Model: Brand new Lenovo X13 Gen 2
Problems:
– Laptop does not properly shut down after downgrading to Windows 10
– Latest BIOS (1.51 from 1.47) refuses to install (causes laptop to hang on reboot)
(Updated 3-9-2023 – see Update at the end of the article)
Bios Update Issue
So I unboxed a couple of these laptops the other day, and had to re-image them back to Windows 10 from Windows 11. In doing so, I installed Lenovo Commercial Vantage and got all the latest Lenovo updates installed, however on the last one, the latest BIOS update, the laptop would act like it’s starting to install, but upon reboot, the laptop would just hang. It appeared to still be running/generating heat, FUNCT-ESC turned on the the funct-lock light on/off, but nothing on the screen.
Pressing the reset button on the bottom of the laptop via paperclip may or may not work; unplugging from power seemed to make the reset button work reliably. In addition, one of the units I had was missing the hole! I had to remove the cover to reset it in that case.
Despite trying several steps, such as defaulting the bios, and even downloading an intermediate version like 1.48 (as they came with 1.47), all bios updates still seemed to have the same problem, and I sort of felt like these two issues were related in that the computer was in an unknown state when trying to shut down.
In the end, the BIOS update was fixed by downloading the bootable ISO version of the update, and using win32diskimager (or your USB writer of choice) to write it to a USB stick, then booted the laptop from the stick and followed the prompts to do the BIOS update. That seemed to be more reliable and got the BIOS update to actually install properly.
Shut Down Issue
Once the BIOS update was installed, it still didn’t shut down – it would just go into a wierd state with the power light blicking non-stop. I was able to force it off by holding down the power button. (Note that its normal for the light to blink a few times when you shut down a Lenovo, but not indefinitely).
With the help of Lenovo tech support, we looked at Device Manager under “System Devices”, and found that the “SMBus” device was showing as a “Synaptics SMBus” device. I first made sure the latest Intel Chipset drivers were installed (you can find these under the “Motherboard” category on https://support.lenovo.com), and then I “un-installed” the Synaptics SMbus device, also checking the “Delete Device Driver” checkbox as well. I then rebooted, and it re-installed the device as an Intel SMBus device, which seemed to fix the shut down issue.
Epilog
Hard to say if just doing the SMBus fix first may have also fixed the Windows-based BIOS updater; if I get more of this model I’ll give that a shot next time, but the steps above worked reliably enough that I figured I’d share. Have fun!
UPDATE!
I’ve since deployed more of these, and found that fixing the SMbus issue mentioned above FIRST actually fixes the BIOS update issue, so strongly recommend doing that first before trying to install the bios update. Also to note – as of 3/9/2023, support.lenovo.com lists the latest bios for this as version 1.52, when in fact you download it, it’s 1.51.