Ok I will start with that
Can you solder/desolder yourself? Asking because if you can, and are good enough to not be concerned with that, might be a good test to see how the system acts with the backup BIOS removed, in case that may be the only way forward
Yes I can. I will do that and show you result.
By the way, as I told you before I can send you 1 barebone system with DDR memory like that you will have a system in your side.
I have a friend who can do that for me from HK.
Thank you
Salim
Great! I’m hoping if recovery is forced by simply updating the ME as mentioned above in test BIOS from previous page, then remove the backup BIOS and see if same or other issue occurs. I think it would stop any recovery check, attempt at recovery process.
Test post #100 with the board as-is first though, so if no recovery we can move forward one part at a time until we find the source of the recovery initiation.
I’ll send you PM on the send system, but I think it will be too costly in shipping $
Don’t worry I can handle that.
Most important for me is to use 7th Gen cpu
Did you test BIOS in #83 yet? How many of these do you own, why so important to spend so much money on multiple systems and possibly shipping around etc? Do you plan to get a lot and then re-sell, or is it for your offices or something like that?
Let me explain to you
now in my office i have 3 pieces, 2 of them have problems and 1 is completly new.
in HK, my friend have around 20 pieces which i want to buy it from him and plan to sell in our market but problem here is CPU price very high and intel 7th Gen is very low.
This is why i want to update CPU MC and use 7th Gen.
I can take risk to send 1 to you and at the end wining by installing i3 7th gen cpu. like thqt i can cover my loss.
Hope you understand my meaning.
Thank you
Salim
That sounds like you could make a very good profit then, now I understand why!
But, what if it’s not possible no matter what we do? I think we can, but you know, not everything we think is possible can always come true with computers 
Very good profit I dont think.
Just trying
But if I can make good profit i will share it with you.
Just help me to make it possible then dont worry.
Salim
Not good profit? I thought it sounded like it, since CPU is so cheap, and I assume good deal on the systems too.
NO way, I don’t want any profits, all yours!! I was only saying that being happy for you, to be able to make good $$ on resales
Waiting for your address.
Maybe not needed, did you start trying again yet or no? With advice on post #100 and #104?
Hi
Today I used my New programmer which I received last week and I programmed your File in POST #83 which come with only ME modified.
After i finished with that and power on my Computer; everything goes well and I didnt faced any problem with only problem of Fan speed which we can solve later.
Before I made changes to my bios; the old version was N11 2.t18 and now it is N11 2.30 with ME version 11.6.20.1221. Now I think we can move to another step and add CPU Microcode and check.
Hope we can win this time.
I will receive during this week and small quantity of Dell Optiplex 5040MT desktop and Optilex 3046MT desktop which are running Intel 6th gen cpu with same Chipset as HP Q170 but with only 1 Bios Chip. I need your help to add 7th Gen.
Link for Dell Bios:
https://www.sendspace.com/file/yz990r
Thank you
Salim
Nice, so success now vs before, that’s good! So what, maybe programmer problems before you think, since you already tested the ME only BIOS and it failed previously, correct?
If so, then maybe go ahead and re-test final BIOS I sent you with all mods once again, just to check and be sure it didn’t fail before because of programmer issues.
BIOS IN post #76, try again now with new programmer and only flash 16MB chip (If recovery happens, this may always be the case, so we may need to temp remove/disable that chip)
Dell I will look at for you too, 1 BIOS chip is better so we wont have to worry about auto-recovery! The BIOS link is for Dell 7040MT?
Hi
Today I didt what you asked me to do and i used file where everything has been modified.
After I powered on my AIO, it go directly to recovery and it install it and keep only ME updated to 11.6.x.x.
CPU MC still same.
VBioS same
…
Do you have any idea about HP Sure Start option which come with this kind of Desktops and AIO’s.
Check this attached file, I think after you read it you will know what is happening exactly.
Thank you
Salim
c05163901.pdf (610 KB)
Thanks for trying once more, at least now we know that happens even with good programmer too! I have not read the PDF yet, but will shortly. As of now, due to this recovery stuff, I think the easiest way to stop that is to remove the second BIOS chip.
I would say you can also desolder and raise it’s vcc pin (pin 8, opposite pine 1), but that is tough to do without breaking BIOS leg usually. If you have any low melt solder removing the chip is very easy even if you are not super good at soldering. Low melt solder can be purchased cheap on ebay.
Off to read PDF - * edit, still reading PDF, but I see here there may be a setting to change Sure Start from auto to manual (Maybe even disable?) - https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Notebook-O…en/td-p/6198623
See page one and two, one page two user says setting is at Security → BIOS SureStart - Uncheck “Sure Start BIOS Settings Protection” Discussed also on page 10 of the PDF
If the above setting does not allow reflash complete BIOS mod again, without recovery, then what I mentioned about removing that second BIOS chip may be only solution.
But I see there is error (31) mentioned for that corrupted or missing too, so there may be third “BIOS-like” chip we need to locate and remove/disable/blank etc. (Like EC FW Chip, but for Sure Start)
No matter what is actual solution, a non-HP loaded windows install is needed to, in order to disable or not have the HP Sure Start software-side stuff checking in the background too.
Hello
Please any nezs regarding Dell.
Today i will try again with HP and let you know
Dell? I was waiting on you, did you see my reply about Dell?
Yes the bios link is for Dell Optiplex 7040MT.
OK, I asked because you said two different models when you mentioned that, and neither were 7040MT, so I thought you sent wrong dump.
Yes, I checked above and you said "5040MT desktop and Optilex 3046MT" So which of the three is correct?