Re: [coreboot] Can coreboot for KabyLake rvp11 work on Intel Sasby Island kit?

[Jay Talbott]

Toan Le,

Be careful using the public Kaby Lake FSP from github for SkyLake-U or KabyLake-U processors… my first attempt resulted in two different CRBs (one RVP7 and one RVP15) becoming boat anchors – even restoring the original BIOS made no difference, the boards were completely bricked and had to be sent back to Intel for new functional replacements. Ultimately, after working through the various issues I was having with the FSP via an IPS case for the past 6 weeks (and trying multiple interim FSP releases provided by the engineering team via VIP along the way), I finally got a working solution just this week.

I have no idea if/when the latest version of the FSP that I am now using which actually works on the RVP7 and RVP15 will be publicly released. That’s completely up to Intel.

Just speaking from personal experience…

- Jay

Jay Talbott
Principal Consulting Engineer
SysPro Consulting, LLC
3057 E. Muirfield St.
Gilbert, AZ 85298
[phone]
[phone] (FAX)
[e-mail]

http://www.sysproconsulting.com http://www.sysproconsulting.com/

From: coreboot [mailto:[e-mail]] On Behalf Of Toan Le manh
Sent: Friday, January 05, 2018 7:16 PM
To: Naresh G. Solanki; coreboot
Subject: Re: [coreboot] Can coreboot for KabyLake rvp11 work on Intel Sasby Island kit?

Hi Naresh,

Thanks a lot for your reply.

Could you please advise which settings should be modified for sasby island?

Thanks.

2018-01-06 2:33 GMT+07:00 Naresh G. Solanki :

I guess you have coreboot working on rvp11.

You may have to modify few settings based on sasby island.

On Jan 4, 2018 7:58 AM, "Toan Le manh"  wrote:

Hi,

I had a Intel Sasby Island kit, which has CPU family: SkyLake, model i7-6600U, Memory: LPDDR4.

Do you think coreboot for Intel rvp11 (Kabylake U, LPDDR4) can work on that Sasby Island kit?

Thanks & BRs,

Toan Le

Can coreboot for KabyLake rvp11 work on Intel Sasby Island kit?

[Nico Huber]

Hello Jay,

On 06.01.2018 07:13, Jay Talbott wrote:
> Be careful using the public Kaby Lake FSP from github for SkyLake-U or
> KabyLake-U processors… my first attempt resulted in two different CRBs
> (one RVP7 and one RVP15) becoming boat anchors – even restoring the
> original BIOS made no difference, the boards were completely bricked and
> had to be sent back to Intel for new functional replacements.

can you please elaborate which binary caused this issue and why you sus-
pect that it's related to -U SKUs. There are two versions on github by
now. One is tagged KabylakeFsp0001, the other (current HEAD) is called
"Gold release" with no tag at all (8267cde097).

We use KabylakeFsp0001 here with Skylake-H and, IIRC, Purism uses it
with Skylake-U.
> I have no idea if/when the latest version of the FSP that I am now using
> which actually works on the RVP7 and RVP15 will be publicly released.
> That’s completely up to Intel.

In my experience, we'll never figure that out. Even when they release
a new version on github, you can never tell to which version of the
(original?) FSP it corresponds (unless you find the exact same binary,
of course).

Nico

Can coreboot for KabyLake rvp11 work on Intel Sasby Island kit?

[Jay Talbott]

Nico,

The release notes for the Kaby Lake FSP on github says it's specifically just for KabyLake-H. It makes no mention of supporting KabyLake-U.

I initially attempted to use the version that was uploaded to GitHub back on June 22nd, which is the version that caused the bricking of the RVP7 and RVP15 CRBs.

After opening an IPS case on the issue, I discovered that the KabyLake FSP on github was developed by IoTG for KabyLake-H, while a different KabyLake FSP was developed by a completely different team at Intel for KabyLake-U (which was the FSP that was used for validating the kblrvp mainboard support in coreboot). This other KabyLake FSP is current not available on github (and I don't know if it ever will be).

Via the IPS case I was provided with this other KabyLake FSP kit via VIP, and I now have it up and running on the RVP7 and RVP15 (a couple of changes/fixes to the coreboot code were required to support the DDR4 on the RVP15, but the latest "other" KabyLake FSP itself now works fine for both boards).

I have not attempted to use the latest "Gold" release from github. Since the latest release notes still make no mention of supporting KabyLake-U, I'm not going to risk turning another CRB into a boat anchor. I'll just continue using the latest "other" KabyLake FSP that I got via VIP.

Note that while the version of the KabyLake FSP on github was developed by IoTG to target IoTG applications, the "other" KabyLake FSP was initially developed to target Chromebooks. That being said, there's really no technical reason why one couldn't be use for the other application, and vice versa, except that support becomes a bit of a nightmare...

- Jay

Jay Talbott
Principal Consulting Engineer
SysPro Consulting, LLC
3057 E. Muirfield St.
Gilbert, AZ 85298
[phone]
[phone] (FAX)
[e-mail]
http://www.sysproconsulting.com
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Nico Huber [mailto:[e-mail]]
> Sent: Monday, January 08, 2018 6:02 AM
> To: Jay Talbott; 'Toan Le manh'; 'Naresh G. Solanki'; 'coreboot'
> Cc: Youness Alaoui
> Subject: Re: [coreboot] Can coreboot for KabyLake rvp11 work on Intel Sasby
> Island kit?
>
> Hello Jay,
>
> On 06.01.2018 07:13, Jay Talbott wrote:
> > Be careful using the public Kaby Lake FSP from github for SkyLake-U or
> > KabyLake-U processors… my first attempt resulted in two different CRBs
> > (one RVP7 and one RVP15) becoming boat anchors – even restoring the
> > original BIOS made no difference, the boards were completely bricked and
> > had to be sent back to Intel for new functional replacements.
>
> can you please elaborate which binary caused this issue and why you sus-
> pect that it's related to -U SKUs. There are two versions on github by
> now. One is tagged KabylakeFsp0001, the other (current HEAD) is called
> "Gold release" with no tag at all (8267cde097).
>
> We use KabylakeFsp0001 here with Skylake-H and, IIRC, Purism uses it
> with Skylake-U.
> > I have no idea if/when the latest version of the FSP that I am now using
> > which actually works on the RVP7 and RVP15 will be publicly released.
> > That’s completely up to Intel.
>
> In my experience, we'll never figure that out. Even when they release
> a new version on github, you can never tell to which version of the
> (original?) FSP it corresponds (unless you find the exact same binary,
> of course).
>
> Nico
>
> Tel.: [phone], Fax: [phone]
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> __________________________________________________________
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Can coreboot for KabyLake rvp11 work on Intel Sasby Island kit?

[Nico Huber]

Hi Jay,

On 08.01.2018 19:35, Jay Talbott wrote:
> The release notes for the Kaby Lake FSP on github says it's specifically
> just for KabyLake-H. It makes no mention of supporting KabyLake-U.

sorry, I might be just blind. But there don't seem to be release notes
for the version from June:

[icon@bob FSP]$ git checkout KabylakeFsp0001
  HEAD is now at d88078a... initial Kabylake FSP check-in.
  [icon@bob FSP]$ find . -iname *release*
  [icon@bob FSP]$ git grep -i release
  KabylakeFspBinPkg/Fsp.bsf:        Help "Size of SMRAM memory reserved.
0x400000 for Release build and 0x1000000 for Debug build"
  KabylakeFspBinPkg/Include/FspmUpd.h:  Size of SMRAM memory reserved.
0x400000 for Release build and 0x1000000 for Debug build
  KabylakeFspBinPkg/SampleCode/Vbt/Vbt.bsf:$RelStage
            1 byte      ; Release status
  [icon@bob FSP]$

The release notes of the Gold release mention it, though. But, earlier
versions often listed only one variant while they supported all. Doesn't
matter any more, I guess. If they force people to reverse engineer their
stuff, that's ok for me (I'm pretty sure now that this is less effort,
than ensuring their undocumented blobs work).
> After opening an IPS case on the issue, I discovered that the KabyLake
> FSP on github was developed by IoTG for KabyLake-H, while a different
> KabyLake FSP was developed by a completely different team at Intel for
> KabyLake-U (which was the FSP that was used for validating the kblrvp
> mainboard support in coreboot). This other KabyLake FSP is current not
> available on github (and I don't know if it ever will be).

Now this is what I call a Google Support Package.

Nico

Can coreboot for KabyLake rvp11 work on Intel Sasby Island kit?

[Jay Talbott]

Hi Nico,

The fact that the prior release on GitHub did not include release notes is why I assumed it would work for the -U, when, in fact, it did not - and instead managed to turn the CRBs into boat anchors. First time I've ever seen an FSP be able to completely take down a CRB to where it can't be resurrected by restoring the original factory UEFI BIOS image.

Some FSPs have only listed what specific variants they support because those were the only variants tested/validated, even though the FSP might work on other variants that were not ever validated. But in this case, the KabyLake FSP on GitHub apparently only supports -H.

It took the past three months to get this all sorted out, and to finally get a bootloader that boots on the RVP7 and RVP15 CRBs - something I should have been able to have up and running in a couple of hours - or worst case, a couple of days.

At least now I can finally start focusing on porting from the RVP7/RVP15 coreboot implementation to my client's board design...

- Jay

Jay Talbott
Principal Consulting Engineer
SysPro Consulting, LLC
3057 E. Muirfield St.
Gilbert, AZ 85298
[phone]
[phone] (FAX)
[e-mail]
http://www.sysproconsulting.com
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Nico Huber [mailto:[e-mail]]
> Sent: Monday, January 08, 2018 3:19 PM
> To: Jay Talbott; 'Nico Huber'; 'Toan Le manh'; 'Naresh G. Solanki'; 'coreboot';
> Stefan Reinauer
> Cc: 'Youness Alaoui'
> Subject: Re: [coreboot] Can coreboot for KabyLake rvp11 work on Intel Sasby
> Island kit?
>
> Hi Jay,
>
> On 08.01.2018 19:35, Jay Talbott wrote:
> > The release notes for the Kaby Lake FSP on github says it's specifically
> > just for KabyLake-H. It makes no mention of supporting KabyLake-U.
>
> sorry, I might be just blind. But there don't seem to be release notes
> for the version from June:
>
> [icon@bob FSP]$ git checkout KabylakeFsp0001
>   HEAD is now at d88078a... initial Kabylake FSP check-in.
>   [icon@bob FSP]$ find . -iname *release*
>   [icon@bob FSP]$ git grep -i release
>   KabylakeFspBinPkg/Fsp.bsf:        Help "Size of SMRAM memory reserved.
> 0x400000 for Release build and 0x1000000 for Debug build"
>   KabylakeFspBinPkg/Include/FspmUpd.h:  Size of SMRAM memory
> reserved.
> 0x400000 for Release build and 0x1000000 for Debug build
>   KabylakeFspBinPkg/SampleCode/Vbt/Vbt.bsf:$RelStage
>             1 byte      ; Release status
>   [icon@bob FSP]$
>
> The release notes of the Gold release mention it, though. But, earlier
> versions often listed only one variant while they supported all. Doesn't
> matter any more, I guess. If they force people to reverse engineer their
> stuff, that's ok for me (I'm pretty sure now that this is less effort,
> than ensuring their undocumented blobs work).
> > After opening an IPS case on the issue, I discovered that the KabyLake
> > FSP on github was developed by IoTG for KabyLake-H, while a different
> > KabyLake FSP was developed by a completely different team at Intel for
> > KabyLake-U (which was the FSP that was used for validating the kblrvp
> > mainboard support in coreboot). This other KabyLake FSP is current not
> > available on github (and I don't know if it ever will be).
>
> Now this is what I call a Google Support Package.
>
> Nico