@lfb6 - Thanks for info. Sorry, I don't remember discussion about ME FW before, this is long thread and I help in too many threads to remember all each day V11 is same as V9, just follow guide and then all will be done correctly.
Sounds like maybe something was not done correctly if instant power off, no it would not be related to boot guard (it's not covered). And even if ME FW corrupted or missing, usually still bootable just with failed ME FW, but, sometime can brick, so hard to know, maybe he inserted wrong?
For testing, if you want to test I will make cleaned/UPD ME FW, but I would like answers to my questions about ME FW first from IanP50 first (Asked at end of post #100), so I know if I should use someone else's BIOS for ME FW base or his.

@Lost_N_BIOS You mean the questions about updated ME? At least bricked bios came with updated ME. And it's not very likely that he inserted it wronlgy since it was the complete first 7 MB: FD, GbE, FD as one block.

Yes, those questions at end of post #100 - And yes, I know "Bricked" BIOS has updated ME FW, that's the reason I started asking my questions
Users not familiar with BIOS editing can insert things wrong in many ways (hex, or body instead of as-is, as-is instead of body etc) If you feel he did the insert correctly, or have checked that file etc, then the ME FW was not updated properly is the only thing left to make that brick.

@Lost_N_BIOS - I believe the ME FW has been updated in the past, although It's not something I ever went looking for. Lenovo periodically push bios/ME updates to the machine and ask if you want to install them. I generally say yes. This is what happened when I got bricked. I'm afraid I don't recall if the ME FW was in the list of updates when this happened, but I'm pretty sure it's been updated this way before.

I think lfb6 has covered your questions about the cleaning of the ME FW. I don't think I've done anything wrong when I've combined GbE, ME, FD with bios region. I just open both in HxD, copy bios region, and paste insert the bios region at the end of the GbE, ME, FD. This gives a full 16MB file that I then flash to the eeprom.

I don't see how the hardware could have got damaged either. I've never worked on anything while power was attached, so unlikely to be a short. Nothing was dropped, and I don't think I damaged anything physically. Everything on the motherboard is fairly self contained, and there's not really much to leave disconnected. There's several ribbon cables, but only for things like keyboard, touchpad, fingerprint scanner & screen colour calibrator. There's connectors for screen, camera, WiFi antennas, speakers and power button, but nothing else. All of the good stuff is part of the motherboard.

I've tried the ME FW update linked in #101. It all installed fine, but no change to the Nvidia GPU error.

Thanks,
Ian.

@IanP50 I'd propose tah you try to update the EC firmware like @Lost_N_BIOS said: Use the bios update 1.59, download the tool from Lenovos website, exceute it, but don't choose 'install' but 'expland'. please open an administrator command prompt in this directory. Execute all 4 Winflash??? commands with '-help', should give you an output with the options. Might also be -? or /help or /?

When you found the correct command for the syntax- run all 4 commands again and redirect the output to a textfile, this way it's easiest to attach. For example "Winflash64 -help > Winflash64.txt", "Winflash64s -help > Winflash64s.txt",.....
Please attach these four files so that we can be sure about the syntax of these tools!

@Lost_N_Bios I tried to clean a ME yesterday, but there's something that I didn't understand. In IanP50s bricked bios there are some uncorrect settings in the FD:
Region access settings:
BIOS: 00Bh 00Ah ME: 00Dh 00Ch
GbE: 008h 008h EC: 020h 020h

FIT will not allow 020h for EC (read and write) and 008h isn't a correct value for GbE Read Access. Do you think these values matter in this situation? Is the EC the FD refers to really the EC IanP50 is going to reflash?

The older 'good' bios had BIOS: 00Bh 00Ah ME: 00Dh 00Ch GbE: FFFh 008h EC: FFFh FFFh


I compared the ME settings (xml file) for the foreign 'Good' and the 'bricked' ME, there's no difference.

I can attach a cleaned ME, but would really like you to check it.

@IanP50 - Thanks for the answer. Seems unusual that ANY OEM or Brand company would put out, or push update to, latest ME FW, that's usually only something us end users do, so that's why I asked.
99.9% of the time, most manufacturers are many versions behind on everything, so while they may push or include an updated ME FW in BIOS or update package, it's very rare that it would actually be the "very latest"
So that's what caught my eye and made me ask you (because if done wrong, this would be something we need to fix with someone else's ME FW as base

Yes, if you just pasted in correctly, then that just means that was a bad ME FW UPD in that FD/ME/GbE partial you compiled.

See post #104, do that, and see if it helps or not.

@lfb6 - For the FD stuff you mentioned while working with FITc, let it set whatever it wants, then just unlock the FD once you are done, problem solved
EC read/write access in the FD only pertains to whatever the descriptor locks/allows to write to the EC. You can put it all back to OG once you are done, or do as suggested above, unlock it all.
Either way, the EC FW update tool/method will be allowed to write to EC FW

ME FW XML only shows settings for comparison, many things in the ME FW can be messed up other than settings, sometimes you can see those errors if BIOS dropped on ME Analyzer, sometimes you can notice a pause (often this can mean some issue too, while no error show)
You can also add these flags after you drop the file on there before you hit enter, to check for more errors >> -unp86 -bug86 << Then scroll up and look through all the output after it's done with the scan.

Sometimes ME FW can be messed up, but no errors found in any checking methods too.
I'd say in this case, if/when he tested/used that other known good BIOS, and the same issue with graphics still happens, this probably has nothing to do with ME FW because I doubt that ME FW would also messed up in a similar way, if at all.
Probably EC FW issue here

He should update the EC FW, using the matching EC FW from whatever BIOS he is on. If on 1.59, use the tool and EC FW in that package, if on 1.62, use that package tools and EC FW etc.
I linked extracted package and outlined command to use on post #104

Sorry, I can't really check ME FW, other than how I mentioned above, I am not a ME FW pro, that would be plutomaniac's arena. Only thing I know about ME FW is how to update and clean ME following the guides, and check the files how I mentioned etc.
In cases where ME FW base source is questionable, I will often grab other known good dump from google, if I do not already have in model folder from some other user who I helped to mod or fix BIOS.

@lfb6 & @Lost_N_BIOS - Tried updating the EC FW, but get the following error:

SCT Flash Utility for Lenovo
for Windows V1.0.3.9
Copyright (c) 2011-2017 Phoenix Technologies Ltd.
Copyright (c) 2011-2017 Lenovo Group Limited.

SecureFlash BIOS detected.
Read BIOS image from file.

ERROR 081 - Failed to load BIOS image file!

Not sure where to go from here.

Thanks,
Ian.

@IanP50 Not sure what you did. Which commandline did you use? The set and commandline from #104?

As proposed, execute all the 4 winflash programs and try to let them release their commandline options, possibly switch '-help'. Found one manual which stated other switches/ no longer had the /ipf ec switch.

@lfb6 - I used this:

winflash64.exe /sd /ipf ec /file N1EET89W\$0AN1E00.FL2

I'm currently running 1.62 bios, so used the later update files, so N1EET89W instead of N1EET86W.

I've attached the help outputs from all 4 winflash programs.

Thanks,
Ian.

@IanP50 Thanks a lot, all the same, and old-style, switches corresponding to the article. Anyway "ERROR 081 - Failed to load BIOS image file!" Seems that the program didn't find the file? Or there is a configuration file somwhere that tells the programm to search for the main bios file?

Try all the programmers with the syntax. One might work. (It's not understandable, but of 4 programs in a Samsung flash only one 32-bit version worked (in 64 bit Windows).

If that doesn't help: Try to copy the file to the same directory, possibly the error will change to missing manifest or something like that?

Try to find the syntax/ switches of Winuptp, found one reference that stated it was only program which worked for EC?

And try to find the backup switch in addition, it might give as somthing to compare with the original file, maybe.... (bak [filename] Backup BIOS ROM before flash)

@lfb6 - I tried the same syntax command on all 4 programs.

winflash32.exe /sd /ipf ec /file N1EET89W\$0AN1E00.FL2 & winflash64.exe /sd /ipf ec /file N1EET89W\$0AN1E00.FL2 both give the same 081 error.

winflash32s.exe /sd /ipf ec /file N1EET89W\$0AN1E00.FL2 & winflash64s.exe /sd /ipf ec /file N1EET89W\$0AN1E00.FL2 both appear to do nothing.

Tried moving the $0AN1E00.FL2 file into the same folder as the winflashxx.exe programs, and running the following commands give the same error as before:

winflash32.exe /sd /ipf ec /file $0AN1E00.FL2
winflash64.exe /sd /ipf ec /file $0AN1E00.FL2

I don't actually have Winuptp.exe. I have Winuptp,1.exe, WINUPTP,2.EXE and Winuptp64.exe. Whatever switches I try, just fires up a bios update utility. Same for all 3 programs.



Thanks,
Ian.

@IanP50 Try once "winflash32.exe /sd /ipf ec /bak ec.bak /file $0AN1E00.FL2" Might give us a backup, but I doubt it.
Try
winflash32.exe /sd /ipf:ec /file $0AN1E00.FL2
winflash32.exe /sd /ipf:ec /file:$0AN1E00.FL2
winflash32.exe /sd /ipf ec /file:$0AN1E00.FL2
Did the error change?

@Lost_N_BIOS Some ideas about these tools? There are lot of options, trying other tools, like EFI or DOS versions? In some flash procedures for EC it's mentioned to put the system back to Legacy and use DOS tools?

@lfb6 - All give errors. see below.

C:\Users\Ian\Desktop\{code_GetExtractPath_}>winflash32.exe /sd /ipf ec /bak ec.bak /file $0AN1E00.FL2
SCT Flash Utility for Lenovo
for Windows V1.0.3.9
Copyright (c) 2011-2017 Phoenix Technologies Ltd.
Copyright (c) 2011-2017 Lenovo Group Limited.

SecureFlash BIOS detected.
Read BIOS image from file.

ERROR 081 - Failed to load BIOS image file!

C:\Users\Ian\Desktop\{code_GetExtractPath_}>winflash32.exe /sd /ipf:ec /file $0AN1E00.FL2
SCT Flash Utility for Lenovo
for Windows V1.0.3.9
Copyright (c) 2011-2017 Phoenix Technologies Ltd.
Copyright (c) 2011-2017 Lenovo Group Limited.

ipf:ec : is not a valid command!

ERROR 105 - Command line error!

C:\Users\Ian\Desktop\{code_GetExtractPath_}>winflash32.exe /sd /ipf:ec /file:$0AN1E00.FL2
SCT Flash Utility for Lenovo
for Windows V1.0.3.9
Copyright (c) 2011-2017 Phoenix Technologies Ltd.
Copyright (c) 2011-2017 Lenovo Group Limited.

ipf:ec : is not a valid command!

ERROR 105 - Command line error!

C:\Users\Ian\Desktop\{code_GetExtractPath_}>winflash32.exe /sd /ipf ec /file:$0AN1E00.FL2
SCT Flash Utility for Lenovo
for Windows V1.0.3.9
Copyright (c) 2011-2017 Phoenix Technologies Ltd.
Copyright (c) 2011-2017 Lenovo Group Limited.

file:$0AN1E00.FL2 : is not a valid command!

ERROR 105 - Command line error!

C:\Users\Ian\Desktop\{code_GetExtractPath_}>

Thanks,
Ian.

@IanP50 OK, seems syntax was right... Just to be sure: You did try this as administrator, right?

There's a possibility that the utility checks for the other file- did you delete $0AN1E00.FL1? If so what happens if try with both FL1 and FL2 files in the directory?

How's a normal bios flash performing? Is there some feedback? Is the system rebooting? Can you see anything regarding which kind of environment they're using, like the reboot and do it in EFI environment? What if you reflash the latest bios? Do you get an information which parts get updated/ Which were omissed since same version...?

@Lost_N_BIOS Ideas for Error 81/ other ways to flash?

I wonder, at least in the bios chip the EC firmware got updated. The MAIN bios page shows directly after programming the bios with 1.49/1.17 from 'good' bios still the 'real' newer EC version from the separate chip (1.18), see first MAIN bios page picture in #43. Next dump after bios update 1.49 > 1.62 did also update EC firmware in bios chip. (checked in dump)

Good bios (1.49/1.17) with personal data, own GbE, corrected FD, cleaned ME

Dosflash (older) used in "Unlocking my Lenovo laptop, part 3", complete

@IanP50Did you remove .FL1 as I initially suggested? If yes, put it back in there, sorry, I didn't know it would cause this issue. I assumed since we're not updating BIOS it would not be needed.
Also, this may be an issue in the path >> {code_GetExtractPath_}

Rename that folder so {code_GetExtractPath_} is not part of the path. Then do exactly as I first mentioned, first without .FL1 in folder, then if error put it back and try again.
If still fails, do all same, but from DOS instead.

@lfb6 - As mentioned, what EC FW is "IN BIOS" does not matter here, we are flashing EC FW in the actual non-BIOS chip, what's in BIOS does not matter for any of this (consider it a backup/copy etc)