Inspiron 1525 - Get WOL and ...

[tjm]

Hi,

I've got an old Dell Inspiron 1525, with a broken keyboard and battery that I'm planning on freeing from it's case and placing in a custom built box to use as an HTPC.

The BIOS i'm currently using can be found here.

I really need wake on LAN working but it's not available in the bios although I know my NIC supports it.

I also will be removing the laptop screen and running exclusively from an external monitor, the problem here is that the external monitor doesn't get initialised until the operating system starts booting, so with the laptop monitor removed I would never be able to get back into the bios again. I need the monitor to be initialised as soon as the computer boots. (I wasn't quite sure how to explain what I wanted here in a few words, hence the "..." in the title).

Would either of these be possible to achieve? Any help would be greatly appreciated as I'm quite excited to get started on this project.

Thanks, T.

[1234s282]

Please post a bios download link however Dell use their own unique format which we dont have any tools to unlock settings for unless the 1525 is one of those few models that we can mod. Most use a Dell Phoenix bios which is not the same as a Phoenix bios. The occassional few use Award bioses but apart from that we cant mod Dells to unlock hidden options

Sorry
Admin

[tjm]

Thanks for your reply. Thats a shame, but I'll keep my fingers crossed.
The BIOS download link is in my original post, it is: http://support.us.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=gen&releaseid=R246843&formatcnt=0&libid=0&typeid=-1&dateid=-1&formatid=-1&source=-1&fileid=358934

EDIT. Just to let you know, I decided to get started anyway and have removed the screen from the laptop. It seems that if the screen is unplugged it will go to the external monitor straight away without any BIOS modification. So it's just WOL that I really need.

[TheWiz]

Hi tjm,

Please run a BIOS backup dump for me:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1525839/Programs...Backup.EXE

Thanks,
TheWiz

[tjm]

Hi The Wiz,

That's a little tricky I'm afraid, the computer is currently a lone motherboard that I can boot from a usb stick! Even if I did have everything up and running I run linux, so wouldn't be able to run that program. Is there a way I can get what your looking for under linux that you know of? What does the BIOS backup dump give you? Are you looking for the .hdr file? I can give you a link to that as soon as I get plugged back in to get the system ID. If that wasn't what you were after at all, sorry, I'm just getting my head around these things.

While I'm here I'll also say, it seems the IR receiver has been locked out as well. I wasn't even sure I had one, I know some of the 1525's shipped with remotes and some didn't - mine didn't and I've never worried about it 'til now, but it definitely looks like theres a receiver on the motherboard but the OS doesn't detect it, so I'm guessing that's been turned off somewhere too.

[TheWiz]

Hi tjm,

I just need the raw BIOS ROM as when I try to run that dell exe you linked me to it tries to auto flash my computer.

TheWiz

[tjm]

Ah, I see how that would be a problem!

Anyway, I just tried this in a windows VM on a different machine and it outputs a .rom, hopefully it's what you need.

1525_A17.exe -writeromfile

[TheWiz]

Unfortunately this seems to be one of those BIOSes that are encased in the strange Dell format. I have tried several decompression methods for the outputted ROM with no success. If we can find something that'll crack the compression I will be able to take a look. No go with Phoenix BIOS Editor or Phoenix SLIC.

TheWiz

[tjm]

Oh OK. I guess I'll have to do without.
Thank you very much for your time and efforts though.
Keep up the good work!

[adrianp03]

After a year I come in . I same problem: Dell 1525 + want WOL on BIOS (searched all the internet, but without success.)
Can somebody please help?

Thanks.