[Problem] Bricked TongFang GK7MRFR BIOS

BIOS/UEFI Modding BIOS Modding Guides and Problems
1

Hello everyone,

I am requesting urgent assistance to unbrick my laptop, a rebranded TongFang GK7MRFR (i7-10750H / GTX 1650 Ti) chassis. The laptop is completely dead following a faulty in-OS EC flash attempt.

I have successfully used a CH341A programmer and can read/write/verify both flash chips, but using my backups/extractions has failed to restore power. The root cause is likely a corrupted Intel Management Engine (ME) region or an incompatible EC/BIOS pairing.

System & Hardware Details

  • Barebone / Chassis: TongFang GK7MRFR

  • Rebrand: PC Specialist Optimus Series / XMG Core 17 (E20)

  • CPU: Intel Core i7-10750H (10th Gen)

  • GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 Ti

  • RAM: 32GB DDR4

Identified Flash Chips (Both 3.3V Confirmed)

  1. Main BIOS Chip (16MB): Winbond 25Q128JVSQ (BIOS)

  2. EC Flash Chip (1MB): GigaDevice GD25LQ80 (EC firmware)

Timeline of Failure & Prior Issues

The core issue before the brick was an erratic keyboard backlight that often remained off and did not respond to FN+F5/F6/F7 or Control Centre commands, nor later under linux (Confirmed as a fiddly EC issue).

  1. Originally ran BIOS N.1.03 stock, then couple years back updated to 1.04 from XMG/Schenker and everything was fine here (cant remember what files I used as lost the drive they where stored) .

  2. Asked PCS for a bios update in march last year and they sent over 2 files (1.06 Bios + 1.19 EC), after flashing under efi, noticed the keyboard backlight acting weird and mostly stayed off.

  3. Flashed XMG BIOS N.1.05. BIOS version changed to N.1.05, but EC remained 1.19.

  4. The Brick: Attempted to extract and flash a 64KB EC part from an old 1.04 file using dd and from the EFI shell flashed it with ifux64.efi .

  5. The flash completed, but after an EC reset, the laptop went COMPLETELY DEAD (no power LED, no charge indicator, no fans, no POST). Later realised the initial 64KB extraction/flash was faulty and corrupted the EC boot sequence.

Current Recovery Status (CH341A Attempts)

I have successfully performed the following steps using flashrom, but the system remains dead:

  1. Main BIOS Chip: Flashed my full working backup: bios_backup_GK7MRFR_N106.bin – Last working dump before updating to N1.05 verified working, 100% OK.

  2. EC Flash Chip: Flashed a newly extracted EC image from the XMG 1.05 ROM (EC_1MB_Extract.bin) to the EC chip. Unknown condition, file uploaded for verification**.**

  3. Conclusion: I strongly suspect the the EC provided by PCS wasn’t 100% fit and or Intel ME Region within my original 1.06 backup was compromised, or the 1.06 ME is incompatible with the 1.05 EC firmware, leading to a failure in the power-on handshake.

Request for Files & Guidance

I kindly ask the community for assistance with the following:

  1. Full SPI Dump: A complete dump from a working GK7MRFR system (any BIOS version, with a clean, configured Intel Management Engine (ME) region.

    If possible, and if i’m not asking for much a full unlocked SPI dump or assistance with modding/unlocking the BIOS after the restore would be greatly appreciated, as the locked nature may be hindering full recovery.

  2. Clean EC Firmware: The full EC firmware file (lastly installed was EC 1.19 but could be any vers as long as its paired with the BIOS) for the GD25LQ80 chip.

Guidance Needed: Please advise on the flashing order (EC or Main BIOS first if this actually matters?!?) and confirm which file should go to which chip.

Files I Am Uploading for Analysis


Edit by Fernando: Thread moved into the “BIOS Problems” Category and title shortened