Hello, ppl
I have some trouble with asus nb (n73sm) - it doesn’t boot from internal card reader. When the card sits inside during turn-on and entering bios - there’s no “mass media” device detected, so no way to select it as first boot-entry.
I also have another nb - k50id - and is does boot from sd-card, placed in internal card-reader ok. When the card sits inside during turn-on and entering bios - there is a “mass media” device detected (smth. like “USB Multicard”).
What i tried/know so far (no positive result reached yet):
- updated nb bios to latest stock 302
- modified original 302 bios (ami IV) so that all options are unlocked (there’s “USB config” in Advanced, but nothing helpful there) and flashed it; tools used: amibcp_v4-55-0070, mmtool_v4-50-0023
- both nbs (n73sm and k50id) utilize Alcor Micro Usb2 card reader, sitting on usb (no pci/pci-e card-readers involved in this case)
- i noticed, that n73, upon booting to OS win7 with inserted card - there’s no card discovered in “my computer” until i re-insert it - wtf? some weird hw solution? or alcor driver, loaded by os, somehow “enables” chip?
Any ideas what to do next?
p.s: if needed - i can get close pictures of motherboard near alcor chip
so i looked further into this card "re-insertion" thing:
turned out, n73sm has au6437 chip (vs au6433 on k50id), that incorporates "power-saving mode". so i tied pin 43 low (soldered 0-ohm link), and now upon booting win7 card reader always present, no matter if card is inserted or not
but
it has absolutely no effect on bios detecting "usb multicard"-like device, so still unable to boot from card-reader
any ideas? now, when hw stuff looks 2b out of the picture, it definitely must be bios
p.s.: an alternative solution came to me: jump-wire data+/data- from au6437 to one of the back-side usb-ports;
pros: probabl boot problem will go away
cons: minus one usable usb2 port
- also, while in n73 bios on advanced->usb configuration tab i noticed:
1 keyboard, 1 mouse, 2 hubs
could it be, that if internal card-reader is connected via “hub” (vs directly to south bridge) - it’s not detected by bios?
new stuff:
- cougarpoint-m pch, which is incorporated into n73s*, has 14 usb ports; card-reader is connected to port11 (0-based)
+ there’s a possibility, that bios skips enumeration of certain usb ports (hardcoded balcklist, containing webcam, bt AND card-reader) for boot speed up
need to find that module (possibly “usb mass storage”) and fix it - no luck so far
update: so i managed to re original bios module usbrt, and found that in latest version (302) the OemSkipList-based mechanism is not yet implemented, and this is very strange, because a fix EIP51653 is commented in sources and dated 4/06/11, and bios itself is dated 2012)
the only check inside USBIdentifyAndConfigureDevice is of dev-compatibility (USBCheckNonCompliantDevice sets incompat-flags)
patched it to skip this check
still not working…
+also tried patching uhcd module, to skip check of flags USB_FLAG_MASS_MEDIA_CHECK (USB_FLAG_MASS_SKIP_FDD_MEDIA_CHECK) - for the case, when no media in device - no results
any more ideas?