Recovery of VOYO V1 VMac Mini PC

[Learnincurve]

Hi,

  I just bought one of these:

http://www.gearbest.com/tv-box-mini-pc/pp_606551.html

based on Apollo Lake 3450 and with AMI /APTIO EFI ("BIOS").

  Within a day I had managed to brick it by trying to flash a "BIOS" upgrade from the Voyo support site:


http://en.myvoyo.com/xiazai/MINI%20PC/VM...I_PC/down/

file is at:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/fso1ebq6kfsfbyj/AM01.rar?dl=0


I have tried the regular AMI recovery workflow, renaming bin file to AMIBOOT.ROM on a USB stick and:

1. Plugging in the USB, leaving the system to find the file and waiting
2. Plugging in the USB, pressing HOME to force the system to find the file and waiting
3.  Plugging in the USB, pressing CTRL+HOME to force the system to find the file and waiting.

  None of these have worked for me. 

when I try to recover:

If I use a USB pen with builtin LED, I notice that the LED starts to flash quickly as soon as it is plugged into the powered USB 3 socket, but the flashing doesn't change at all when I power on the system using the power switch.  There is no onboard beeper and no other LED's apart from the system LED which illuminates as soon as I press the power button. The "system" (if it can be called that in its current state) can also be turned off again by pressing and holding the power button. Apart from this LED, there is no other indication that anything is going on in the system. The UEFI interface does not come up when I press ESC (the normal key). No boot menu when I press F7. No other screen activity.

I tried using the AMI MOD Tool v. 1.45 to find the magic recovery file name, but when I run it against the bin file from the support site, it is not recognised as an AMI bios.

It would be really fantastic if someone could analyse the bin file from the URL above and see if there is a way to find the magic file name and key combination to load it.

  best regards

Marius

[imago]

I'm in the same boat..   6 months and no reply from voyojack.  anything?

[Learnincurve]

Hi Imogo, Thanks for your reply here and mail. Here's what I know so far:

 There is no software recovery route for these boards.
The original w25q64fwsig eprom needs to be reflashed using a 1.8v programmer. I used a cheap combination of a CH341a programmer and 1.8v adapter, both readily available from ebay. The proprietary windows software for both of them is quite flaky and needs to be found (I can help you with that), but there is a reliable tool called "flashrom" available for Linux, which gives you better control and debugging information.
Due to surrounding circuitry, the chip needs to be flashed off-board, which means you need to very carefully unsolder it, without physically damaging the pins, or heat-damaging the chip itself, flash it and carefully resolder. Luckily I had help from a friend who is an electronics engineer.

Only the original chips can be successfully re-flashed. We bought and flashed some identical, new chips, but the boards still failed to boot after successfully flashing the same efi that worked on the original chips. It seems that VOYO have included some once-only code that can not be read, cleared or replaced using a programmer.

Interesting what you said about the efi code not being AMI. I wonder what they have done and if anyone at the forum could analyse it and make a genuine, AMI EFI that could be flashed to a fresh chip and booted??

Good luck with your board and let me know if I can help.


Marius

[Gorbush]

I concur that it is the best practice not to try flashing BIOS inside VOYO device. Or at least try to disable forced flash beforehand. Remove /y parameter in UEFI nsh file or /f switch inside Windows bat file. That might save your skin when you read warning text displayed in yellow hue.

[Learnincurve]

Hi,

  I have a VOYO V1 mini PC, also known as Vmac mini.

There is a so-called "Linux-unlocked" EFI formware for this pc (attached), that I have installed on my device.

 Examining the fw file in AMIBCP Version 5.01.0014, I can trace the opened Setup options through the following tree:

"Setup"                               - 0x0014  (Displayed, Access/Use= "Default") -> 
"Chipset"                             - 0x002D (Displayed, Access/Use= "Default")  ->
"South Cluster Configuration" - 0x05CC (Displayed, Access/Use= "Default") ->
"Miscellaneous Configuration" - 0x0685 (Displayed, Access/Use= "Default") ->
"Wake On Lan"                     - 0x0515  (Displayed, set Disabled by default)

From that, I understand that the option should be available to me in the EFI UI, but when I look on the PC, everything from "South Cluster Configuration" and down is hidden.

*Would anyone be able to take a look at the file and let me know why I am not able to access these options?
*Is there any magic key combination that I can use to access the rest of the settings that are not showing but set as "Show"=Yes, "Access/Use"="Default" in the fw?

[FabioBiz]

Hello, I bricked my VOYO Vmac Mini V1 using the Windows tool, I know you had the same problem, how did you fix it? Thank you.

[FabioBiz]

PS: I tried everything suggested here, but the stand alone programmer. I will do it if necessary, but I guess I need a working BIOS file. I had flashed, via Windows 10, AM01_102A_720.bin, and it bricked the VOYO, so I guess the file is bad or incompatible? Where do I find the file of the original BIOS?

[Learnincurve]

Hi Fabio,
It has been a while now, so I can't remember exactly what I did and whether there was any success, but I think the original EFI chip had to be unsoldered and re-flashed with the default image, then re-soldered. I tried ordering new chips and flashing those, but there was a region that couldn't be flashed, so that failed.

Voyo gave no useful support at all.

In the end I wrecked the board and gave up.

[FabioBiz]

Hello, thank you very much for your prompt reply, it's much appreciated and I didn't even put many hopes in it to the honest. Smiles.

I had setup this little PC (that has been sitting on a drawer for years, due to faulty nVME, that I replaced) to make it a low power webserver (with my own custom code), and it was perfect for that. I even managed to install Windows 10 without the original image (by the way, do you have the drivers and OS images? The website doesn't exist anymore and the file have been deleted also from dropbox it pointed to), too bad that I bricked it in the attempt to upgrade the BIOS and start using it.

I just ordered a CH341A programmer with 1.8V adapter, but I need the original BIOS file, and I can't find it, besides AM01_102A_720.bin, but it was the one that bricked my VOYO VMac Mini V1 (N3450), so I guess the file is bad or incompatible? Where do I find the file of the original BIOS?

Or could it be that the file works well, but needs to be programmed by the CH341A and not via Windows?

Thanks a lot for your support.

Cheers.

[Learnincurve]

I did find this archive on my hard drive, which you are welcome to try.  I don't know if it is the original and can unfortunately not remember any more about the process, as it was so long ago.  Good luck!