[Guide] Dell XPS 13 9333 using Clover

[the-braveknight]

Can you be more specified please? I downloaded the firmware for 8-series in my case, but how will I flash it? What tool did you use to do it and how?

Thanks!

 

[vbo]

Can you be more specified please? I downloaded the firmware for 8-series in my case, but how will I flash it? What tool did you use to do it and how?

Thanks!

I think you're off to a wrong start since I believe haswell mobile (going by your profile) is 9 series, ME tools 9.5.
I encourage you to read through the linked thread thoroughly to make sure you use the right tools and understand what/how to flash your firmware.
As far as what tool and how, the tools are packaged with the firmware on that website (see section C2). You can flash either from windows, DOS (such as a freedos usb key, what I used), or directly from the UEFI.

For the cliff notes of how to do a simple upgrade, see my post in that thread I linked to above: Laptop won't sleep/shutdown after a few hours of uptime

 

[the-braveknight]

Okay will try that.

But can I actually flash MEI firmware if the MEI is not detected itself?

 

[vbo]

Okay will try that.

But can I actually flash MEI firmware if the MEI is not detected itself?

I don't know, I never had that issue.
All I'm trying to say is that (IMHO) trying to patch OSX to go around the problem will not give you a satisfactory result. You need to fix the MEI problem as there's no good way to go around it.
Your options as I see them are 1. try to reflash the bios. 2. try to reflash the MEI firmware. 3. get a replacement motherboard.

 

[the-braveknight]

I don't know, I never had that issue.
All I'm trying to say is that (IMHO) trying to patch OSX to go around the problem will not give you a satisfactory result. You need to fix the MEI problem as there's no good way to go around it.
Your options as I see them are 1. try to reflash the bios. 2. try to reflash the MEI firmware. 3. get a replacement motherboard.

I see. Thank you anyway

 

[CoBrA2168]

I don't know, I never had that issue.
All I'm trying to say is that (IMHO) trying to patch OSX to go around the problem will not give you a satisfactory result. You need to fix the MEI problem as there's no good way to go around it.
Your options as I see them are 1. try to reflash the bios. 2. try to reflash the MEI firmware. 3. get a replacement motherboard.

vbo,

I also have a question in regards to the MEI firmware upgrade. Which version are you running? I plan on installing Windows on this laptop before putting on El Capitan so that I can upgrade the MEI firmware. From the link you posted above, I'm guessing I need to use the 9.5 utility to update the MEI firmware on my laptop.

I will also post back with any questions/problems I run into when I get around to installing El Capitan on this laptop.

Thanks,
Josh

 

[xcaret]

[GUIDE] Dell XPS 13 9333

Found your problem:

You must have updated your version of iasl since you last disassembled your linux dump. The one I was using was from 2013-11-15 and it worked fine. However, I was able to reproduce your issue with newer versions of iasl. Turns out the disassembly is different:

Before update: External (_SB_.PCI0.PEG0)
After update:  External (_SB_.PCI0.PEG0, UnknownObj)

which broke one of my patches.

It's fixed now, just update your repo (only 1 file was changed, patches/syntax_dsdt.txt) and it will work fine.

Intel ACPI Component Architecture
ASL Optimizing Compiler version 20140926-64 [Oct 16 2014]
Copyright (c) 2000 - 2014 Intel Corporation

ASL Input:     patched/dsdt.dsl - 15449 lines, 480344 bytes, 5976 keywords
AML Output:    build/dsdt.aml - 61098 bytes, 1836 named objects, 4140 executable opcodes

Compilation complete. 0 Errors, 51 Warnings, 83 Remarks, 189 Optimizations

Hi vbo,

I am trying to patch my DSDT/SSDT files as well but I am getting the same error message as this post "Compilation complete. 81 Errors, 53 Warnings, 70 Remarks, 195 Optimizations"

I am running the following iasl:


Intel ACPI Component Architecture
ASL+ Optimizing Compiler version 20160422-64(RM)
Copyright (c) 2000 - 2016 Intel Corporation

Any help will be deeply appreciated.

 

[vbo]

vbo,

I also have a question in regards to the MEI firmware upgrade. Which version are you running? I plan on installing Windows on this laptop before putting on El Capitan so that I can upgrade the MEI firmware. From the link you posted above, I'm guessing I need to use the 9.5 utility to update the MEI firmware on my laptop.

I will also post back with any questions/problems I run into when I get around to installing El Capitan on this laptop.

Thanks,
Josh

That's correct, you need the 9.5 utilities and the corresponding 9.5.xx.xx firmware. I haven't updated the firmware since 2015 because I haven't needed to. The firmware shipped with the Dell BIOS is severely outdated, but any firmware since 2015 fixes the sleep issue.

Note that you don't need to do a full windows install if you only want to flash the firmware. You can do this from a dos prompt (e.g. from a freedos USB), or directly from the EFI.

 

[vbo]

Hi vbo,

I am trying to patch my DSDT/SSDT files as well but I am getting the same error message as this post "Compilation complete. 81 Errors, 53 Warnings, 70 Remarks, 195 Optimizations"

I am running the following iasl:


Intel ACPI Component Architecture
ASL+ Optimizing Compiler version 20160422-64(RM)
Copyright (c) 2000 - 2016 Intel Corporation

Any help will be deeply appreciated.

It's probably due to a change in how the newer iasl disassembles the aml files. As you can see from the quote in your post, the one I use is ASL Optimizing Compiler version 20140926-64 [Oct 16 2014] and I haven't used a new version since everything works fine with it.

I can see that the link in the first post for the iasl binary I use doesn't work anymore (probably due to the new forum engine), and that RM's bitbucket doesn't have old versions.. Try disassembling with his iasl51 version. Not sure if it will work but it might. If it doesn't, I'll either upload my old iasl binary (if I'm lazy) or look at the disassembly output with the latest version and update the patches appropriately (if I'm less lazy ). Will keep you posted later today/this weekend.

 

[RehabMan]

It's probably due to a change in how the newer iasl disassembles the aml files. As you can see from the quote in your post, the one I use is ASL Optimizing Compiler version 20140926-64 [Oct 16 2014] and I haven't used a new version since everything works fine with it.

I can see that the link in the first post for the iasl binary I use doesn't work anymore (probably due to the new forum engine), and that RM's bitbucket doesn't have old versions.. Try disassembling with his iasl51 version. Not sure if it will work but it might. If it doesn't, I'll either upload my old iasl binary (if I'm lazy) or look at the disassembly output with the latest version and update the patches appropriately (if I'm less lazy ). Will keep you posted later today/this weekend.

Best to just fix your patches... There are many patches now not necessary due to improvements in iasl disassembly, mostly due to bugs I reported to Intel (and in some cases fixed).

Some of the patches commonly used (in the past) to fix bad/buggy disassembly will actually break a correct disassembly.