HP/Compaq NC4200 104-Unsupported wireless FIX?

Back to HP Pavilion (ze2000) ZE2005EA BIOS fix

Bought a (new) miniPCI card and been greeted with this?

104-Unsupported wireless network device detected.
System Halted. Remove device and restart.

NC4200

This info has been taken from the latest Compaq NC4200 F.08 BIOS (SP31380) from HP's site.

Intel® Centrino™ Mobile Technology , Pentium M processor 730-770 or Celeron M, Mobile Intel 915GM Express Chipset, DDR II SDRAM
Intel Pro/Wireless 2200BG
Intel Pro/Wireless 2915ABG
Broadcom 802.11b/g WLAN
Broadcom 802.11a/b/g WLAN

This BIOS is a different kettle of fish to ZE's and seems to be a 1 meg .bin file with cleartext in (this seciton at least) [that therefore doesn't need decoding?].

Please note this is empirical data only from fiddling, I am only making suggestions, not stating facts.

rom.bin extract in Editpad (from NC4200 F.08)

VENDOR/DEVICE ID , SUBSYS ID

As you can see this seems yet another different structure from others. It is a work in progress but you can have an idea how it works.

The first part relates to Intel 2200 cards, specifically to 'HP branded' Intel 2200 cards.
You can easily see the Vendor (86 80, from 8086 below) and Dev (20 42, from 4220 below).
Then comes a joint first part of the Subsys (3C 10, written last below as 103C), then two separate chunks (F5 12 and F6 12, written below as 12F5 & 12F6)

PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4220&SUBSYS_12F5103C ; HPQ 2200 mPCI 3B - MoW Subven 103c
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4220&SUBSYS_12F6103C ; HPQ 2200 mPCI 3B - RoW Subven 103c

from w29n51.INF

The second part is for Broadcom 43xx cards.
The Vendor E4 14 is clear, then the Dev 20 43.
Next is the end part(as written below) of the Subsys 3C 10 (note the `byte gap` - in other BIOS revisions these `byte gaps` move so doubt it has any great significance. See below for difference to original F.00 BIOS).
The next parts of the Subsys for the different cards (as written below) are clearly present (F8, FB, FA, F9, FD, FC)
The final part to the puzzle is where the final '12' got too? I can only presume as it is a common ending to all the Broadcom cards it doesn't need to be checked and so is omitted from the test.

%BCM430G_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XG1, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4320&SUBSYS_12F8103C
%BCM430G_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XG2, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4320&SUBSYS_12FA103C
%BCM430G_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XG3, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4320&SUBSYS_12FB103C
%BCM430M_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XM1, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4324&SUBSYS_12F9103C
%BCM430M_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XM2, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4324&SUBSYS_12FC103C
%BCM430M_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XM3, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4324&SUBSYS_12FD103C

from bcmwl5.inf

There seems no credible mention of the Intel 2915ABG card in this location, which seems abit odd.
Having said that, if you look after the last `FC` from the broadcom section, following along 7 bytes, there is a 51, 52, 53, 54 which could, just possibly relate to the HP (only) branded Intel 2195 subsys's(see below). Maybe the final 13 is omitted as its common to all again as with Broadcom? I have not marked them above though as its abit wooley. The only other piece of credance to this idea is that they occur in all the BIOS revisions, a coincidence??. I suppose this could easily be tested by someone doing a mod who has a 2195 card.

PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4223&SUBSYS_1351103C ; HP 2915ABG mPCI 3B Americas/Europe ZZA
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4223&SUBSYS_1352103C ; HP 2915ABG mPCI 3B Europe ZZE
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4223&SUBSYS_1353103C ; HP 2915ABG mPCI 3B Japan ZZJ
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4223&SUBSYS_1354103C ; HP 2915ABG mPCI 3B High-Band ZZH

rom.bin extract in Editpad (from NC4200 F.00) ORIGINAL BIOS - illustrate `byte gap` postitional changes & address difference

The final oddment to this BIOS seems to be some Intel related code further down, but I do not know what to make of it.

It appears to be the DEV and VEND only of 3 types of Intel based cards;
Intel 2100 mPCI 3x (43 10) [not listed as a supported card]
Intel 2200 mPCI 3B (20 42) [as above]
Intel 2915ABG mPCI 3B (23 42) [listed in specs as a supported card]

I cannot see any subsys parts and therefor assume it is some other check for Intel cards, relating to displying it being a ``Centrino`` maybe?

If anyone has any further insight into this please let me know, and likewise if anyone wants to try a 104 fix, please let me know how it goes!
Caution: I do not know about any CRC checking, it could well be more important with this than the ZE because it isnt reconstructed with a special util after its been edited.

NX8220

...for Krzysztof

This info has been taken from the latest Compaq NX8220 F.10 BIOS (SP32117) from HP's site.
[BIOS supports NX8220, NW8249, NC8230]

Intel® Pentium® M Processor 730 - 770 (1.6-2.13 GHz, 2-MB L2 cache, 533-MHz FSB, Mobile Intel 915PM Express Chipset
Broadcom 802.11b/g WLAN
Broadcom 802.11a/b/g WLAN
Intel PRO/Wireless 2200BG 802.11 b/g WLAN
Intel PRO/Wireless 2915ABG 802.11 a/b/g WLAN

This seems to have an almost identical structure to the NC4200 bios as above with the `byte gap` in the Intel space instead(as with the older NC4200 bioses).

rom.bin extract in Editpad (from NX8220 F.10)

And similarily the Intel oddments...

Again if anyone fances confirming a mod with this is possible it would be appreciated.

NX6110

...for Victor

This info has been taken from the latest Compaq NX6110 F.0C BIOS (SP31879) from HP's site.
[BIOS supports NC6110, NC6120, NX6110, NX6120]
This seems to have an almost identical structure to the NC4200 bios as above.

rom.bin extract in Editpad (from NX6110 F.0C)

And similarily the Intel oddments...

Again if anyone fances confirming a mod with this is possible it would be appreciated.

NX5000

...for Toni .es

This info has been taken from the latest Compaq NX5000 F.0D BIOS (SP29995) from HP's site.

rom.bin extract in Editpad (from NX5000 F.0D)

This only seems to have one vendor code for Intel (86 80) and then two DEVICE codes, (43 10) for a 2100 card and the other (20 42) further split down for two 2200 mPCI cards.

PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1043&SUBSYS_25228086 ; Intel 2100 mPCI 3B - RoW

PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4220&SUBSYS_12F5103C ; HPQ 2200 mPCI 3B - MoW Subven 103c
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4220&SUBSYS_12F6103C ; HPQ 2200 mPCI 3B - RoW Subven 103c

Again if anyone fances confirming a mod with this is possible it would be appreciated.

NC6000

...for josuah13 et al. on HP Resource Centre Forum

This info has been taken from the latest Compaq NC6000 F.14 BIOS (SP30814) from HP's site.
This seems to have a fairly similar structure to the NC4200 bios as above.

rom.bin extract in Editpad (from NC6000 F.14)

Firstly are 2 Atheros based cards
MB22ag_01, PCI\VEN_168C&DEV_0013&SUBSYS_00E50E11 (HP WLAN 802.11a/b/g W500)
MB22g_01, PCI\VEN_168C&DEV_0013&SUBSYS_00E60E11 (HP WLAN 802.11b/g W400)

Secondly are 2 Intel 2100 802.11b wireless cards
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1043&SUBSYS_25228086 ; Intel 2100 mPCI 3B - RoW
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1043&SUBSYS_25278086 ; Intel 2100 mPCI 3B - MoW

Thirdly is a solitary Broadcom b/g 43xx wifi card.
BCM43XGT, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4320&SUBSYS_12F4103C

Fourthly (similar to the rest above) 2 Intel cards 2200 (Is there a mistake in the BIOS here!? [F5 14 should be F5 12]
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4220&SUBSYS_12F5103C ; HPQ 2200 mPCI 3B - MoW Subven 103c
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_4220&SUBSYS_12F6103C ; HPQ 2200 mPCI 3B - RoW Subven 103c

But un-similarily to above, this has no the Intel oddments later on in the file.

Again if anyone fances confirming a mod with this is possible it would be appreciated.

NX6125

...Dagarlas

This info has been taken from the latest HP / Compaq NX6125 F.0D BIOS (SP31846) from HP's site.

AMD Turion™ 64 Mobile Technology processor ML-30, 1.6 GHz, 1-MB L2 cache, Integrated ATI Mobility Radeon X300

This seems to be the most restrictive BIOS yet and allows just one Broadcom a/b/g card.

rom.bin extract in Editpad (from NX6125 F.0D)

BCM43XM1, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4319&SUBSYS_1358103C

Broadcom 802.11a/b/g WLAN

Again if anyone fances confirming a mod with this is possible it would be appreciated.

WHAT (DOESN'T?) WORK (NC/NW series) - this was received BEFORE this page was made

This is from an email I received from someone who wished to remain anonymous. This was his story. I make no assertions to its accuracy, it is a direct paste of the email.

" Have tested your way to patch the bios[referring to ZE2000 - Ed.], unfortenately is the nc6000/nc8000/nw8000 bios not compatible with Phoenix Editor.

So i have patched directly the BIOS from my nw8000 with Hexeditor ( from 14E4,4320 to 14E4,4324 ( subvendor of course too ) -> Dell TreuMobile 1450 mini pci was the target ).

Well, after reboot BIOS was there, everything was fine.

So i have put the minipci card and reboot again, woooop, thats all. Notebook is gone.

Unfortenately there is no recovery option for this notebook, have tested everything ( Boot block jumper, all known keys ).

Same procedure tested with nc6000, same result. It seems to be some kind of crc check. The Vendor id and Subvendor id are in clrear text, chipset from both minipci crads are compatible ( in case of some hidden init procedures ), so it must be some kind of protection.

If i get the new one board i will play again with the BIOS, this time with plcc socket and backup bios :)

You can use this information on your site, as kind of warnning."

Well, I guess one can draw several conclusions from this. I find it odd that it would be fine after a reboot, and only go wrong AFTER a card was inserted in such a way that removing the card wouldn't fix it?
This tells me there isnt a CRC problem as otherwise it wouldnt have rebooted at all? And that inserting the card shafted it, static, short, who knows.
Just be careful!

Contact:
Mail me at anything to this domain.