Bricked Dell

[Shack]

Anyone have any past postives with reviving a completely bricked Dell laptop? Vostro 1520~2009. Every possible avenue been traveled and trying to find out where I am coming up short. Will run down where I am at if anyone posts back.

I have "yet" to be able to not master a .rom yet. From smartphones with no signs off life to GPS hacks that failed and motherboards mods that flopped, I have been able to crack the tiniest of chips. The Dell is flopping me for a loop. Figure it is something stupid like the winphlash file type or the naming of the wph file. Formatting in wincris, fat(16) and topping it off with minidos. Tries A00-A09.

Thanks and I will go into detail if anyone shows signs or the willingness to find out.

[pureinsanity]

So by bricked you mean it doesn't turn on right?

[Shack]

Yes and no. Without going into too much detail, the device turns on when plugged in and powered up (I.E. lights, fans, sounds work) but does not know what to do and does not load into BIOS. Which is needed to boot into your OS. Basically in short, the laptop never reaches this screen:

But powers up and does all the actions prior to this screen. This was caused by what I assume was a corrupt BIOS update file or something was not told to me like loss of power, sudden shutdown during update or some other snarf-foo during the update.

Either way I am getting closer and basically going over and re-traveling all recovery option(s) variables I have already covered using a formatted USB stick, but have switched up to using my old USB floppy drive. Floppy is my preferred method to use because A: is recognized and accepted by everything. USB flash~thumb drives on most things are recognized as a just a removable device. You can spend days going over everything using a properly formatted USB stick, loaded with the proper recovery files, just to find out the device or PC will not accept files in MSDOS loaded from a removable device. It needs to be noticed as a disk or floppy.

My main issue, going into some detail here, is that no matter how I slice and dice the start of BIOS recovery, this laptop is NOT going to recognize a USB memory stick. The BIOS is a mixed combo of Phoenix & Dell. No matter how much the downloaded file from Dell's Support Website ~dellbios.exe~ may on the surface look like Dell's own creation, if you dissect the update and look within its core you find winphlash.exe which is a Phoenix program. IMO and compared to other makes and models of BIOS I know, the Vostro's actions righgt now, mixed with the documented recovery tactics indicates the Vostro's BIOS is more Dell than Phoenix. This just screams going the .hdr path as the day is long and renaming to model#/update or other token 7.3 file format, thus USB flash~thumb~stick would be the only option because the update .exe to .hdr file exceeds 1.44mb (max for floppy). This sends me down the old path of creating a mini or full DOS startup/bootable crisis disk with wincris.com or HP, substituting the preloaded bios.wph file with an identically renamed to bios.wph (needs to search and see the unique file extension and name to load recovery) within yourbios123.rom file extracted from the Dell downloaded update. Typically this DON'T fly from a USB thumb drive because of being so old school, but I would assume works from a floppy. I figure this dilemma was brought on by the failed update and has affected the BIOS chip and is blocking the more traditional method (being a 2009 model) of loading recovery from a USB. Roundabout way of the boot block(ed).

Yada~Yada~Yada BUT!!! Mid post I thought of something!!

Another problem I have is~ Lack of other needed files within the Dell update needing to be on the floppy disk to get the bios rom chip to load into recovery. USB sticks (all 10 or so I have setup as bootable) range from 6 years old 512mb~16g. Partitioned down even to 126mb. Having the winphlash.exe deep within the update program, the recovery has to be a full GUI and NOT the tried and true blank screen with nothing more than the tune of a floppy drive making noise during recovery to guide your way. My idea is to meet a floppy and USB stick halfway using a device that came and went it seems like overnight and now is a nothing more than $3.00 item at a garage sale. This would be the 100mb Zip Drive. The Red Headed Step Child of the storage world past. I think I even have some formatted bootable and brand new in the package disks. I literally picked one up for a buck or two with disks a year or so back at a garage sale. Can be cloned, if not already is, to be the A: floppy drive, USB connection (which you need) but more than enough room to hold a 2.0mb .hdr file with boot and dos files loaded.

I was sitting here 24 hours ago thinking of giving it a break for a couple days and figured what could I loose posting it in here. I knew chances are there are not many in ere who even know what BIOS is, much less BIOS recovery, but I was in a jam and by tossing out a question it put me on the spot slightly to keep chugging for the answer. Off to find that Zip drive.

[Shack]

For the record, I am NOT a fan of Dell or advicate their consumer based products. They seem to put more corporate IT and network based security within their consumer based products which makes for either a time consuming headache finding a work around to problems other manu's have easy solutions for or a $1000 paper weight. I know this translates into security, but also seems to translate into a consumable product. Dell's flagship has always been their customer support. Dell had rock solid Pen II systems that lasted years. Just not getting the love when reading up on the current Dell scene with their home based PC users who have been hanging on.

Plus their products have no flare IMO. Well short of their rack space products, which are still some of the coolest non-flare systems out their.

[DTro]

and here I thought you could only "brick" a phone.

Good luck Shack

[pureinsanity]

Dells are pretty easy to work on and for that reason I love them over any other brand.

what kind of LED's do you have on when you turn them on?

check dells HSOforum for the Diagnostic Lights and what they mean.

Remove the battery from the mother board for 10 minutes or so and put it back in. If that doesn't work it is probably a mother board issue. Specifically if you cannot get into the bios setup. Also check the voltage of the battery, I have seen it where a old battery caused problems with the motherboard and bios.

Was anything installed previously? I recall a time where someone installed some ram and had a similar issue where the bios would freeze. removed the ram and bios came back.

Try removing all the memory except one chip. if that one works remove it and replace it with another one to make sure there isn't something wrong with one of the chips.

Also if you get into the bios make sure the floppy is turned off.

im thinking faulty memory, bad battery, or the floppy is not disabled... or a combination off all of them.

good luck and let us know

[Shack]

Good tips PI and you can bet memory was tested before the laptop was torn down to the CMOS battery on Sunday evening. I wish and love the easy stuff working and always like to review the basics because I miss things.

I am proud to say this Dell is repaired, I love Zip drives , and prOblem solved. After cloning the Zip to be a floppy and bootable, simply extracted the .HDR file from the full Dell download and renamed (get this) KEYLARGO.HDR.... Worked and after 10min of Zip drive Zipping, had to reboot myself, loaded into Winphlash.exe recovery. Updated Bios to Dell recommended A09 and after reboot Windows loaded. Still tried this file name after Bios was recovered with USB flash and no go.

[Shack]

PI I was mainly referring to Dell's Laptops and Notebooks, obviously in the "heat" of repair. Why is it not possible for Dell to at least allow something easy like a jumper swap instead of having to do something like this as an end result:

Just a pain even getting to the CMOS battery on this laptop. A complete disassemble, well minus removing the screen. Same thing with the other hand full of Dell laptops I have worked on in the past.

Dell is crazy cool when it comes to non-consumer based products. I actually and really do like their Optiplex Business series and Poweredge Servers. Well of course as long as an Asus or Intel board is installed LOL. I would say the lack of customization at the manual level with their motherboards is my main complainer.

[upnorth]

If you get a device that will power up but won't complete POST, you got a hardware issue. Could be as simple as a shorted keyboard or mouse, or a shorted onboard NIC or the like. Dells series of lights make it easier to trouble shoot on a laptop than most. Most people I know won't spend a lot of time with laptops cuz it is miserable to find the faulty parts.

[Whoaru99]

Laptops can be a PITA to work on. I have this old ACER that the BIOS battery died on so I got the notion to fix it. Literally had to take just about every piece of that computer apart to replace the BIOS battery. Wasn't worth it at all, except for the satisfaction of knowing I could do it.

That old powerhouse Pentium 133 MMX still works though. Not for much, but it works...

[pureinsanity]

dells are easy to take aparty. unless they changed their design since i worked on them last.

[Shack]

UpNorth those are the first things to check. The first thing to check is any peripherals by eliminating them out of the picture. The only USB related item I was not able to remove with this Vostro was the built in Bluetooth, but taking off everything is the first step. Re-seating and dropping memory, then replacing with known good ddr was next. Actually I figure it was power supply as the battery had just been replaced, but thanks to a stop at Battery's Plus for a test on the battery and replacing the power cord with a known good one, this was eliminated right away also. I agree hardware also, because most "hardware" failures are not caused by something physically being broken but cause by something not knowing how to send data for a process from point A to B to get it done. Drivers, firmware, etc...

PI Dell "Desktops" have been known to be easy to work on. I assume you are thinking of the Optiplex series where everything is word and brightly coded and with two firm grasps of your hands, you had the chassis/case split and folded open? Dell laptops are not the same. I would expect if I removed all access covers, components under them and then all open and hidden chassis/case screws (with a couple of pry to free clipped points included) the laptop would split. Nope and I give Dell some slack in this ares because other manu's are like this. The Vostro series was the corporate answer to the consumer(off the shelf) Inspiron as they moth have matching model numbers and are extremely similar. I would have guessed it would have been easier to work on being the "business" series. That is if you do not mind breaking things here and their. In this case it was not mine and I was repairing, so you have to do things right because if you want people to come back, you can not give them something back with a loose corner.

[Shack]

Whoaru99

Pentium 133 MMX

LOL if it is suffering let me know. Mobile or Desktop? I know some old laptops had the pen 133 with MMX in them. I know I have parts for desktop and almost positive I have parts for the Mobile side. I will check my stach of processors and mobos to see what I have on the MMX tech side of life still.

[Whoaru99]

No, don't need any parts now with the battery replaced. It works as well as Pentium 133 MMX works, just not much by today's standards.

That said, I do have a spiffy new work computer, HP EliteBook mobile workstation/laptop, i7 with 8GB RAM running Win7 64-bit.

[Shack]

I had to pull some of my "old" stuff

I thought I had a 133 but it was a 233. Same thing just a little more juice.

I do have a AMD-K5 66MHz in their.

I did a comparison and laptop timeline awhile back

I have not dug it out, but I positive the Think Pad (Running the original Win 95 to perfection still I might add ) is running smooth and cool on the original Pen 133 with MMX.

[upnorth]

Quote:

I agree hardware also, because most "hardware" failures are not caused by something physically being broken but cause by something not knowing how to send data for a process from point A to B to get it done. Drivers, firmware, etc...

Actually drivers etc is your typical, BSOD as they don't come into the picture til the OS is loaded. From your description you are not get to the point of or past POST and loading the BIOS, no drivers loaded at that point, for that you need to start loading windows or whatever your OS>

If I am reading your description correctly you are not completing POST(power on self test) Anything touching the motherboard, including the motherboard and CPU is subject to being suspect at this point. Anything shorted, broken or just plain faulty will stop POST and or loading the BIOS.