Swift 3 SF314-54 How can I force a reinstall of same version of BIOS?

jpb61
jpb61 Member Posts: 3 New User
edited August 2023 in Swift and Spin Series

On Swift 3 SF314-54, I have latest BIOS installed, 1.18, but Windows system stats show as 1.17. I've been having power issues with an inability to wake the laptop from sleep, and after trying multiple fixes, I'm down to maybe the BIOS. I see no way to reinstall 1.18, as it says it's already at that version and stops. Is there some way to force 1.18 to install again?

[Edited the thread to add model name to the title]

Answers

  • billsey
    billsey ACE Posts: 34,932 Trailblazer

    You can try a crisis recovery using the .fd file from the BIOS install package:

    Click on "Like" if you find my answer useful or click on "Yes" if it answers your question.
  • jpb61
    jpb61 Member Posts: 3 New User

    Thank you, Billsey. After doing the BIOS recovery, the device manager firmware still shows as 1.17, even though the actual BIOS is 1.18. The BIOS metadata is probably off. In any case, this doesn't appear to be the source of my inability to wake my laptop from sleep.

    Thank you for the help, though!

  • Puraw
    Puraw ACE, Member Posts: 14,505 Trailblazer
    edited August 2023

    There is not much of a change in BIOS versions 1.17 and 1.18, I would not bother about updating your BIOS unless you have an issue with programming code in System Management Mode. The Modern Standby setting in BIOS (S0-S3) can affect the Power Plan settings, but probably a conflicting advanced Power Plan setting is causing your issue. Select Balanced Power Plan and reset it to factory defaults, check that closing the lid triggers Sleep Mode and opening the lid does nothing. Disable Fast Startup and Hibernate options in Power Plan. Modern Standby and sleep/wake issues are very common, widely reported for all laptop brands, especially for the latest models. Don't use ACC or bloatware that interfere with Windows Power management and MS ACPI drivers. Only use Windows apps.

  • jpb61
    jpb61 Member Posts: 3 New User

    Thank you, Puraw. I reset the plan, turned off hibernation and fast startup, and still no joy. What's interesting, though, is that I set both AC and DC options for sleep time to never and left the turn off display options to 3 minutes. When the display turns off, I can't get it back. If I use the key to turn the display off, I can toggle it back on. This may be a display issue, not a sleep issue after all.

    I recently did a fresh install of Win11 and tried reverting to the latest display driver on the Acer support site for my model. Windows Update later updated it back to the most recent version from Intel. Both versions act the same. This all started quite some time ago on Win10.

    After the Win11 install, I now have barely anything installed other than Office. The only thing that works reliably is to set both sleep and display off settings to never and to manually toggle the display on and off, with Win11 nagging me about inefficient power settings.