HP pegatron APX78-BN AGESA update

[jimbo34]

I need a bit of help with an old pegatron APX78-BN made for an HP computer. I know it can support a Phenom II 95W processor as I'm running an x3 720 cpu in there succesfully. However I tried to upgrade the CPU to an x4 945 95W and get a CPU unsupported error message. The chip is the same as the 720 but with an extra core so I think it should be supported.

Im running bios 5.12 (the last released in 2009) which aida shows as having an agesa version of 3.3.2.0. The BIOS type is AMI. Is there a way of manually updating the BIOS (I assume using the agesa version) to support the Phenom II x4? Bios here.

[jimbo34]

I've looked a bit more and managed to find an HP AMI bios from a PC that comes with an X4 945 cpu. download here. If I compare the CPU patch using MMTOOL, the x4 945 pc has 2 more lines of patches. I'm the first to admit I'm a complete noob to bios modding but if I extract and insert these extra patches into my bios will I get support for the x4 945 on my motherboard? Or will I turn my pc into a brick? I've attached images. My bios is slicnuts. The one from the x4 945 pc is alv6.07. Am I even on the right track here or way off what needs to be done get the 945 working?

[andrewx12]

I need a bit of help with an old pegatron APX78-BN made for an HP computer. I know it can support a Phenom II 95W processor as I'm running an x3 720 cpu in there succesfully. However I tried to upgrade the CPU to an x4 945 95W and get a CPU unsupported error message. The chip is the same as the 720 but with an extra core so I think it should be supported.

Im running bios 5.12 (the last released in 2009) which aida shows as having an agesa version of 3.3.2.0. The BIOS type is AMI. Is there a way of manually updating the BIOS (I assume using the agesa version) to support the Phenom II x4? Bios here.

Bump, I also need a CPU whitelist removal. I'm looking to install an Athlon 2 x2 260.

Trying to make a Frankenstein computer for free out of the parts I have laying around.

Edit:

I have the same motherboard

[1234s282]

Ok, let's have a look .........

I finally managed to find the 5.12 bios download for your board - since HP changed their website so many of the old download links don't work and it looks like they've removed pages for a lot of the older BIOS updates :S - But I found it eventually!

The HP v5.12 BIOS has 12 AMD microcodes, and an AGESA version of 3.3.2.0 , there is also a "P6 Microcode" module which appears to be the equivalent of the NCPUCODE.BIN microcode module found in Award BIOS.

I had a look at the BIOS from the Asus Crosshair II Formula motherboard, as that does officially support the Phenom X4 945.It has an AGESA of v3.7.0.0 , however I don't think the AGESA simply being a higher version number means it'll support the X4 945...

I replaced the P6 microcode module with the NCPUCODE.BIN that I extracted from the Asus BIOS and inserted it into the HP BIOS and checked again. There were now 15 microcodes listed instead of the initial 12 , and one of the 3 extra microcodes that wasn't there before had a CPUID of 1043, which looks like the microcode for the X4 945!

Will keep looking .........

[JeanGab31]

hello @ll,

Since this Week End I'm trying to update the latest bios for the APX78-BN motherboard from HP to support a "new CPU".
At this time, this configuration is running latest HP available bios (5.12, file sp43067.exe I canpost if you need it) and uses CPU ADX250OCK23GQ.
I want to use CPU athlon 2 x2 280 model ADX280OCK23GM[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_AMD_Athlon_X2_microprocessors#cite_note-7][/url].
So I had  alook using mmtool and add some cpupatch from other motherboard such as M3N78-VM-ASUS-1801.ROM.
I flashed my bios using afuwin but still my x2 280 is not recognize, I get unsupported cpu mesage.
So I think it's time to ask for some help, since I'm pretty sure it is not enough (I mean patching) and it's linked to AGESA version which is !!AGESA V3.3.2 (I get it by editing the original bios with my hex editor).

So do you have a way to go or can you help me adding this CPU to the supported list ?

Thanks a lot.

PS: I've all the files if you need to get them, just let me know.

[DeathBringer]

Post screenshots of first (CPU) & third (Mainboard) tabs of CPU-Z with native CPU.
And make & post a foto of the screen with error.

[JeanGab31]

Post screenshots of first (CPU) & third (Mainboard) tabs of CPU-Z with native CPU.
And make & post a foto of the screen with error.

Hello,

Thanks for your interest. Sorry to say that the error is from bios string and very fast displayed before any POST (so that after 5 seconds of power the computer immediatly shuts down). Anyway I'll post you ASAP a screenshot of CPUZ (CPU and mainboard) with the working athlon 2 x2 250.

Regards.

[DeathBringer]

Your case looks like this one.
Try to flash my mod.
If new CPU boots than make & post a screenshot of regedit with expanded key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\System\CentralProcessor\0
A new screenshot of CPU-Z is needed too.

[JeanGab31]

Your case looks like this one.
Try to flash my mod.
If new CPU boots than make & post a screenshot of regedit with expanded key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\System\CentralProcessor\0
A new screenshot of CPU-Z is needed too.

Hello again,

I'm back to all my servers and PCs.
So first thanks for this mod I'll give it a try in a few minutes.
But as per request here are the screenshots from CPUZ.
Don't know how you guess I was running Windows .... :p So that's a chance since I plan to run also Ubuntu 16.04. So that I'll be able to send you the registry entry also.

Regards

[JeanGab31]

Your case looks like this one.
Try to flash my mod.
If new CPU boots than make & post a screenshot of regedit with expanded key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\System\CentralProcessor\0
A new screenshot of CPU-Z is needed too.

Here it is !!

So it's booting fine and detecting the model and speed.
Here is the exported reg entry (sorry I forgot I mentionned running afuwin so that of course you were aware I was running that OS:-)).

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\System\CentralProcessor\0]
"Component Information"=hex:00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00
"Identifier"="AMD64 Family 16 Model 6 Stepping 3"
"Configuration Data"=hex(9):ff,ff,ff,ff,ff,ff,ff,ff,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00
"ProcessorNameString"="AMD Athlon™ X2 280 Processor"
"VendorIdentifier"="AuthenticAMD"
"FeatureSet"=hex(4):fe,7d,3b,24,00,00,00,00
"~MHz"=dword:00000e10
"Update Revision"=dword:010000c8
"Update Status"="Success"
"Previous Update Revision"=dword:00000000
"Platform Specific Field1"=dword:010000c8

Then some differences with previous CPU I can see, stepping and revision, also seems the enhanced speed step makes it running at lower speed when idle but I get a look on the speed when launching some apps and it's reaching the full 3.6 GHZ speed.

One question: which piece of soft do you use to get the assembler code ? (my understanding is that you made a tricky working mod)...

thanks,

regards.

ps : just let me know if you need to have some other try or trace.