Member Avatar for ktsangop

Hi everyone!

I'm having trouble on my hp laptop.
The system won't post, instead i get a blank screen and CAPS LOCK + NUM LOCK leds blinking twice, then pause, then blinking twice repeatedly.

According to hp support website this indicates : BIOS CORRUPTION

So i tried to clear CMOS the old way (remove CMOS battery etc...) but no hope.
After research i found out that the new UEFI/BIOS system stores extra information on a hidden hard drive partition and there is no documented way to flash your bios outside windows, neither on hp's website nor on Insyde's.

[I][B]from Wikipedia : [/B][/I]
Extensions to EFI can be loaded from virtually any non-volatile storage device attached to the computer. For example, an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) can distribute systems with an EFI partition on the hard drive, which would add additional functions to the standard EFI firmware stored on the motherboard's ROM.

Googling around i found that there is an emergency bios recovery method using a usb flash drive on boot.

http://www.bios-mods.com/forum/Thread-Recovering-From-A-Bad-Insyde-Bios-Flash

Anyway after a lot of struggle finding the right BIOS images etc, i couldn't manage to recover my BIOS.
According to the procedure mentioned above and on other websites when bios recovery completes the machine would shut down.
Mine doesn't...
:(

So i am pretty sure that, either i got the wrong bios file (quite impossible as i downloaded all available versions from hp's website), or the procedure cannot be completed because of a corrupted EFI partition on my hard drive.

I would appreciate any help from anyone that has faced the same problem!
Can i re-create the efi partition in any way?
Would it be helpful if i placed the laptop's drive in another machine as a slave disk and tried to check it for errors?

p.s. This problem was not a result of flashing the bios in the first place. It just happened...

p.s.2. Is there a slight chance that the BIOS chip on the motherboard is damaged?

Thanks in advance!

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  • Latest Post Latest Post by rameneater90

Dani AI

Generated

Practical recovery checklist (for ) that builds on 's point that the firmware lives on an on-board flash chip. Follow these steps in order, from least-invasive to most-invasive.

Try the official HP USB recovery flow first: on a working Windows PC run the HP BIOS download/utility for your exact product number and let it create a FAT32 USB recovery stick, use a USB‑2.0 port (not USB‑C), connect AC, then invoke the emergency recovery key sequence on the dead laptop. This is the supported route HP documents for notebooks. ()

If that fails, inspect the hard drive on another computer (SATA→USB adapter). Look for a small FAT32 EFI or an HP_TOOLS partition and backup any recovery files. If you need to rebuild an EFI partition to restore Windows boot files, you can use DiskPart and bcdboot from an elevated command prompt on the working PC:

diskpart
list disk
select disk N
create partition efi size=260
format fs=fat32 quick
assign letter=S
exit

bcdboot C:\Windows /s S: /f UEFI

(Adjust letters and sizes to your layout.) Microsoft documents how to recreate EFI and restore boot files. (learn.microsoft.com)

If USB recovery never completes or the flash is unresponsive, the next step is hardware‑level recovery: an SPI flash reprogrammer (or professional repair) can read/write the on‑board BIOS chip. That is an advanced, warranty‑voiding approach and requires the correct bin and tooling; community guides explain CH341A/flashrom workflows for this. For safety, consider an authorized service if uncertain. (winraid.level1techs.com)

Member Avatar for rameneater90

If it's the BIOS you say, that's not good. The BIOS has its own internal chip on the mobo, where it stores its firmwares, etc.

Anyway, try this:

I've done it before, it works well.

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