Dell 3080 Micro BIOS dead

[tracks]

Hello all,

I have a Dell 3080 Micro with a problem. As it is right now, it seems to be boot looping, maybe... There's no output, just fan on and power led lights up and blinks off every 2 seconds or so.
Previous owner told me he bought it with a BIOS password, he tried to use a CH341A programmer with some random test clip and tried to mess with it while it was powered on. Now it won't boot.

I tried to dump the bios with an EZP2023+ but I can't get a consistent read. Every time the dump is different, so it's unusable. I think the BIOS chip is fried.

I have a replacement BIOS chip, but can't seem to find a proper generic BIOS image file. Whatever I found at Dell is just 24MB where the chip is 32MB. I'm guessing it's just an update, not a full image.

Since I have no available dump, can anyone please point me to a full image I could use? Or can I just use one of the many 'password-cleaned' images on the forum?

I'm trying not to kill this board, so I'd rather make sure I have a proper image before replacing the chip. I don't have the best tools or smd soldering experience so I'm trying to minimize the damage

Thanks in advance for any help!

[SMDFlea]

I tried to dump the bios with an EZP2023+ but I can't get a consistent read. Every time the dump is different, so it's unusable. I think the BIOS chip is fried.

https://www.badcaps.net/forum/troubl...28#post1622428
1.1.1.5. EZP2019 ,EZP2019+ ,EZP2020 ,EZP2023 ,EZP2025
Supports I2C (24-series), SPI (25-series), 93-series.
Support list: https://www.hklrf.com/wap/Download.html?styleid=&page=1
Add chip support to EZP2019, EZP2019+, EZP2020, EZP2023, EZP2025 https://www.badcaps.net/forum/troubl...ro-programmers

Note: Auto-detection may not work properly for 8Mb and larger ROMs, it is recommended to select the part number manually. In addition, if there are errors when reading and writing, try to lower the speed.

[tracks]

Thanks SMDFlea, I already saw those threads, I've been using the EZP for over a year now and I'm aware of the limitations. But I have a new flash IC to replace it and if I try to write and verify, it's good every time. The original chip is messed up and spitting out random garbage at every read... None of the dumps can be opened by UEFI tools or anything else.

In the meantime I asked a friend with a T48 to read the original chip and he got the same useless dumps, so it's not my EZP's fault.

So I'm stuck with a blank [new] chip and looking for a complete image I can flash onto it.

If I use one of the many clean BIOSes I can find around here, will that create any problems for anyone? As I understand it, after flashing it should go in factory mode so I can set the correct service tag.


LE I tried to extract an image from the official Dell BIOS downloads, extracted [following this and a couple of other threads] only to end up with a 24MB file so that's clearly not complete...

[tracks]

So I got the machine working... I flashed a Winbond replacement chip [instead of the Macronix it came with] with an image I found for the W25Q256* and the system booted. I set the Service Tag, disabled Absolute, did other normal settings, exited manufacturer mode.

BUT, when I power it up, it takes about 25 seconds until I get an image. After that everything seems to work as intended. Debian, Windows, FreeBSD all work. There are no errors in the system logs [bios], everything looks good. Post behavior setup doesn't matter, this is all before video is initialized. Installed latest BIOS from software, all looks good but having the same delay.

Does anyone know why the long startup time?

[tracks]

Turns out the problem was a mismatched ME region in the BIOS. Now it works properly, no weird delay at boot, all components are running fine, no problem with any devices, Windows key or whatever.

In my case, with the Dell 3080 Micro running on the Comet Lake-V platform, I had to find an Intel ME 14.5 generic image.

If anyone out there needs them, I attached the ME image and the FIT tool that I used to fix my machine. I am not responsible for any outcome of your using these files, I did not make them, they just worked for me. You are solely responsible if you break anything using these files.

All you need to do is:

- open the donor full BIOS dump in FIT
- go to 'Flash Layout' -> 'ifwi: Intel (R) Me and PmcRegion' -> 'Intel(R) ME Binary File' and select the new, generic ME image file
- go to the Build menu -> Build

That's it for the ME region. Just flash the generated image to the chip with a programmer [can't be flashed from software... I tried ].

At first boot go into the BIOS, set the Service Tag, disable Absolute, any other settings you like, save and exit. After it restarts use Alt-F to exit manufacturing mode and it's all done.

My donor dump was running on BIOS 2.2.1, but after all the changes I just installed 2.29.0 from the Dell support site and it upgraded all the components. No complaints from the Dell tool, now I'm on the latest version and it's running great.