Stubborn R61i BIOS

[dances_with_woof]

I've been trying to upgrade an R61i BIOS to Middletons, which has not worked, following the guides and suggestions of others. I have quickly discovered that it will not upgrade it's BIOS to the stock Lenovo update from 2009 for that matter. In the latter case, I get a "system not recognized" message.

The system is a 4:3 , 15 inch, type 8943, system board is a 42W7822.

The Middleton hack cross-flashing as per the guide, utilizing Winphlash, locks up, but fortunately, hasn't destroyed the BIOS. Right now I'm just trying to get the 2009 update to work in hopes that may reset everything right so the hack can go through as others have done.

I am running Windows 7, 32 bit. Flashing from the BIOS side with a CD has also not worked.

[RealBlackStuff]

OP just informed me that he was sold a fake R61 motherboard, which turned out to be an R60 mobo.
Back to the drawing board...

[dances_with_woof]

Yes, I hate to report that this is true. It was an R60 board labeled with an in-house "42W7822" sticker from directmacros.com, but a factory-placed R60 FRU. It looks like an internal error, but they have a return and refund policy for these sorts of situations. The R60 15 inch boards are almost completely indistinguishable from the R61i boards.

[axur-delmeria]

I've never had an R60 or R61i , but If the southbridge chip isn't covered by a heatsink, you can read the markings to determine if it's an ICH7-M (Intel 82801GBM, used in the R60) or an ICH8-M (Intel H82801HEM, used in the R61).