XPS 8900 ERROR - (A7) Me FW Downgrade - Request MeSpiLock Failed

Hi,

I have a XPS 8900 I purchased from Costco about 2 months ago.  Just this month I have had my system freeze on me 7 times.  It boots up ok but freezes randomly while I am logged in on the internet or in outlook.  I have had to do cold boots. This last cold boot I did today I barely saw the message "Request MeSpiLock Failed" as it was booting up.

Costco tech support asked me to did a system restore which didn't help and another time ask that I do a rebuild to earlier version of Windows 10.  I don't have high hopes that this last change will help.

Do you think the steps you listed in your post on 1/15/16 at 6:38pm would fix my problem?

Thanks - Joanne

Hey Joanne,

My steps were for the mespilock message in regards to freezing on start up, I don't think those steps will help your issue. I actually returned my first xps 8900 and got a new one about two weeks ago, the new one is okay-ish but I still see the mespilock message when starting up sometimes and it still freezes like yours on the internet. The best advice I have for you is to use Google Chrome, most of my issues have been because of Microsoft Edge. 

Hi Joanne!

I have the same problem with my two month old XPS 8700 bought directly from Dell...

It's now frozen solid with "(A7) Me Fw Downgrade Request MeSpiLock failed on the primary screen" during the boot process.

On a different PC I can't submit a Service request. Dell System says "Error while... try later".

Did you find a solution?

Or do you know what the problem is?

Arnold

Hi Arnold,

My XPS 8900 would freeze once or twice a week while I was on internet and/or outlook which is different from you in that yours is doing it doing the boot up.  This is what one person on dell forum did to fix his boot up freeze issue:

• Dell customer support wasn't able to help me fix this issue. Luckily I've got a bit of experience with computers and was able to figure it out. Basically, my XPS 8900 started freezing at start up (at the Dell logo) and would either remain frozen or black out the screen with the error message, (A7) Me FW Downgrade - Request MeSpiLock Failed.
•  
• So, for anyone else unfortunate enough to encounter this error, here's the fix;
•  
• - Start Computer
• - Press F12 at the Dell logo (May require wired keyboard)
• - Select "Change Boot Mode Settings"
• - Select "Legacy Boot Mode, Secure Boot OFF"
• - Apply changes
•  
• - Computer will restart, press F12 again at the Dell logo
• - Select "Windows Boot Manager"
•  
• - Computer will start as normal. Log in. Once on your desktop, restart computer
• - Press F12 at the Dell Logo
•  
• - Select "Change Boot Mode Settings"
• - Select "UEFI Boot Mode, Secure Boot ON"
•  
• The computer should then start normally and you should have no more issues. 
• Hopefully I can help at least one person with this information, I was tearing my hair out in frustration. Have a good day :)

I had Costco tech support try to assist me last week and they did a rebuild which is to rollback changes from last update to Windows 10.  I don't know if this really caused my freeze up but it has been working so far...knock on wood.  I hope the above steps help you out.

Hi Zaschark!

Thanks a lot for that recipe; it worked greatly.

The message disappeared and no more "system freezes" for a couple of hours now thanks to you.

I remember now that this problem occurred when an automatic Microsoft Windows update 

"Intel Corporation driver update for Intel(R) HD Graphics 530" failed and I had to manually power off the XPS 8900. After that, the system was kind of "out of sync"...

Things went from bad to worse over a week.

That update is still in the Windows update queue.

Do you think I should let it run?

Thanks so much for your clear and concise directions and  so for we have successfully re-booted several times without that disturbing message.  What a shame though, the first Dell that presented this problem was returned and we were flabbergasted to see the same message on the new replacement Dell.  The first time it happened, Best Buy Geek Squad said it was a hardware problem and to return the PC, well now we know better.

Again, thanks so much,

Sincerely,

Sandi

Bad news...

The PC ran fine for 3 to 4 hours but then it froze again, I had to Power OFF, the message reappeared, I did the procedure again... and after few minutes it froze again, etc again and again.

But the situation has evolved : The PC does not boot anymore!!!

What's the procedure to get a replacement?

That's a 2 months old XPS 8900 that I bought to replace a running fine 3 years old XPS 8500 that did not support Windows 10...

I wasted at least one week on that problem.

Thank you for helping, I appreciate, but I am so *** off!

Could you please tell me what's the procedure to get a replacement?

Hi!

That procedure worked fine in the sense that the message "(A7) Me Fw Downgrade Request MeSpiLock Failed" disappeared.

However, that message was consecutive to repeated manual Power OFF made necessary by number of random system Freeze ups.

These random system Freeze ups themselves were caused by an automatic driver update "NVIDIA Geforce GTX 745" that failed last Jan. 31. Additional drivers updates and few driver roll backs for "NVIDIA Geforce GTX 745" also failed. Dell diagnosis reported no problem.

Somehow, at one point after days rolling back the driver worked and resolved the freeze up problem. Like if the driver was just partially updated...

Conclusion : the problem is resolved, but I don't really understand why, and I feel that one of the coming days I will face it again.

Thanks!

Dear Zaschark

I have tried this twice

Windows Logo appears but unfortunately the screen freezes gain. Alos I eas 2 hours with MSN Support on a chat and wetried to sytem restores with two differnt dates , nothing changed to the issue.

Any idea from your side please ?

Thank you

Hi Characato!

My problem disappeared entirely two weeks ago and I don't understand what happened.

For 2 or 3 weeks, my system was freezing up randomly (after few or several minutes or few hours of operation). This forced me to cold reboot every time. Dell diagnosis were reporting no error.

At one point, I discovered that automatic driver update "NVIDIA Geforce GTX 745" failed last Jan. 31.

I rolled back the driver. After several reboots, no freeze up anymore!

So I guess you could check if driver updates have failed recently and do a roll back.

I know how frustrating this problem is.

I hope this will help and wish you good luck!

I pinged my Dell tech contacts about the "Me FW Downgrade - Request MeSpiLock Failed" error message.

Appears to be a problem with Win 10 and BIOS because it's being seen on systems from multiple manufacturers, including from Microsoft.

I've asked Dell if they have any suggestions how to resolve this. In meanwhile you can do some homework to see if anybody posted a fix in some other forum that will work on your PC...

Will post back if I hear anything from my tech contacts.

I believe this response has the best solution:

http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/desktop/f/3514/t/19665996?pi21953=1

The ME is INTEL MANAGEMENT ENGINE.

SPI lock has to do with failed bios update and internal MANANGEMENT ENGINE FIRMWARE.