M4800 Owner's Thread

[unnoticed]

 

On 5/9/2024 at 2:41 PM, Per Astra Ad Deum said:

Alright guys,

here's the update. First things first: it did work. Currently running a NVIDIA GTX 1050 Ti Mobile in my M4800.

However I did have to flash coreboot for it to work. Wouldn't boot with the original vendor firmware. The MXM-A-GPU makes use of the same hole spacing as the AMD cards, so no new heat pipe is required for the switch.

 

 

 

Performance is as expected. It blows the WX 4150 easily out of the water. Performance is nearly doubled according to Unigine Superposition Benchmark, while I even see FPS triple in some games.

 

There are some issues though. Power management is not available for this card. Power limit is reported as 5000 Watts! (yeah...) Say, @MELOCODI, did you ever find a modified vROM for a 1050 Ti? 😄 

Does this gpu require eDP motherboard?

On 5/9/2024 at 10:41 PM, MELOCODI said:

Coreboot? On M4800? Jeez.. I didn't think that it can be done

Right ...seem suspicious?
Did Per Astra Ad Deum really get this working?

[Per Astra Ad Deum]

34 minutes ago, unnoticed said:

Did Per Astra Ad Deum really get this working?

Oh, come on! Why would I lie? To impress like five guys on an obscure notebook forum? 🙄

It isn't rocket science. Here's the M4800 port on coreboot. As you can read in the description, coreboot does support any GPU that is physically compatible with this laptop.



The developer working on that port even states that he was able to boot with an 1050 (non-Ti apparently though) further down the description. I'm sure it'd work with an 1650, too.
 

 

34 minutes ago, unnoticed said:

Does this gpu require eDP motherboard?

I'm not sure. I have an eDP board though.


Addendum:

If interested I can provide a rudimentary guide for flashing coreboot. But please be aware that flashing coreboot requires some tools, can put your hardware at risk, and does have some drawbacks.
 

Edited May 11 by Per Astra Ad Deum

[unnoticed]

18 hours ago, Per Astra Ad Deum said:

Oh, come on! Why would I lie? To impress like five guys on an obscure notebook forum? 🙄

It isn't rocket science. Here's the M4800 port on coreboot. As you can read in the description, coreboot does support any GPU that is physically compatible with this laptop.



The developer working on that port even states that he was able to boot with an 1050 (non-Ti apparently though) further down the description. I'm sure it'd work with an 1650, too.
 

 

I'm not sure. I have an eDP board though.


Addendum:

If interested I can provide a rudimentary guide for flashing coreboot. But please be aware that flashing coreboot requires some tools, can put your hardware at risk, and does have some drawbacks.
 

I didn't mean to ridicule you it just seemed to good to be true to find a coreboot for a dell precision where mods has been in progress but didn't make it to a functional state having to make hardware access through the pins on the realtek sound card chip.
This is awesome, if the devs get the S3 and screen brightness sorted it will be very interesting to flash.

And if you're up for contributing with a guide/tutorial how to flash it that's awesome!

[Per Astra Ad Deum]

1 hour ago, unnoticed said:

I didn't mean to ridicule you it just seemed to good to be true to find a coreboot for a dell precision where mods has been in progress but didn't make it to a functional state having to make hardware access through the realtek sound card chip.
This is awesome, if the devs get the S3 and screen brightness sorted it will be very interesting to flash.

Ahh I see. No offense taken then! The port is fairly new (half a year old) and not yet merged.
As you've pointed out, there are certain things missing. S3 is one of them, however another coreboot dev managed to get it working. I'm using his patches and suspend works flawlessly on my M4800. Here's his patch.

Regarding screen brightness: that one works as well, although not with the keyboard shortcuts but from OS controls.

Addendum:

It is possible to flash coreboot without the need of external tools or even disassembling the device on the M4800. However I strongly recommend to at least have these tools (flash programmer, clip and wires) at hand in case something goes wrong (which usually means a brick). If you fuck up, you'll need to re-flash externally in order to repair the damage done by a faulty flashing.

Here's the link to the tool.

[MELOCODI]

4 hours ago, Per Astra Ad Deum said:

It is possible to flash coreboot without the need of external tools or even disassembling the device on the M4800. However I strongly recommend to at least have these tools (flash programmer, clip and wires) at hand in case something goes wrong (which usually means a brick). If you fuck up, you'll need to re-flash externally in order to repair the damage done by a faulty flashing.

 

Can you provide the ROM/flash files? I can do it right now, I made a quick access for my BIOS + ME chips in the laptop's frame so I can do it fast with my CH341A v1.7

[Per Astra Ad Deum]

29 minutes ago, MELOCODI said:

 

Can you provide the ROM/flash files? I can do it right now, I made a quick access for my BIOS + ME chips in the laptop's frame so I can do it fast with my CH341A v1.7

That isn't possible, I'm sorry! The coreboot image is build with a MRC.bin (closed-source binary for RAM initialization) that isn't legally redistributable. 😐

You can, however, build coreboot yourself. And you should do so, for various other reasons:
For example, I've build coreboot with EDKII as a payload (open-source UEFI implementation). I don't know if your installation (Linux? Windows?) would boot with that (depending on whether you use legacy BIOS or UEFI). Also, in case you're running Windows, I don't know if it will boot without TPM support properly implemented.

Also also, please be aware that you lose certain BIOS settings you've set in the vendor firmware. Thinks like display signal routing via the laptops MUX chip (and the docking stations MUX chip) won't work, so, depending on your use case, that might be an issue.

As I've offered before, I can write a comprehensive How-To. But it will be focused on Arch Linux (I have never build coreboot on Windows, so I have absolutely no experience in this regard)

[MELOCODI]

2 hours ago, Per Astra Ad Deum said:

I can write a comprehensive How-To. But it will be focused on Arch Linux (I have never build coreboot on Windows, so I have absolutely no experience in this regard)

Okay then, maybe I'll do it one day, I just don't want to touch Linux, ever, I've had enough

[unnoticed]

On 5/12/2024 at 6:09 PM, Per Astra Ad Deum said:

That isn't possible, I'm sorry! The coreboot image is build with a MRC.bin (closed-source binary for RAM initialization) that isn't legally redistributable. 😐

You can, however, build coreboot yourself. And you should do so, for various other reasons:
For example, I've build coreboot with EDKII as a payload (open-source UEFI implementation). I don't know if your installation (Linux? Windows?) would boot with that (depending on whether you use legacy BIOS or UEFI). Also, in case you're running Windows, I don't know if it will boot without TPM support properly implemented.

Also also, please be aware that you lose certain BIOS settings you've set in the vendor firmware. Thinks like display signal routing via the laptops MUX chip (and the docking stations MUX chip) won't work, so, depending on your use case, that might be an issue.

As I've offered before, I can write a comprehensive How-To. But it will be focused on Arch Linux (I have never build coreboot on Windows, so I have absolutely no experience in this regard)

mmm that sucks, I love my docking station

 

[Per Astra Ad Deum]

14 minutes ago, unnoticed said:

mmm that sucks, I love my docking station

 

I feel like I should further elaborate on this.

The docking station will work just fine. You'll have a video signal on all outputs.

There's just a more niche use case where you tick an option in the vendor BIOS (next to switchable graphics) that allows the iGPUs signal to be routed to the docking stations DVI/DP output. This way you can use an external monitor with the docking station without making use of the dGPU.

This option however is not yet implemented in the coreboot port. There's an ongoing research to make this possible with coreboot, albeit without an ETA.

EDIT:

Have a look at this schematic. It shows how the video signals are routed:

 

[Per Astra Ad Deum]

I've been spending some time now with the 1050  Ti Mobile and found it running pretty hot in the M4800. Sadly I can't control neither voltage nor power limit with the current vBIOS.

  

So I thought about flashing another onto my card. Backing up my vBIOS worked with NVFLASH under Linux.

However, I can't fine a suitable vBIOS! Neither for the preferred 1050 Ti Mobile Max-Q, nor for the regular 1050 Ti Mobile. The only one I was able to find was an unverified Dell 1050 Ti Mobile. This one was fitted with just two GB of RAM though. Mine has four 😞 

If anyone knows where to to find a suitable vBIOS, please let me know!

[mobomobo]

 

Has anyone heard about Sony SxS Express card series?

Sony's SxS express card supports up to 1TB and 1.4GB/s file transfer speed.

I think this may work on M4800's express card slot.

 

 

[Zenkibou]

On 3/1/2024 at 11:19 AM, MELOCODI said:

Does anyone have a Quadro T1000 from Adlinktech here? I've been screwing around with mine at night and found a VBIOS on TechPowerUp database that improved my temps without a performance sacrifice. 

I changed my MSI Afterburner OSD configuration yesterday and noticed this:

  Reveal hidden contents

LIM1 is a stat that shows what limits the GPU (POWER,TEMP, NO LOAD) and in my case it NEVER changed, GPU Power was on 3.5W too. I knew it was something with VBIOS, but when I tried to flash some 1650 VBIOSes - it didn't work, even with nvflashk/omgvflash. But then I tried to flash the sketchiest out of all T1000 VBIOSes - one that had "0 MB VRAM" identified on TechPowerUp. And would you look at that:

  Reveal hidden contents

(On this screenshot I've been playing for two hours already)

Now temps aren't going higher than 73 degrees, even in stress tests, yay!
Here is the link for VBIOS: https://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/239942/239942
Flash using nvflashk: https://github.com/notfromstatefarm/nvflashk

How to flash it:

  Reveal hidden contents

• Disable your Quadro T1000 in a Device Manager
• Open Terminal/CMD in a nvflash(k) directory and execute those commands:
   nvflashk --protectoff
   nvflashk -6 (VBIOS ROM NAME HERE).rom
• Reboot
• Enable your Quadro T1000
(I am not sure if nvflashk is required, maybe original nvflash would be good for that too)

 

 

Hello,

 

I've just received a Quadro T1000 that I bought from ebay and it's the Adlink one.

I have temp issues as well, I will try this vbios.

 

However I have a bigger issue, which is that I have a M4800 with QHD+ 3200x1800 (eDP) screen without Optimus, and this MXM GPU doesn't detect it.

I'm able to boot using an external HDMI screen, but it's not good.

 

I'm going to first try the vbios mentioned to see if it's better (temps and eDP), if it doesn't I will try a Dell VBIOS for the T1000 I found on techpowerup, maybe it will be better ?

 

Any clues as to why the M4800 QHD+ eDP would not be detected ? I previously upgraded the K2100m to a M2200 and it worked great, I'm wondering why would the T1000 eDP not work ?

[unnoticed]

3 hours ago, Zenkibou said:

 

Hello,

 

I've just received a Quadro T1000 that I bought from ebay and it's the Adlink one.

I have temp issues as well, I will try this vbios.

 

However I have a bigger issue, which is that I have a M4800 with QHD+ 3200x1800 (eDP) screen without Optimus, and this MXM GPU doesn't detect it.

I'm able to boot using an external HDMI screen, but it's not good.

 

I'm going to first try the vbios mentioned to see if it's better (temps and eDP), if it doesn't I will try a Dell VBIOS for the T1000 I found on techpowerup, maybe it will be better ?

 

Any clues as to why the M4800 QHD+ eDP would not be detected ? I previously upgraded the K2100m to a M2200 and it worked great, I'm wondering why would the T1000 eDP not work ?

could it be that this only supports lvds?, sounds stupid but it might be a possibility?

[Aaron44126]

6 hours ago, unnoticed said:

could it be that this only supports lvds?, sounds stupid but it might be a possibility?

 

Rather doubt it in this case; its a Turing GPU, and NVIDIA has been supporting eDP only starting with Pascal.

 

I thought other users had reported success with this GPU (and T2000 as well) in the M4800, but I haven't been paying close attention to what display was being used.  I think M4800 with a 1080p panel is more common.

 

Maybe flashing a different vBIOS will help.  Just make sure that you back up the original one...

[nforce4max]

Installed an T1000 from an HP Z2 mini in my m4800 and it worked pretty much right out of the box aside from having to sacrifice an x bracket. The display is an 30 pin edp ips panel that came stock.

[kingofswag187]

Hello all!
I have recently installed a HP WX4150 (Blue PCB) into my M4800, however I cannot seem to get it to work properly! I have flashed the VBIOS that user MELOCODI has provided (Baffin.rom) however with that VBIOS and others, I still cannot get the card to work. Currently, I can install drivers, but the card will not display out through any of the system's direct outputs (DP/HDMI etc) and I cant get any programs to actually use the GPU.

[MELOCODI]

On 7/5/2024 at 9:19 PM, kingofswag187 said:

Hello all!
I have recently installed a HP WX4150 (Blue PCB) into my M4800, however I cannot seem to get it to work properly! I have flashed the VBIOS that user MELOCODI has provided (Baffin.rom) however with that VBIOS and others, I still cannot get the card to work. Currently, I can install drivers, but the card will not display out through any of the system's direct outputs (DP/HDMI etc) and I cant get any programs to actually use the GPU.

I'll search around slav forums to see if there is any other VBIOS

[MELOCODI]

Try this, I hope it works out for you, I can try to send some Techpowerup ones but I am not sure if it will work properly

DELL_AMD_Radeon_Pro_WX4150_updGOP.rom

 

[kingofswag187]

Hey! I did try that VBIOS, but alas nothing happens. The GPU is still unusable. I have tried OEM drivers, AMD drivers, Nimez modded drivers, disabling driver signature checks, patching the VBIOS signature with ATI/AMD pixel clock patcher, and still nothing sadly. Unsure what I am doing wrong as I know other people have used this card in this and similar machines. I wonder if it is because mine is a blue HP PCB card instead of a green dell card.
EDIT:
I forgot to mention that the card does work in my HP 8300 USFF.

[Zenkibou]

On 7/3/2024 at 9:58 AM, Zenkibou said:

 

Hello,

 

I've just received a Quadro T1000 that I bought from ebay and it's the Adlink one.

I have temp issues as well, I will try this vbios.

 

However I have a bigger issue, which is that I have a M4800 with QHD+ 3200x1800 (eDP) screen without Optimus, and this MXM GPU doesn't detect it.

I'm able to boot using an external HDMI screen, but it's not good.

 

I'm going to first try the vbios mentioned to see if it's better (temps and eDP), if it doesn't I will try a Dell VBIOS for the T1000 I found on techpowerup, maybe it will be better ?

 

Any clues as to why the M4800 QHD+ eDP would not be detected ? I previously upgraded the K2100m to a M2200 and it worked great, I'm wondering why would the T1000 eDP not work ?

Just to report my progress, I did try all the T1000 VBIOS I found, the non-Adlink didn't flash, even with nvflashk.

The Adlink ones did flash, but no laptop screen support with any of them.

 

In the end I put back my M2200, I don't think this T1000 is going to work.

(It would be great to be able to convert it to a kind of eGPU with expressCard or something, but it's probably not worth it)

 

By the way, after uninstallation of the T1000 I noticed that the radiator was not touching the GPU core at all, I think some ICs (like mosfets) are taller than the original K2100 and the M2200, so it doesn't work with the stock thermal pads.

This explains why the temps where high, the fan spinning and performance was poor, so check that when upgrading.

(In my case it doesn't really matter because the lack of laptop display is a no-go anyway)

[unnoticed]

Decided to dust off my machine for some cybersecurity training.
Was a bit disapointed by the performance being used to nvme drives nowadays, I booted into bios and enabled RAID On, made two 220 GB drives RAID 0 and having a separate drive for vmware.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not bad for a ten year old laptop.
This is two healthy drives in Raid 0, 128KB block size, Windows 11 with standard 4KB, bitlocker enabled.

[panda_zzz]

What should I do if I scratched my laptop cover? Replace the part? Or maybe it's better to get a little creative....

 

Spoiler

 

[unnoticed]

23 hours ago, panda_zzz said:

What should I do if I scratched my laptop cover? Replace the part? Or maybe it's better to get a little creative....

 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

I replaced all of my chassis parts several time but haven't done so last time.
I bit the bullet and added stickers from the office we had all over the place from IT-security vendors.
I replaced my lcd back panel to a brand new only for it to peel a bit, its powder coated from factory but with bad prep work. And there are 7 or 8 different models both back panels and lcd bezels so you need to take it apart and read the part number and hope dellparts or aliexpress has it.

 

Your back panel look brand new, is the scratch so little it won't show on the picture?

[panda_zzz]

1 hour ago, unnoticed said:

Your back panel look brand new, is the scratch so little it won't show on the picture?

Just for the reason of making a mistake with the lid, I did not order a new one, but decided to creatively modify the existing one. Unfortunately I didn't take a photo before engraving on the lid, but the scratch itself was quite wide though not deep and visually was in the area of the girl's leg.
But two passes of the laser on the lid helped to get rid of it, and the rest I added at will 😇

[MELOCODI]

My M4800 doesn't want to boot when RAM sticks are inserted into B and C slots, I am so exhausted. This happened after the CPU repaste.