10 replies to this topic

[zzpulp]

If you are at all confused about any part of this guide just ask.  After all, you are performing this operation AT YOUR OWN RISK!


This thread is about the ever popular XPS2 hacked BIOS.  This BIOS is to allow the Inspiron 9300 laptop to be flashed with the XPS2 system BIOS.  The reason you would want to do this is to allow full use (3D clocks) of the 6800 go Ultra or 7800 go GTX.  There are only two BIOS installers on this cd.  One for the 9300 and one for the XPS2.

THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO REASON TO DO THIS UNLESS YOU WANT TO PUT A 6800 GO ULTRA OR 7800 GO GTX INTO A 9300.

What to do:

Burn the bootable iso to a CD and reboot.
Press F12 during the Dell BIOS screen to enter selective boot and choose CD
Option 1 -> Option 1 -> Option 2
Type "IXPS2A01"
If you get an error about flashing your bios with an older bios just push "C" to continue.
Press Y to flash your bios with the XPS2 Bios.
The laptop should reboot and you can reenter your Operating System.
Windows will redetect all of your hardware and prompt to reboot.
Reinstall video card drivers (I recommend the safe mode driver cleaner route always).
You can proceed to flash the latest XPS2 BIOS if you please.

To get your system back to normal follow the same directions except Type "I9300A02" at the prompt.  Again, after doing this you can update the BIOS to the latest version.

Notes:
This guide has been rewritten.  The original author was IRobertus @ nbf.
This post has nothing to do with Videocard BIOS/Roms.
The later 9300's are SATA.  All XPS2's were PATA.  Certain SATA hard drives require you use the "Thorough Boot" option in the XPS2 BIOS to prevent problems.
This whole guide applies for the XPS2 as well if for some reason you wanted to flash your XPS2 laptop with the 9300 BIOS (ABSOLUTELY NO REASON IMO).
You do not have to use a bootable cd.  You could just put the I9300A02.exe and IXPS2A01 on a bootable flash drive for example.
Before you go crazy and start asking why this wasn't done with the 9400 and the M1710, consider how dissimilar these two machines are compared to the 9300/XPS2.  Theoretically, we could always get more card support by hacking the BIOS but this BIOS here wasn't exactly "hacked."  From what I understand, the installer was merely patched to allow it to work on a 9300 machine without booting you out of the install.  You would need an actual BIOS hacker to help you in more complicated cases.
Original Guide

Link: Bootable ISO archive (you must have 7zip to extract this archive)

[coolcop06]

just curious.. what does this hacked bios do thats diffrent from the original bios??

Edited by coolcop06, 04 November 2008 - 09:58 PM.

[zzpulp]

coolcop06, on Nov 5 2008, 04:56 AM, said:

just curious.. what does this hacked bios do thats diffrent from the original bios??

The post has been edited to include more information.  Anyway, Dell often limits which video card a laptop can use based solely on the system BIOS and not hardware.  So, the 9300 was fully able to use better video cards but its BIOS wouldn't allow it.  Hence, there is a hacked BIOS from a machine that does allow you to use such cards.

[coolcop06]

zzpulp, on Nov 4 2008, 08:43 PM, said:

The post has been edited to include more information.  Anyway, Dell often limits which video card a laptop can use based solely on the system BIOS and not hardware.  So, the 9300 was fully able to use better video cards but its BIOS wouldn't allow it.  Hence, there is a hacked BIOS from a machine that does allow you to use such cards.

ahh i see, thanks. just was curious.
now i wish they would hack a bios for my xps m1530 to add fan control support... haha

[RFrancis]

Second

[zzpulp]

coolcop06, on Nov 5 2008, 05:58 AM, said:

ahh i see, thanks. just was curious.
now i wish they would hack a bios for my xps m1530 to add fan control support... haha

i8kfangui has been the tool of choice for controlling fans on dell laptops.  Anyway, if you want to talk about that then create a thread and link me to it via PM.

[coolcop06]

zzpulp, on Nov 5 2008, 08:10 AM, said:

i8kfangui has been the tool of choice for controlling fans on dell laptops.  Anyway, if you want to talk about that then create a thread and link me to it via PM.

yea i8kgui and speedfan doesnt control fan for xps m1530

id love to have a hacked bios for m1530 as long as im 100% sure it wont break my comp... lol

[radixxx]

This is probably a bit risky ?

[zzpulp]

Not really.  This is actually one of the safest mods that you can do for the 9300.  No one as far as I know has broken their computer from this and A LOT of people have used this cd image.  To put it in perspective, its safer than pinmodding and flashing your GPU BIOS IMO.

[Michael Marley]

Sorry for that spam post that was #9.  It has been deleted.

[zzpulp]

See that's why I should be able to mod my own threads hehe.  Anyway, thanks.