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    *FIX* Restoring HDMI-out for area51-m15x and Quadro 3600M

    Discussion in 'Alienware Area-51/Aurora and Legacy Systems' started by kampma, Sep 14, 2012.

  1. kampma

    kampma Notebook Enthusiast

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    Hello all,

    Needed to post this somewhere. A few users scattered across the internet were reporting the same issue that I had. Hope this helps someone.

    Originally purchased a 3600M (non-branded) card from an ebay user about a year ago to replace a burned-out 9800M GT. The card worked beautifully in my area51-m15x, except HDMI-out was no longer functional. I have the x36 system BIOS installed and video driver 186.91. When pressing "F2" to see the system BIOS during startup, on the first page, the video card bios was reported as "62.92.27.00.05". I believe this was an 'nvidia' or OEM 3600M VBIOS.

    A few days serious research into the issue revealed some area51-m15x users reporting their VBIOS as "62.92.27.00.09" with a 3600M installed. I flashed my card with the 62.92.27.00.09 HP vbios for 3600m, hosted at techPowerUp! :: Video Bios Collection . You can follow instructions posted here for flashing the VBIOS. Follow those instructions explicitly, but you can skip the parts about overclocking. Make sure you have an extra USB flash pen drive lying around that you can reformat with the 'HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool' hosted in the instructions. You'll then put the nvflash executable and VBIOS ROMs on it. Also take the instructions on "blind flashing" seriously. Make sure you also backup your current VBIOS. Flashing the VBIOS on your card is incredibly painless, but have a contingency plan in case something goes wrong. You will have to use special commands when flashing the new VBIOS with nvflash: " nvflash -4 -5 -6 VBIOSNAME.ROM" This will let you force a flash when the firmware image PCI subsystem ID does not match the adapter ID PCI Subsystem ID. Once I restarted into windows, I knew things were working as my screen resolution was goofed up. Fixed this using display properties. My button combo "Fn+F6" to flip between HDMI/LCD hasn't been working, but if I use "NVidia Control Panel," then select "Set up multiple displays" on the left, I can choose between the laptop display and/or the HDMI port. So happy to fix this, especially with Steam now has "Big Picture" available as a beta.

    PM me if you have any questions/updates.
     
    kampma, Sep 14, 2012
    #1