HP ZV6170us (ZVxxxx series) 104-Unsupported wireless FIX?

HP ZV6170us (ZVxxxx series) 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.


ZV6170US

This info has been taken from a HP ZV6170US Pheonix BIOS F1B (SP31533).

This is the exact same BIOS as used in most if not all of the ZV series, which should include:
zv6000, zv6001XX, zv6002XX, zv6003XX, zv6004EA, zv6004XX
zv6005us, zv6006EA, zv6007us, zv6008cl, zv6009EA, zv6009us
zv6010EA, zv6010us, zv6011EA, zv6013EA, zv6015us, zv6017EA
zv6020EA, zv6024EA, zv6025EA, zv6026EA, zv6027EA, zv6028EA
zv6029EA, zv6061EA, zv6062EA, zv6064EA, zv6065EA, zv6066EA
zv6067EA, zv6068EA, zv6069EA, zv6090EA,

Unlike the ZE2000 the Wifi card string occurs in ROMEXEC0.ROM rather than the BIOSCOD1.ROM section of the BIOS.

Also, unlike the ZE2000, these strings are also in cleartext in the compressed .WPH file.

What I do know is if the BIOS is rebuilt in Phoenix and then compared to the original, alot of changes seem to have taken place - in the ZE2000 only a few had, although more than you would imageine, why? I do not know.

A normal ZE2000 style fix, but instead, editing ROMEXEC0.ROM, whilst Phoenix BIOS editor is open does not work, as the Editor only writes back a memory cached version [presumably as it isn't designed to edit the romexec code].
Modified method, confirmed in R3000
(seemingly same BIOS as ZVxxxx, but untested as yet in a ZV series)
You need to open the .wph file up directly in Editpad as hex, replace an existing cards string, save the .wph file.
Then open the modified .wph file up in Phoenix BIOS editor, change something and change it back (preferable something innocouous like the Multiboot) to un-grey out File > 'Build BIOS'. Then save the BIOS out, the theory is this will fix any checksums directly editing the .wph file make mess up, although this is just a guess. There has been a failure reported of a direct edit only with a ZV6170US (see below).
Method confirmed working by Phil (see bottom of page)

UPDATE 13/June/06 BufferOverRun successfully modified his ZX5000 to support a Prism GT 54 mini pci card.
UPDATE 25/May/06 Paul successfully modified his Compaq Presario v2570ca F.24 bios to accept an Intel PRO/Wireless 2200bg card - whitelist was for only Broadcom prior.
UPDATE 11/May/06 Chris Ritchie successfully modified his Compaq V5000 to take a no name prism Gt card. UPDATE 06/May/06 Robert 'Crashtest' sucesfully modded his zv5415ea (AMD) with bios f35 to take a HP 54g WLAN W450 / Broadcom BCM94306MP card using above method. UPDATE 11/April/06 Phil aka Wolfie has successfully modded his R3000 to take a Intel 2200 card (it was an AMD one so only has Broadcom support initially) using above method.
UPDATE 10/April/06 - I just have had an email from a Mike W. who directed edited the .wph file on a ZV6000 - Winphlash locked processing block 9
UPDATE 06/April/06 - I just have had an email from a Evan G. who killed his ZV6170US - Winphlash locked processing block 9
Currently trying to ascertain the causes of above lockups in light of fact it seems ok on the R3000.

extract in Editpad (from ROMEXEC0.ROM, although is EXACTLY same as a direct edit of the .WPH for this section - obviously with a different address)

VENDOR/DEVICE ID , SUBSYS ID

Note, this laptop only takes Broadcom 43xx cards and no Intel ones (presumably as it is AMD and so cannot be `Centrino`).
There are 5 Broadcom cards whitelisted.

%BCM430G_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XG, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4320&SUBSYS_00E70E11
%BCM430G_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XGT, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4320&SUBSYS_12F4103C
%BCM430G_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XG1, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4320&SUBSYS_12F8103C (ALLOWED)
%BCM430G_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XG2, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4320&SUBSYS_12FA103C (ALLOWED)
%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

%BCM430G_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XG1, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4318&SUBSYS_1355103C (ALLOWED)
%BCM430G_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XG2, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4318&SUBSYS_1356103C (ALLOWED)
%BCM430G_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XG3, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4318&SUBSYS_1357103C (ALLOWED)
%BCM430M_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XM1, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4319&SUBSYS_1358103C
%BCM430M_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XM2, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4319&SUBSYS_1359103C
%BCM430M_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XM3, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4319&SUBSYS_135A103C

%BCM430G_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XG11, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4311&SUBSYS_1363103C
%BCM430G_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XG12, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4311&SUBSYS_1364103C
%BCM430G_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XG13, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4311&SUBSYS_1365103C
%BCM430M_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XM11, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4312&SUBSYS_1360103C
%BCM430M_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XM12, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4312&SUBSYS_1361103C
%BCM430M_DeviceDesc% = BCM43XM13, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4312&SUBSYS_1362103C


I would like to hear from anyone if modding this works via a direct edit / phoenix edit. The output from a BIOS rebuild in Phoenix BIOS editor log says

Total BIOS Size: 640D4h/ 409812
Total Free Space: 1BF2Ch/ 114476
ROM Size: 80000h/ 524288

CHECKSUM AT: 078AE2(in File) VALUE: 42

Maybe the checksum is important?



Compaq Presario R3000 (AMD) Notebook PC

A very similar BIOS layout to ZV's above.
This info has been taken from a Compaq R3000 (AMD) Pheonix BIOS F35 (sp30397) ROMEXEC0.ROM extracted from 08A0F35.wph



BCM43XG, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4320&SUBSYS_00E70E11
BCM43XGT, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4320&SUBSYS_12F4103C (ALLOWED)
BCM43XG1, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4320&SUBSYS_12F8103C (ALLOWED)
BCM43XG2, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4320&SUBSYS_12FA103C (ALLOWED)
BCM43XG3, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4320&SUBSYS_12FB103C (ALLOWED)
BCM43XM1, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4324&SUBSYS_12F9103C
BCM43XM2, PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4324&SUBSYS_12FC103C

Interesting it allows a Broadcom based card that is unset in their drivers which equates to a mystery....
PCI\VEN_14E4&DEV_4301&SUBSYS_12F3103C
This DEV corresponds to Broadcom 802.11b reference design / or Dell TruMobile card!

UPDATE 11/April/06 Mod confirmed working - Phil aka Wolfie has successfully modded his R3000 to take a Intel 2200 card (it was an AMD one so only has Broadcom support initially)



Contact:
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