Gigabyte P34G UNLOCKED Bios

Hey guys!

This is my first BIOS mod so it took a while to figure out, but I've created an unlocked BIOS for the Gigabyte P34G.

I have tested this personally, and it seems to work fine, but the usual disclaimer applies. I am NOT responsible for any broken machines.

Turns out Gigabyte actually included a convenient "Hidden Function" switch (under Advanced), which, when set from ENABLED to DISABLED, unlocks a bunch of extra BIOS features, including:

Adjustable TDP in Intel XTU (disable Platform Power Limit Lock and Package Power Limit Lock in Advanced > CPU Configuration)
Variable Number of Cores
Disable Hyperthreading
And a lot more I haven't gotten a chance to explore yet!

Here's an album of all the unlocked menus: http://imgur.com/a/sHsRH

To flash, simply download and unzip the package, and run FLASH.bat.
Note that this
Please report back with any findings. Happy Exploring!

F303A
Download: https://mega.co.nz/#!Pcky1QCA!Ac9Ijx6soNoIaTzcWp5SdBy4QoJUr0ISasUlp1cJQAU
MD5: b3acbeefa34a5904f3802c0a34c60edb

F003
Download: working on it!
MD5: cdfd22862dd6b85be7acd2782e344a7f

 

Possible to disable hyperthreading?

 

Yes

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

I'm currently working on a mod for the F003 bios as well, if anyone wants to test, please PM me.

 

Hello,

Thanks a lot for this mod, much needed one...does this help to avoid the fan ramp up at 50 degree temp and control the fan in more optimal manner. Also can we go back to default bios by re-flashing to stock one once changed to the modded one.

Please let me know. And thanks a lot for your help.

 

In one of the images there are fan options. It seems you can select the fanspeed and the fan turn on treshold. Would be nice if someone could test this.

 

Hasn't been working for me, but someone else might be able to figure it out.

Yes, you can go back to the original with a simple reflash.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

Would suck of one of these unlocked options is broken and bricks the device though. Testing needed

 

I know I replied in the owners thread - but thanks a lot for finding this tocirahl .

Here's hoping we can use it to get the Notebook Fan Control to work and extend the battery life of the device .

 

Were you able to use any of these functions to modify the functioning of the computer successfully?

Thanks,
Peter

 

I've definitely been able to modify things like number of cores, unlocking things in xtu, turning off hyper threading etc.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

That's great . Have you seen an effect on battery life or noise/temps?

Thank you very much,
Peter

 

Temps are definitely lower battery life is about 30-40 minutes better.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

That's great to hear .

With what settings are you having such good results? Is it that the temps are lower so the fan doesn't trip anymore during light use (ie. on open a new tab, or window, etc..)?

All the best and thank you,
Peter

 

Can we solve the issue of processor running @0.77GHz on battery with this?

It's kinda frustrating when im using my laptopp on battery..

 

I actually was looking at the HEXUS review and thought this might solve it but I went through every screenshot in the album in this thread and none of them seemed to directly touch on this (though it may in one of the sub options).

It'd be great to have longer battery life when we need it - but to be able to bump it up to full for a few minutes to do something quickly - unless the physical hardware battery volt/amperage can't allow more than .77/1.3GHz max we should have that option....

Thanks,
Peter

 

Here's the guide I promised some of you. Sorry for the delay but finals and all that.

It's actually pretty easy:

1. Download AMIBCP from Prema's thread on Clevo BIOS Mods: CLEVO BIOS Mods & Ami Modding Tools
2. Download 7-zip or any other tool capable of unzipping exes: 7-Zip
3. Download the appropriate BIOS file from Gigabyte's Website: GIGABYTE - Notebook & Netbook - Notebook & Netbook - P series - P34G
4. Unzip your the exe you downloaded from Gigabyte.
5. Under the stuff you just unzipped, go to \BIOS\BIOS.BIN, and copy the file that's exactly 8MB to a different directory. It should be R3456BF.303A for the 303A BIOS and something that ends in F003 for the Win7 version.
6. Start up AMIBCP and open the file you just grabbed (R3456BF.303A). You may have to switch the file explorer to "show all files"
7. Once it's loaded up, under the "Setup Configuration" Tab you should see a blank folder. Expand it.
8. Click on "Advanced" and on the right side of the window, a bunch of options should pop up.
9. You should see under the "Control Group Structures" column, an entry called "Hidden Function." Set its "Access/Use" column to "USER" by double clicking the entry under "Access/Use" and switching it from the dropdown menu.
*Note that you can change any other option available in any of the submenus to "USER" to get them to show up, but I've found this to produce somewhat odd results occasionally. Feel free to experiment.
10. Save the modified BIOS (File > Save)
11. Change the BIOS extension to ".bin"
12. Back under the folders you extracted from the exe from Gigabyte, navigate to \BIOS\AFUEFI\WIN64
13. Copy everything in this directory to wherever your modified BIOS is saved.
14. Run the following command under an elevated command prompt window: afuwinx64.exe Modified.bin /gan
Replaced "Modified.bin" with the name of your BIOS.

That's it!

 

That's awesome thank you . I hoped on the site now and downloaded a copy of the AMIBCP 4.53 & MMTOOL 4.50.0.23 tool just incase - thanks a lot for posting this guide

Thank you tocirahl!

Peter

 

Thanks a lot!

I tried your guide and it worked ;-). I'm now on the modified version of the F003-BIOS.
I tried modifying the trigger points for the fan control to make the notebook a bit less noisy. I set the temperature trigger from 55°C to 63°C, but it doesen't seem to make any difference. Looks like the smart manager overwrites these values since the fan ticks in at 45°C on my P34G. Do you have any suggestions how to fix this?

 

Meh! I hoped I'd never be one of those posting something like this, but I'm afraid I have to.

Modified the BIOS, flashed, just after the text I think read something along "erasing...." the screen went blank and while the diodes and keyboard was still lit. Let it run for 10 minutes just to be sure something wasn't still working, then forced a reboot. No go. Unplugged both the main battery and the CMOS battery and made a few attempts. It don't boot. The diode to the extreme right stays lit and sometimes the HD-lamp flashes briefly when the CMOS is freshly cleared. Attempted the BIOS recovery procedure for AMI BIOSes as outlined here with a FAT16 formated USB drive and a FAT32 formated SD-card but no go. Finally I dug up a "2.5 sata laptop drive not in use, created a small partition on it with the BIOS file. The HD-diode lights up for a few seconds and I can feel the drive spin up, but before long it shuts down again.

To my knowledge I'm probably screwed, but I will have to read through some lenghty BIOS recovery threads before I give up. This is a nightmare as I likely will have to ship the laptop abroad to wherever Gigabyte has an European service center and its not warranty case. Worst possible timing too, the laundry machine just crapped out a few days ago, plus I'm absolutely scraped after Christmas and I'm in the middle of a breakup with my better half of the last three years. Great start of 2014!

Funny thing is that I had a private convo with tocirahl about the risks of BIOS flashing and how to mod the BIOS a while back. I decided not to crash test dummy his Win7 BIOS. Curiosity and lust to experiment finally took hold of me nevertheless I've flashed modified BIOSes several times before and this isn't exactly my first BIOS flash either, been flashing for 20 years. I don't know if it was the file itself that was borked or if I did something else wrong, but I do not hold anyone else but myself responsible.

Ah, sigh....sorry for the rant! If anyone have any ideas or input I'm all ears.


Mac

 

Dang Mac, I'm sorry to read that. I was away at a Monastery in the US since December 27th and I didn't have internet. I installed the unlocked BIOS that same day that I got my P34G (I'd downloaded it onto my N56 in advance). I didn't think to run the flash.bat at first and tried doing it manually, but that just gave me error: "Unable to start a Secure Flash session" - the bat file has a /gan attribute that works.

Flashing was smooth and went great (with the batch file), it took awhile to erase and less to write - my heart was pounding while it was doing both and I scarcely moved a muscle from when it started just incase, but it all went well. I have access to the Hidden Function right away. I do not know if it had any effect on me activating Windows (or if it was just that I overwrote the key when I installed the standard 8.1 trial key on upgrade).

One thing I found though is that the Thermal settings don't work. Changing the thermal cut offs has no effect in Windows 8/8.1 unfortunately. I can confirm though that the F303A Windows 8 BIOS that tocirahl worked fine on my machine (I like the fast boot of UEFI too much to go back to 7 ) so I didn't need F003.

This is all about me flashing the ready made file tocirahl posted, not modifying one myself.

I'm really sorry Mac that all this is hitting you all at once (and at all!) - I hope everything that can be recovered, will be. Sorry I can't give any suggestions but I wanted to share my experience.

Peter

 

@ CCz_Cataphract

As I stated initially, whatever went wrong was probably some error on my side. I've spent the last day trying all kinds of things getting it to initialize the recovery and read the ROM, but with no error messages on the screen there's little to go by. I the briefly flickering HD-light gives me a small glimmer of hope, but no matter what kind of bootable media and the setup of it nothing seem to work so I'm pretty certain by now that this is beyond what I can fix. About the only thing that remains is to try a bootable floppy over USB, however the 8mb BIOS file obviously won't fit I've bricked hardware in my time, mostly HDs dropped, fried by power wires lacking insulation and stuff like that, but never something like this. It sucks and I have a feeling its going to get expensive one way or the other. Also I was really enjoying this laptop, really awesome unit that smoked everything I threw at it.

BUT! There is one small chance, if anyone could take a couple of minutes and study the recovery partition!

It seems some AMI BIOS Gigabyte mobos have programmed the recovery stuff to look for a BIOS file on the recovery partition, at least on earlier models. If anyone still have this recovery partition, could you look into it and see if there's a BIOS file hidden somewhere on it? If you find one, what's the path and file name? File system (FAT32/NTFS)? Any scripts/.bat-files? What OS did your unit come bundled with? I got the P34G-version without OS so I never had the rec partition myself so my idea of it's contents is at best rudimentary.

Mac

 

Yep, I understood what you said and still said what I said

I followed these steps to try to help you: » How to: Make recovery partition visible in Windows 8 IT Blog. I then looked into the 4 hidden partitions I could then access. 3 were NTFS, the System partition was FAT32. The System partition was 256mb and not accessible. Another was a 300mb Windows 8 RE Tool partition. Another was 350mb and contained a Recovery directory that I took ownership of to access and was also just Windows RE recovery tools. The 20GB Recovery parition that I think Gigabyte placed on the system was accessible, but just contained a "RecoveryImagE" directory with a series of install.swm files in sequence.

Let me know if I can help further with more info,

Peter

I know that probably wasn't what you wanted to hear, and it may be the other partitions could be of some use

 

Thank you mate! This is good info even if it isnt what I hoped for. At least I know I have done all I can to fix it before sending it in. I have tried to locate the BIOS chip itself on the motherboard with a faint hope that it is not soldered on. If that was the case I could have bought another P34G, hotswapped the BIOS chip, flashed and swapped it back and returned the 2nd unit. Alas, I had no luck, it must be darn well hidden or simply very nondescript. I attempted googling the codes on a number of the chips on the mobo to identify them, but they are everything else but an 8mb AMI BIOS chip

I am gaming and working on my old laptop again, but I have to say after that glorious, vibrant panel of the P34G its not quite the same running at 1024x res with everything set to absolute low

Mac

 

Sorry to hear that man, I'd contact support and let them know something went wrong when flashing the BIOS and that you'd like to get it repaired. Then you can get whatever information on how to do it - note that depending where and how you purchased it you may have another warranty also (I know with my Dividend Visa I have 90 days coverage even if the device is lost or stolen or damaged or spilled on, etc..). It may be possible to start it as a warranty repair and then pay if they decide it is not covered - up to you of course.

I know though I'd hate to go back - I hope you can get it fixed and get back to it before too long

Peter

-----------

UPDATE: Please note that a 305 BIOS version was released by Gigabyte a few days after this post which improves the noise issues tremendously - it is highly recommended you update to it. Please see the P34G Owners Lounge and Fan Control Thread for more information.

 

Hi M4cr0s,
i am in similar trouble of my p34g. I have made a general Bios update from Gigabyte and now it is dead. Unfortunately i read that i don't recover the Bios myself. Have you shipped it back to Gigabyte and they repair it of warrenty?

 

I have had this computer for several months and I just have to vent. This is a horrendous piece of crap. I have an hp elitebook 2540p, an alienware m11x, a custom built desktop and this gigabyte p34g
I bought this thinking that this would be very good for gaming, boy was I wrong

Looking at the compoonents and comparing them to my other two laptops.
1- the touchpad is sticky, and innacurate.
2- nvidia optimus is the worse piece of forcefully fed garbage we endure without a choice. , no wonder amd is taking over the world, optimmus messes everything up, it DOES NOT WORK.
3- the keyboard is horrible, its like typing on a flat surface
4- the battery is hilarious, literally will last 1 hour or less, even when not playing, this is garbage
5- overal looks of the machine is cheap, looks like a cheap 200 buck laptop from radioshack
6- when not plugged in, it wont play games, the cpu clocks down too much in a pathetic attempt to "save power" cmon , really? what is the point of buying a "gaming" laptop if you have to be plugged in to play?
7- when you finally wrestle optimus , plug the computer to the wall, and are able to((for some reason) sit down to play, it overheats like a freaking stove in no time, cpu gets up to 84C, this is absurd, forcing you to turn it off and save your ridiculously expensive piece of crap laptop
Seriously, im not a fan boy, and I know the "i hate whatever's popular makes me cool"attitude , but if you are looking to buy a "gaming"laptop, just buy alienware. specs arent always all there is to it, and this computer is a living example. or better yet, if you have a desktop, just buy a good gpu and thats it.

I want to get rid of this and get a good desktop gpu.if this review does not scare you, I am willing to trade my p34g for a high end desktop gpu and some cash back.

(ps I wrote this while very angry, might come back and edit it)

 

Sorry to hear you're having issues with the laptop. I've had mine for just over 3 weeks and think it's quite awesome. While I agree that the touchpad is kinda so-so, I find the keyboard quite good.

I bought the laptop with the understanding that the gaming portion is probably best when plugged in so I don't have any issue with it clocking down to save power. If you want to game for hours and hours on battery power then get ready to buy a 20lb 17inch gaming laptop.

On battery with screen on about 40% brightness I get 4:30-5 hours of use which is more than fine for me. It seems your expectations were slightly skewed when you bought the P34G. The laptop is obviously meant to be a middle ground between someone who likes to game and someone who travels. Notice the laptop has a VGA port which is most often used by business travelers as a large percentage of projectors offer only VGA as input.

As for gaming while plugged in. I've played BF3, Titanfall Beta, Dishonored, Bioshock Infinite, Starcraft 2, Tomb Raider, Far Cry 3 (and the Blood Dragon spinoff), Crysis 2 & 3, and the new Thief game with 0 issues heat or otherwise. You may have gotten unlucky and got a faulty laptop.

Also, shouldn't this whole rant be in the main P34G thread not this BIOS thread?

 

Any news of an unlocked BIOS for the P34g v2???
I REALLY want it to OC the GPU

 

Hey!

Sorry to revive this thread after all this time, but did anyone test the "switchable graphics" options. I would find it very interesting if this meant one could actually choose the graphics card to be used (i.e. discrete or integrated).

Cheers

 

Will this work on a P34g V2-CF4? And if not where do I find a modded bios for this model? P34g V2

 

Anyone? Any Guidance?

 

I realise I'm digging up an old thread but I just wanted to say thanks, these instructions worked for modding my P35X V3 BIOS too.

 

Just reading through (I know it's an old thread!) but you can define which graphics card to be used from within the Nvidia Control panel. Just select the program you want the setting to affect and pick the card you want it to use. At least that's what I do on my P34w V3 so I'm assuming it's the same no?

 

Thanks a million! It was simple as pie. I modified my P35W V2 BIOS and got the menu unlocked. Hopefully and finally I can fix the throttling issues with this laptop. I´ve disabled the HT, anything else worth mentioning?

 

hello, can anybody upload a new link please? i want to modd my p34 to get better temperatures. thx

 

Any way of getting this work on an AORUS bios?

 

HI
Thanks for the procedure.
I just bought a Gigabyte P35X v6 and the first thing I usually do when buying a laptop is delete windows. I wanted to claim the value of windows that is already included in the total price of the product. For that reason I did not wanted to activate windows, but it seems that I need to enter into windows to flash the bios so I can change the booting options to boot from my boot pendrive so I can install any other system. Is that right???

Sheila

 

Hi,

What is the keyboard combination to force recovery boot when i can't access to the bios and even windows (PC brickec but still start (black screen)).

Thanks a lot
regards