(UEFI) Dell XPS 15z L511z modded BIOS - and HOWTO

[jkbuha]

Just out of interest - have we successfully managed to reintegrate a modified DSDT back into the Bios? There are quite a few interesting mods we could apply, especially that of default brightness under OSX for some Dell machines, but I'm not sure if that has been done?

[TimeWalker]

Just out of interest - have we successfully managed to reintegrate a modified DSDT back into the Bios? There are quite a few interesting mods we could apply, especially that of default brightness under OSX for some Dell machines, but I'm not sure if that has been done?

Nope, hasn't been done. All we get is a black screen.

Brightness in osx is controlled by the frame buffer, because if you swap ioacpifamily in lion for version from10.6 the brightness initially will be at normal level, and not half how it is right now..

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk HD

[HairyCube]

Do 3350, 3550 and 3750 also freeze on Fn+F2? If they don't, perhaps we could have a look at their DSDTs?

[TimeWalker]

3350 & 3550 have Insyde, 3750 freezes, yes.

[TimeWalker]

People over at iXBT are also cursing idiots behind EC firmware for our ITE IT8518E chips, particularly people who coded thermal table with such a high headroom.. the fan tends to run almost constantly when plugged in, even though it's obviously isn't required. This chip is not documented, I have found only engineering data of the actual hardware... nothing more than that. I recalled that for 15z thermal table got updated, according to changelog anyay.. maybe @jakbuha you could take a look at EC part of the firmware capsule to see if there are any changes to a particular block of it (it's not huge, 132Kb IRRC).

* A11 8/13/2012
1.Modified the rule of reading adapter watt.
2.Modified BIOS setup menu browser refresh interval.
3.Update thermal table v1.7f

* A05 8/16/2011
1.Can't Coldboot to USB3.0 ODD when CD/DVD is set as first boot device in BIOS setup
2.Enter S3 then flashing BIOS in Windows, it will go to S3 after shutting SUT down
3.In Win8 system Bios does not correctly implement XHCI Handoff - the update is for embedded USB3.0 controller
4.Thermal table is updated to Rev. 1.7d
5.Code change - Send out ejection SCANCODE (0xE009) when MFG_ON and ACPI_ON
6.Unused USB port #5 is disabled

[jkbuha]

Sure TW, though I'm not sure which module or offset in the main binary I should be looking at? If you have any pointers for where to look - or even a byte sequence to search for - ill get back to you with the diffs.

[TimeWalker]

Cheers. EC firmware is at offset range 00400000h – 00420FFFh inside the F33 firmware capsule, starts with a block involving "ITE Tech. Inc" unicode string. I've been lurking around recently but haven't found anything in my EC fw, changes are too dramatic to distinguish anything..

[kasar]

oh, its nice to know the EC firmware is at the BIOS upgreade, I allways felt worried since I just installed external access to the main bios/ME chip and not to the EC chip.

I wondwer why they use two separate chips if there are some free extra/unused space at the 4MB one, I think they could also put the info from the 512 chip at the 4Mb one, I think it just complicate things ^^

[jkbuha]

Here you go guys - I've attached the ITE firmware for Dell L511z A08 and A11. There are differences for sure, but I'm not clear where the table is...

[TimeWalker]

lol, naming things "VBIOS" apparently has stuck in your mind for good now
will try to find this thing if it's even remotely possible .. i've disassembled my EC fw, will try to look for similar ranges.
there should be DST limit tables for PWM and FAN tachometer limits corresponding to the first table... it's a shame ITE hasn't put out an datasheet yet.