17 R4, bios recovery not working

Hi @rlongthorn  go to Dell Support How to Recover the BIOS and watch the video. For Dell Models released after December 2015, computer should have the on-board BIOS Recovery tool that is designed to recover a corrupted BIOS. Try the recovery process for notebooks:-

1. Ensure battery does not have less than 10% charge. 
2. Shut down notebook. 
3. With notebook turned off, disconnect the dc adapter from the notebook. 
4. Press and hold down both CTRL + ESC keys on the keyboard. 
5. While still holding down the CTRL + ESC keys on the keyboard. Reconnect the dc adapter and start up notebook. 
6. Wait until the BIOS Recovery page appears. Then release the CTRL + ESC keys. 
7. On the BIOS Recovery screen, select Reset NVRAM (if available). Press the Enter key and select the Disabled option. Press the Enter key to save this BIOS setting. 
8. Select Recover BIOS and press the Enter key to start the recovery process. 

Please share an update. Thank you. 

@crimsom
Thanks for your reply, yes i have tried the CTRL & ESC trick unfortunately it does not do anything when i reconnect the power cable. I have tired adding my own step and pressing the power button but this just starts the 7 beeps situation i described above.
I have even tried both CTRL keys and a combination of pressing the power button for different periods of time, nothing seems to work.

when i press the power button just once, the CPU fans spin up and stop 5 times before the 7 beeps is heard as the fans ramp up to full speed, if i press the power button once then followed by a long press of 4 seconds the CPU fans start up right away with keyboard backlight and then i get the 7 beeps plus the 3+3 lights.

Im convinced im missing a key press or have the incorrect bios for this system, even though the RCV file on the dell website says its the correct one. its got to be something simple!

Have you got any other suggestions friend? thanks for your time

Ry

Hi,

I am also stuck in the same situation as of today. I have tried all the troubleshooting tips provided by Dell, but no luck. I am desperate for help and any other suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

@rlongthorn  and @Mike Asare,

If you cannot boot BIOS Recovery from your EFI Partition (from your primary HDD).

Try creating a Dell Bootable USB. Follow these steps to guide you in creating your BIOS_IMG.RCV (download the your bios from Dell Support page). Good luck.

https://www.dell.com/community/Alienware-Desktops/Aurora-R6-BIOS-stuck-on-recover-BIS-after-a-failed-update/td-p/6234909

Thanks for the suggestion @Lunetrix

Unfortunately it did not work. I followed the steps and i continue to get the 7 beeps along with the 3 red + 3 blue light flash on the power button. 

Hi @rlongthorn  thank you for sharing an update. The 17 R4 system is very unhappy and the on-board diagnostics is telling user:-  

• POST (power-on self-test) tries to find all the devices on the 17 R4. POST tries five times to start the 17 R4 (CPU fans spin 5 times and stop), but does not complete. BIOS/UEFI cannot tell the operating system to start. 
• 7 beeps are given = Central Processing Unit (CPU) Failure. POST is saying CPU failure, but this could be a false positive because CMOS has 'lost' its storage of the BIOS settings. Hardware settings, system time and date are the parts of BIOS settings. Replacing the coin battery is the common CMOS fix. 
• 3,3 diagnostic light code = Recovery image not found. Somehow the recovery partition on the OS (C:) drive is not found (deleted) and/or has been corrupted. On-board BIOS recovery is not available. The F12 Dell ePSA Enhanced Pre-Boot System Assessment is not available. 

The reanimation of this 'dead' system must now come from an external source. A possible fix would be to swap out the problematic OS drive and install the cloned OS drive. Then repair BIOS/UEFI by using the on-board BIOS recovery and/or the F12 Dell ePSA Enhanced Pre-Boot System Assessment. If there is no cloned OS drive, or if you do not have another Dell computer, see if a Dell user will create a cloned Dell OS drive for you or get this from eBay, etc. If not possible, explore purchase of a replacement fully functional OS drive from Dell Support. Then repair the BIOS/UEFI. Hopefully the problematic OS drive can now be changed to a storage drive so that its content can be accessed. 

Please share an update. Thank you. 

@Crimson 

thank you for your detailed reply, what you say makes sense but I have 2 questions if you don’t mind me asking.

1.in my situation, is it now only possible to restore bios from a recovery partition on the boot drive? IE. Is a USB recovery not possible? If so why does dell post a bios recovery image on the support site specifically for this machine with instructions on how to load it via USB? 

2. My boot drive is not how it was when the laptop left the factory, I have since installed an upgraded nvme drive & the cloning / copying process of the original  probably did not copy over the recovery partition properly.

I do have access to a dell xps but not another 17 R4, would it be possible to use the OS recovery partition from the xps to get my machine working?

I ask this because you say to ask another dell user to clone their drive and not another R4 user, so is there a possibility of cross compatibility of the recovery partition to ‘jump start’ my machine?

if so can I just clone the recovery partition or do I need the full drive including all partitions? If this is the case I can’t see another user giving me a copy of all of their full drive including data.

Again, thanks so much for your help.

it is very much appreciated. 

Hi @rlongthorn thank you for sharing an update. Will try and answer your questions in the same order as posted. Not going to use a question (Q) to answer (A) format and cannot use numbered answers because all the questions were not numbered. So this Reply post might require looking at a number of times. 

Dell tries to help, but this help assumes that its assistance can work on a computer that is not so far gone, that targeted help cannot give the repair. Computers are very old at four years. 

If your cloned drive was working, it is easy to apply hindsight and now say should have gone to Disk Management to check that the 'invisible' partitions were also cloned. Using good cloning software will use images to tell user that all partitions are or are not cloned in accordance with user instructions, for example Acronis True Image OEM.  

Cloning disk from any recent Dell computer is essential so that all the recent BIOS recovery software is included. Then use F12 at splash screen to repair BIOS. Windows OS will then start and use the default drivers on the cloned disk. Windows OS and Dell SupportAssist will get 17 R4 specific drivers when access to internet is restored. 

A Dell cloned OS drive from your Dell XPS OS drive is suitable, to jump start the Dell Alienware 17 R4 OS drive. (note emphasis on Dell.)

The cloned OS drive requires all partitions to be installed (just like the Factory OS drive did). During subsequent use the cloned OS drive will automatically update the recovery partition for use on the 17 R4 (just like the Factory OS drive did). 

Hope this helps. Gook luck with getting the Alienware 17 R4 to work. (When it is all up and running, create another fully cloned OS drive, as part of disaster recovery.) 

Please post an update. Thank you. 

you guys tried entering the bios refresh tool option in the F12 boot sequence?

that’s how I refreshed my bios when it got corrupt.

@Alienware Area-51 ALX 2006 

These guys say they have tried all the troubleshooting tips provided by Dell and they do not work. Usually the ePSA diagnostics can be executed during the system boot process. Neither of these guy's POST completes, their bricked BIOS/UEFI, and their USB recovery drive no not provide the F12 Dell ePSA option.

A possible fix would be to swap out their problematic OS drive and install their cloned OS drive. Then repair BIOS/UEFI by using the on-board BIOS recovery and/or the F12 Dell ePSA Enhanced Pre-Boot System Assessment.

(Dell ePSA User Guide: Power up the system and then press the F12 key during the boot process to get to the BIOS Boot Menu. It may be necessary to repeatedly press the F12 key during the boot process to get the BIOS to recognize the F12 key at the correct time. Use the up and down arrow keys to select Diagnostics on the menu and press the Enter key.)  

So we have to wait till they come reply back then right?

'This is the way' says the Mandalorian. 

probably is ~ Yoda or something.

Hey @crimsom sorry for the delay, its taken a few days for me to get my hands on the XPS, then turn off bitlocker and clone the NVMe drive, so I have an update however its not good news.

I cloned the XPS including all partitions and verified afterwards, installed the NVMe back in my R4 and its exactly the same, 7 beeps and flashing lights, I never mentioned before but I don't get anything on the display, the backlight doesn't even come on.. only the RGB on the keyboard and the screen bezel. Should i be able to see something to access the F12 recovery?

I then made a DELL approved bootable USB as per the suggestion from @Lunetrix suggested, using both the writeHDR file and the RCR file direct from the dell BIOS_IMG.RCV direct from the support site for my machine on the root of the USB. Again this did nothing, 7 beeps and 3,3 flashes, Tried all USB ports and different presses of the power button.

I cant believe a BIOS update has bricked the machine to this level, I'm a bit peed off that dell wont support the machine yet they are happy to hand out updates that could potentially brick it in an instant.

Have you any further suggestions? - Thanks for your time.

Ry