Lenovo Legion T5-26AMR5 Desktop - Corrupt BIOS

Hello there.

I am working on a Lenovo Legion T5-26AMR5 desktop that currently has a corrupt BIOS and I have been unsuccessful thus far in trying to fix it myself.

This computer came to me initially with an error message that said “BiInitializeLibrary failed 0xc0000001” or “0135 fan error”. It would always be one of the two errors. It should be noted that when it produced the fan error, there was no physical problem with the fans. They were all spinning just fine.

I searched for this error online and discovered quite a few people had this very same problem with this very same computer and the ultimate solution was to flash a new BIOS and the problem would be solved.

The problem was, the provided BIOS update from Lenovo was meant to be flashed from within Windows and I was unable to boot Windows (or anything else for that matter) due to the error message when first powering on the computer. I could enter CMOS and I tried to load “Optimized Defaults” or to change boot order so I could boot off of a CD/USB, and while I could change those settings, it would never go beyond that error message after first turning on/rebooting the computer.

So then, I first removed the BIOS chip from the motherboard and attached it to a CH341A programmer with a 1.8V adapter and took an initial dump of the original BIOS. That file is attached to this post.

I erased the chip and then flashed it with the .bin from the Lenovo BIOS update and soldered the chip back to the motherboard.

Computer does turn on, but no POST. Fans spin, case LEDs illuminate, but nothing ever appears on the display. I let it sit this way for as long as 20 minutes and it never produces an image.

I reflashed the original BIOS back to the chip and the computer still does not POST now. At least before, the computer would POST, but now, even with the original BIOS back on the chip, the computer will not POST.

I compared the original dump with the BIOS update .bin in HxD and saw many large sections of code that are different from my dump and the update file. I assume some of it is vendor specific data like SN and whatnot, but I am not sure how to “merge” in that data from my dump and into the update file or if that is even the problem.

I was hoping someone could look at my dump and the rest of this info and possibly help me create a working BIOS file I can flash back to the chip to get this computer POSTing again.

Thank you in advance.

Computer information:

Model: Legion T5-26AMR5 Desktop (Lenovo) - Type 90RB
SN: MJ0G16B7
Motherboard Model Number: AMDP19ME2 VER:1.0
Original BIOS version already on chip: O4MKT23A (it seems. I was able to find this by searching the bin in HxD)
Lenovo BIOS Update: Here is the official Lenovo download page, but I have also attached it in a ZIP to this message.
BIOS Chip Model: MXIC25U12872F - (I think it might be worth noting that ASProgrammer and NeoProgrammer both detect the chip as MXIC25U12873F, which is incorrect. Mine is ends in 72F)

If you need more information, please ask and I will get it to you right away. Attached are my original BIOS dump and the update file from Lenovo.

Original BIOS dump

Lenovo Update File

Links above are at ZippyShare, since I still can’t seem to post attachments/upload.

I doubt that this is still a firmware problem. When using the original dump you should be able to restore the original boot behaviour…

And you very well may be correct. I considered that perhaps the BIOS chip itself may be faulty, but I am able to read and write to it using my programmer each time I’ve tried flashing a BIOS to it, so that makes me think that the chip itself is ok.

All I know is that the computer at least cleared POST (with bios error messages on the screen) before I did anything and then programming the chip with the latest update from Lenovo caused it to not POST at all and now, even with flashing the original BIOS back to the chip, it still does not POST.

It looks to me like the Lenovo update BIOS file has a lot of missing information that my original dump has which I guess is model, serial number info, etc. I was thinking that if I could get that information from my original BIOS dump and add that to the update file to make it a “complete” update, maybe it would work? I just don’t know how to do it myself.

@bvilletech When you wrote the original BIOS dump back to the BIOS chip with your programmer did you verify that the contents of the chip and the file match? It would be a good idea to rule out the possibility of a faulty BIOS chip.

Yes. I did verify it.

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