To flash new bios or not to flash!

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Hi–hope someone can give me some info or help with the following: My Sony laptop, model VGN-SZ450N recently died. The motherboard had fried and I got a new one through ebay. (the machine is 2.5-3 yrs old and no longer on warranty). I swapped out the motherboard and also changed the OS from Windows Vista (original machine) to Windows 7 Pro after I had checked the Win 7 hardware compatibility app check. Other than an issue with the fingerprint reader everything showed ok to upgrade. Anyway, except for some tweaking on the Nvidea video card drivers, everything worked fine when I fired it up. However I soon realized after unplugging the power adapter that everything was not fine. 5-10 seconds after unplugging the power and relying on the battery, the machine totally powers right off. I mistakenly thought that the battery was the problem, so I bought a new battery, but that also did not help. This led me to believe that either the motherboard was faulty or it was a Windows 7 OS problem with power management. I disabled all power management, but still it shuts down. It works fine on adapter and also the battery icon shows charging to 100% on both batteries. Upon further discovery, both on Sony’s hardware/machine ID app and also a 3rd party hardware identity app (Everest) I discover that the new motherboard (which had a sony stamp, and the same part number as the original, now shows that the laptop is model VGN-SZ220. Upon checking my bios version and checking Sony website for updated bios versions, I find that both my original model SZ450N and the SZ220 BOTH have updated bios versions. I understand that I may have a fix for the battery issue or power management if I do a bios flash, but which one should I choose. I do not know if they are both the same (website does not say) and if it is safe to go ahead. Any thoughts or help would be much appreciated as I do not want to do the wrong thing and render my laptop useless. Sorry for the long read!

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Hi and welcome :),

I had to flash a Toshiba laptop BIOS a few hours ago for a relative, he’d bought 7 (easier than cleaning out malware, he thought) and wiped Vista but could get no Wireless connection, even though everything was installed ok, turned on, etc. The updated flash I found was for Vista and included updated drivers for the WLAN card (which failed to install on 7). Anyway, I’m guessing there was also a fix in the BIOS because after a reboot, it now works as intended :).

You position is a little different, I think.

First, have you checked with other users of both models that 7 actually works 100% with the relevant BIOS update?

Second, have you checked the filenames of the different ‘boards BIOS updates – they may be identical.

Third, does the flashing tool employed by Sony use an auto BIOS backup feature (or can you run a manual backup) and is there a way of reflashing back to the original if anything goes wrong?

I’m sure that other’s will have more things to add, take your time with this decision, it could be expensive.

Good luck ^^.

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Thank you very much for the reply, Andy. I took your suggestions into consideration and called Sony. A tech rep told me the flash bios has no backup or reflash original so I have decided to use the machine as a desktop! At least until or if Sony releases a Win 7 bios version. I have lost my Vista copy because of the Win7 hardware compatibility app that told me everything would be ok. My fault for not trying to retain the Vista OS!. A lesson learned the hard way. Knowing Sony’s prior record, I won’t hold my breath waiting for the Win 7 Bios version for this laptop either.

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Yeah, I’d want to know for sure whether or not I could reflash back to the original bios if things didn’t work out.
but I would also do a search and see if I couldn’t find some means of coppying or backing up the current
bios before completely trusting some company tech rep. Sometimes they tell you whatever is easiest for them.

I’d also want to make sure I could do it from a bootable medium, like a USB stick, or if not a floppy,
a CD/DVD.

me 2 cents

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