebook.

So for now I can only see negative "features" but someone did it for some reason.

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On 2/29/2016 at 3:38 PM, kaberos said:

Hello,
I changed the thermal paste on my e6430 and I accidentally damaged (it's lost now) one SMD part of the GPU. Does anyone know what the component is (capacitor/resistor/something else) and what is its value?
I know I'm an idiot. :/

 

gpu.jpg

 

On 3/14/2016 at 5:24 AM, kaberos said:

40K resistor was right one. With 1K resistor, notebook was detecting GT620M, with .960 resistor notebook was detecting some Nvidia Tesla model, without resistor, notebook was detecting some audio device.

 

 

I have the same problem here. Can anyone point me in the right direction to get a 40k smd resistor?? Ebay link etc.

 

Also, would it be ok for a novice at soldering to do?

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13 hours ago, kwapster said:

 

 

I have the same problem here. Can anyone point me in the right direction to get a 40k smd resistor?? Ebay link etc.

 

Also, would it be ok for a novice at soldering to do?

 

Mouser is your best choice. Search for 40k SMD resistors. Case code is what determines the size of the resistor. Get one with a case code that looks correct. I'm thinking 1005 is correct (1.0mm long, 0.5 mm wide).

 

http://www.mouser.com/Passive-Components/Resistors/_/N-5g9n?P=1yzekikZ1yzmoub

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6 hours ago, Khenglish said:

 

Mouser is your best choice. Search for 40k SMD resistors. Case code is what determines the size of the resistor. Get one with a case code that looks correct. I'm thinking 1005 is correct (1.0mm long, 0.5 mm wide).

 

http://www.mouser.com/Passive-Components/Resistors/_/N-5g9n?P=1yzekikZ1yzmoub

 

Ok thank you but the minimum quantities for purchase are too much.:frantics:

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Hi all.

 

I'm using e6430 - i7 3720qm +400MHz turbo (A20 bios)

I had problem with RAM 2133MHz - Corsair Vengeance 2133 CL11 2x4GB (without xmp proflie...)  - notebook could not boot.

Now i run at 1333MHz and 12-12-12-36-2T timings (manual set uefi) - notebook is working fine now but slowly.

 

Is it possible to set RAM speed using uefi variable?

 

Edited by Bobson
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Hi all.

 

 

 

I'm using e6430 - i7 3720qm +400MHz turbo (A20 bios)

I had problem with RAM 2133MHz - Corsair Vengeance 2133 CL11 2x4GB (without xmp proflie...)  - notebook could not boot.

Now i run at 1333MHz and 12-12-12-36-2T timings (manual set uefi) - notebook is working fine now but slowly.

 

Is it possible to set RAM speed using uefi variable?

 

You have to use Thaiphoon Burner to set One or two xmp profile and after you can enable one of them using uefi.

 

The program is not freeware but is cheap, also a time licence will be good for your work.

You can set slower timing on xmp profile and see what will do, in case of not booting you have to pull out battery and reset your uefi setup, than change the xmp profile to something else and try..

 

The program works from windows and is pretty easy, bye.

 

Inviato dal mio Lenovo P2a42 utilizzando Tapatalk

 

 

 

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On 1/12/2016 at 6:22 PM, timohour said:

 

I never tried OSX on my E6430. Does everything work? (I currently use OSX only on my desktop)

 

Yap: http://forum.osxlatitude.com/index.php?/topic/7478-dell-latitude-e6xxxe7xxx-yosemite-install-guide/ ... and not just that version; all of them. For example: http://forum.osxlatitude.com/index.php?/topic/9717-how-to-install-sierra-to-latitude-e6430/

 

On 4/5/2017 at 0:49 PM, Horizon said:

Can I put 32GB RAM on this system? I found the CPU could support 32gigs of RAM, based on intel ARK

 

No. The chipset has support for it, but the laptop only has 2 banks instead of 4 you will find on HP EliteBook 8xxx workstation series for example.

 

BTW what does the 'paperclip OC' refer to? *edit* oh nevermind! found it in 1st post.

Edited by Rhyker2U
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On 4/14/2017 at 0:18 AM, Rhyker2U said:

 

Yap: http://forum.osxlatitude.com/index.php?/topic/7478-dell-latitude-e6xxxe7xxx-yosemite-install-guide/ ... and not just that version; all of them. For example: http://forum.osxlatitude.com/index.php?/topic/9717-how-to-install-sierra-to-latitude-e6430/

 

 

No. The chipset has support for it, but the laptop only has 2 banks instead of 4 you will find on HP EliteBook 8xxx workstation series for example.

 

BTW what does the 'paperclip OC' refer to? *edit* oh nevermind! found it in 1st post.

The laptop has 2 banks but we can do 16GB each per bank, is it still possible?

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  • 1 month later...
On 05/02/2017 at 2:55 PM, xsmile said:

First of all - there has been a minor bug with the menu visible. The fancy BIOS menu reachable via F2 did not render this section correctly and froze upon saving setting. A manual reboot was necessary but the changes were saved. The textual BIOS menu reachable with F12 didn't have this issue.

 

You are right about the convenience. Settings in this menu display all possible options in a human readable form and you don't have to deal with hexadecimal numbers.

 

Here is a quick walkthrough. I recommend against trying this if you don't have an external programmer for recovery purposes.


You need following tools:
UEFITool 0.21.5 by CodeRush

Universal IFR Extractor by donovan6000

Flash Programming Tool (FPT) by Intel, part of System Tools v8

- modified GRUB shell with setup_var from the first post

- hex editor, e.g. HxD

 

1) With FPT - make a dump of your current BIOS


fptw -D bios-dump.bin -BIOS

2) With UEFITool - find the SetupPrep module containing the menu structure. Ctrl+F and search for unicode text 'SetupPrep'. It should be in module 899407D7. Extract the body of the compressed section in this module to setupprep-body.bin.

3) With IFR Extractor - parse your setupprep-body.bin and let it generate a text file.

4) The menu contains following form references in A18.


0x58669 		Ref: General, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 56 00 57 00 01 00 00 00 FF FF 00 00 80}
0x58678 		Ref: System Configuration, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 64 00 65 00 02 00 00 00 FF FF 00 02 80}
0x58687 		Ref: Video, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 66 00 66 00 03 00 00 00 FF FF 00 03 80}
0x58696 		Ref: Security, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 67 00 68 00 04 00 00 00 FF FF 00 04 80}
0x586A5 		Ref: Secure Boot, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 69 00 6A 00 05 00 00 00 FF FF 00 10 80}
0x586B4 		Ref: Performance, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 6B 00 6C 00 06 00 00 00 FF FF 00 05 80}
0x586C3 		Ref: Power Management, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 6D 00 6E 00 07 00 00 00 FF FF 00 06 80}
0x586D2 		Ref: POST Behavior, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 6F 00 70 00 08 00 00 00 FF FF 00 07 80}
0x586E1 		Ref: Virtualization Support, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 71 00 72 00 09 00 00 00 FF FF 00 08 80}
0x586F0 		Ref: Wireless, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 73 00 74 00 0A 00 00 00 FF FF 00 09 80}
0x586FF 		Ref: Maintenance, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 75 00 76 00 0B 00 00 00 FF FF 00 0A 80}
0x5870E 		Ref: System Logs, Variable: 0xFFFF {0F 0F 79 00 7A 00 0C 00 00 00 FF FF 00 0B 80}

For each reference, the last two bytes of the code visible in the curly brackets determine the ID of the form to load. General loads the form at 0x8000 (00 80), System Configuration loads 0x8002 and System Logs loads 0x800B.

 

Scroll down a bit and you find a huge form section with all the interesting settings that are hidden. It has no name but with 0x401 it has an ID, as every other form does.


0x58909 	Form: , Form ID: 0x401 {01 86 01 04 02 00}

 

Additionally search for the variable 'BIOS Lock', find its address and write it down. It should be around 0x40.


0x598A3 		Setting: BIOS Lock, Variable: 0x40

 

5) Now who needs System Logs, right? Open the hex editor, go to address 0x5870E of the System Logs reference and you should see the same byte sequence as above in the brackets.

Instead of referencing the System Logs form, let it reference the nameless form. Change the last two bytes from 0B 80 to 01 04 (0x401).

Save the file as setupprep-mod-body.bin.

 

6) With UEFITool - replace the body of the compressed section with your file setupprep-mod-body.bin and save the modified BIOS as bios-mod.bin.

7) With setup_var

Check the current state of the BIOS Lock variable, it should read 0x1 as in 'BIOS Lock active'. Replace <address> with the address you wrote down in step 4).


setup_var <address>

Disable the lock with:


setup_var <address> 0x0

Check the current state again to verify.

 

8) With FPT - flash the modified BIOS


ftpw -F bios-mod.bin -BIOS

9) Reboot and open the BIOS configuration menu (I don't remember the exact name) via F12. Now have a look at the System Logs :)

It's not working for A20 or at least I was not able to make it work. When I choose BIOS from F12 menu I receive the following message: "Fatal Error: DellHiiHandle not set!" .  The A20 (IFR) addresses are identical with A18(IFR) but the body compressed section addresses differ in A 20 from the A18 that you posted.

Ex. In A18 the body compressed section addresses for Logs is 0x5870E just like in the main A18 IRF but in A20  the body compressed section addresses is 0x58681, different from A20 main IRF( 0x5870E).  Any advice? Thanks!

E6430A20-setup IFR.7z

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1 hour ago, twm said:

It's not working for A20 or at least I was not able to make it work. When I choose BIOS from F12 menu I receive the following message: "Fatal Error: DellHiiHandle not set!" .  [...]

This sounds like badly edited SetupPrep module. I didn't try it with A20 yet though.

 

Upload the attachment on an external site, I can't seem to access it here because of account restrictions.

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