Dell Vostro 3450 Advanced Options unlocking in progress

[TimeWalker]

Could you snap a pic of the Thermal management section?
This is what I was looking forward to for ages now ..

Also could you specify the byte offsets at least? As looking for 82 45 8A 00 bring up 3 occurrences:

[HairyCube]

Here you go:
http://imgur.com/G8ACJ
Sorry I don't remember the exact offset for it, but it should be safe to change all 82 45 8A 00 to 82 45 8A 01. My PlatformSetupAdvancedDxe.efi (or whatever it's called) has all of them set to 01 and it's working fine.

[TimeWalker]

Wow, this is indeed what I was looking for as the FAN noise was killing me!
This random discovery is absolutely remarkable !

Must be this then: 00 20 00 29 02 0A 82 45 8A 00 has just 1 occurrence at


Yup, it's this one indeed. Thanks for the heads up! I guess you need to inform the guys over at XPS thread about your findings
I have cranked up the 55C mark to 63C (also enabled PTID again) and I'm now in hight hopes of absolute silence while doing office work.

[HairyCube]

Glad I could help. If you ever manage to unlock any other options in the setup menu for 3450, please post your findings here.
I have no clue about unlocking Intel Management Engine and Internal Graphics Device options as of yet...

[TimeWalker]

Until the guys find a proper way of doing crisis recovery I wouldn't advice you do any mayor tinkering actually.
At least I'm not doing any myself as I know this might end bad .. like real bad. But I'm sure I will be looking into the modules in my spare time.

[HairyCube]

Well, logically thinking, if you mess up the Advanced Setup module only, you'll still be able to boot into Windows and flash a different BIOS Though I do agree it's kinda risky...

[TimeWalker]

I agree, but God knows what might happen if you mess up the advanced setup menus and something boot-related will get f-uped down the road...
Here's the updated A04 which includes unlocked thermal configuration: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2573233/V3450_THRM_A04.zip

[HairyCube]

Maybe we could try comparing default DSDT settings in A04 and A11 because later versions seem to have some variable set to a different value that enables switchable graphics mode selection in Catalyst Control Center... perhaps setting this variable to some other value will turn off switchable graphics completely, but I'm just guessing.
Here's a full DSDT dump for A11: http://pastebin.com/CBUDPKkh

[TimeWalker]

I prefer to compare decompiled stuff

Here is the A04 -> A11 diff:

Code:

18a19
> External (\_SB_.PCI0.PEG0.PEGP.DD02) <- DD02 is your LVDS display when discrete GPU utilizes it.
112d112
< Name (SLPO, Zero)
130c130
< OperationRegion (GNVS, SystemMemory, 0xBAF42E18, 0x01B0)
---
> OperationRegion (GNVS, SystemMemory, 0xBAF41E18, 0x01B0)
352c352,353
< OPTF, 8,
---
> OPTF, 4,
> SLPO, 4,
655c656
< OperationRegion (PNVS, SystemMemory, 0xBAE0D018, 0x100E)
---
> OperationRegion (PNVS, SystemMemory, 0xBAE0C018, 0x100E)
3764a3766,3769
> If (LEqual (BRID, One))
> {
> Notify (^^^PEG0.PEGP.DD02, 0x86)
> }
3959a3965,3968
> If (LEqual (BRID, One))
> {
> Notify (^^^PEG0.PEGP.DD02, 0x86)
> }
4055a4065,4068
> If (LEqual (BRID, One))
> {
> Notify (^^^PEG0.PEGP.DD02, 0x87)
> }
4247a4261,4264
> If (LEqual (BRID, One))
> {
> Notify (^^^PEG0.PEGP.DD02, 0x87)
> }
5375c5392
< Zero,
---
> One,
5939a5957,5960
> If (LEqual (BRID, Zero))
> {
> Store (Zero, SLPO)
> }

< means it was removed
> means it was added

As you can see 8bit register OPTF was split into two 4-bit > OPTF and SLPO to allow for monitor sleep/wake functionality (used in _PTS (Prepare to Sleep) and _WAK (Wake) ACPI methods) when discrete GPU is chosen in manual mode.

Also notifications to LVDS were added (0x86 and 0x87) ... the same way IGPU is being notified, when EC queries Q80 and Q81 are executed (these are executed when you increase or decrease brightness using hotkeys from the keyboard). It just involves an additional check to determine if discrete GPU is set as active.

Here's a decompiled dsdt dump from both absolutely clean bios flashes (no mods): http://puu.sh/19JHH

[dexz]

Great work guys and thank you!!! keep it up.. Can't wait for our notebook to boot on UEFI.. Hahaha.. Oh man.. you guys make my day.. yahoo! Anyway thank to TimeWalker for the info.