flashrom February 2023

flashrom@flashrom.org

14 participants
19 discussions

flashrom & flashrom-stable could/should they share resources?
by Nico Huber 16 Mar '23

16 Mar '23

Hi all, since the idea to create a new project "flashrom-stable" on coreboot.org I was wondering how the two projects could coexist best and if they should share resources like the webpage / wiki. Any thoughts on this? Related: If participating in things like GSoC should we do that together? It seems most topics are applicable to both projects anyway. Cheers, Nico PS. I'll also put this on tomorrows meeting agenda.

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Mother MSI H97 PC Mate
by Guillermo Reisch 08 Mar '23

08 Mar '23

Mother home page https://www.msi.com/Motherboard/H97-PC-Mate SO: Debian SID (x86_64) FlashROM version: guille@goku:~/Desktop/7850v59$ dpkg -l flashrom Deseado=desconocido(U)/Instalar/eliminaR/Purgar/retener(H) | Estado=No/Inst/ficheros-Conf/desempaqUetado/medio-conF/medio-inst(H)/espera- disparo(W)/pendienTe-disparo |/ Err?=(ninguno)/requiere-Reinst (Estado,Err: mayúsc.=malo) ||/ Nombre Versión Arquitectura Descripción +++-==============-============-============- ============================================================= ii flashrom 1.3.0-2 amd64 Identify, read, write, erase, and verify BIOS/ROM/flash chips LOG: guille@goku:~/Desktop/7850v59$ sudo flashrom -p internal -r backup.bin -V flashrom unknown on Linux 6.1.0-5-amd64 (x86_64) flashrom is free software, get the source code at https://flashrom.org Using clock_gettime for delay loops (clk_id: 1, resolution: 1ns). flashrom was built with GCC 12.2.0, little endian Command line (5 args): flashrom -p internal -r backup.bin -V Initializing internal programmer /sys/class/mtd/mtd0 does not exist No coreboot table found. Using Internal DMI decoder. DMI string chassis-type: "Desktop" DMI string system-manufacturer: "MSI" DMI string system-product-name: "MS-7850" DMI string system-version: "1.0" DMI string baseboard-manufacturer: "MSI" DMI string baseboard-product-name: "H97 PC Mate(MS-7850)" DMI string baseboard-version: "1.0" Found chipset "Intel H97" with PCI ID 8086:8cc6. This chipset is marked as untested. If you are using an up-to-date version of flashrom *and* were (not) able to successfully update your firmware with it, then please email a report to flashrom(a)flashrom.org including a verbose (-V) log. Thank you! Enabling flash write... Root Complex Register Block address = 0xfed1c000 Error accessing ICH RCRB, 0x4000 bytes at 0x00000000fed1c000 /dev/mem mmap failed: Operation not permitted FAILED! FATAL ERROR! Error: Programmer initialization failed.

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AM29LV040B writes work fine
by Alex Perez 04 Mar '23

04 Mar '23

Hi there, I'd like to report that, when flashing the AM29LV040B with -p satasii (attached to a PCI SATA card) writes work fine. Write Protect does NOT work.

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Optimized Erase Function Selection Algorithm
by Aarya Chaumal 03 Mar '23

03 Mar '23

Hi everyone, I am excited to announce that we've added the optimized erase function selection algorithm to the master branch. It will optimally select the erase functions according to the flash region to erase/write. This should make using our application quicker and more convenient. Please ensure you have the latest source code to test the new feature. Do the following change to the flashrom.c file : ``` -static bool use_legacy_erase_path = true; +static bool use_legacy_erase_path = false; ``` and build flashrom using make or meson. Makefile: ``` $ make clean && make ``` Meson: ``` $ meson setup out $ ninja -C out ``` This feature offers the following: - Lesser flash erase/write times (upto 80 times less on tests done so far) On the long term, we plan to enable feature by default. For now, you need to enable it manually and rebuild from source code. We would love to hear your feedback! Please let us know if you have any questions or encounter any issues. -Aarya

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Flashrom experimental chip support report
by Sadoon Albader 01 Mar '23

01 Mar '23

Hi, I just flashed a firmware image to a "XM25QH64C" which is labeled experimental, the flash was successful with default options on a ch341a_spi clone, here is the log. Sorry I couldn't get the debug output. Reading and writing worked just fine. Thanks a lot for maintaining this awesome software! I used the git master branch version as of today.

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W25Q32FVSIG
by verithas＠danwin1210.de 01 Mar '23

01 Mar '23

Hello, i have a problem. I build coreboot rom and write it with option in menu security: Boot media protection mechanism < Lock boot media using the chip Chip is W25Q32JVSIG After this option I can't erase the chip, log says: root@devuan:/home/user/Documents/flashrom-v1.3.0# ./flashrom --programmer ch341a_spi -E flashrom v1.3.0 on Linux 5.15.41-hardened1 (x86_64) flashrom is free software, get the source code at https://flashrom.org Calibrating delay loop... OK. Found Winbond flash chip "W25Q32.V" (4096 kB, SPI) on ch341a_spi. === This flash part has status UNTESTED for operations: WP The test status of this chip may have been updated in the latest development version of flashrom. If you are running the latest development version, please email a report to flashrom(a)flashrom.org if any of the above operations work correctly for you with this flash chip. Please include the flashrom log file for all operations you tested (see the man page for details), and mention which mainboard or programmer you tested in the subject line. Thanks for your help! Erasing and writing flash chip... FAILED at 0x00300000! Expected=0xff, Found=0x5f, failed byte count from 0x00300000-0x00300fff: 0xddf ERASE FAILED! Looking for another erase function. FAILED at 0x00300000! Expected=0xff, Found=0x5f, failed byte count from 0x00300000-0x00307fff: 0x7883 ERASE FAILED! Looking for another erase function. FAILED at 0x00300000! Expected=0xff, Found=0x5f, failed byte count from 0x00300000-0x0030ffff: 0xf6c5 ERASE FAILED! Looking for another erase function. Option with --wp-disable is not work for W25Q32FVSIG I have a W25Q128FVSIG chip, and option --wp-disable is work. Datasheets with chips is same, different in memory size. I hope the problem will be fixed soon Thanks for attention. Regards.

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Successfully read an XM25QH256C with a CH341a based programmer.
by James Russell 01 Mar '23

01 Mar '23

Hi, I just did a backup of the BIOS chip of a new laptop I got. in case something happened to be able to restore it all to sane defaults. Freshly built Flashrom snapshot on a live Arch (Manjaro) environment, the chip is an XM25QH256C[XIQ] in a WSON8 package (6x8), I didn't want to desolder the chip and I noticed some exposed solder where the contacts would be so I did the dump using a pogo pin contraption attached to the CH341a. It is an old programmer I've had for years (I don't think there's any cheap-ish alternative using at least USB 2.0 that is supported by Flashrom, so... it was slow), both Vcc and the data lines ran at 3.3-ish volts. After the message that appeared during the read I thought "damn, I didn't enable verbose output nor was I logging the operation", so I did a verify operation afterwards which is essentially the same. Log is attached and if you need the contents of the ROM I can attach them too (32MiB). I didn't do much in-depth analysis of the ROM but it seems correct, at least I can see UEFI and ME structures in there. Sadly, I don't plan on writing to that chip anytime soon, at least not until I get a replacement because the setup is not very stable and I don't want to risk the connection getting interrupted. These XMC chips are hard to come by in my area, but Mouser sells an equivalent Winbond that is also supported and is greenlit to be used in this laptop; so I had ordered one of those to have at hand. Anyway, I digress haha, you have the Verify log attached to this email (I thought there'd be more data there). Regards, James. PS. I think it's not implemented, but perhaps adding a progress indicator (since the flash chip's size is known) to read/write operations would be handy, if it weren't for an indicator LED on my programmer board I wouldn't really know if it was progressing or not.

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Fwd: Flashrom experimental chip support report
by Sadoon Albader 28 Feb '23

28 Feb '23

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First release candidate for 1.3 is tagged as v1.3.0-rc1
by Anastasia Klimchuk 27 Feb '23

27 Feb '23

Hello fashrom community, Great news! As subject says: first release candidate for 1.3 is tagged as v1.3.0-rc1 The main thing that will be happening with RC1 now is testing. Few notes about testing and/or using flashrom built from v1.3.0-rc1. If you are a flashrom user who has never built flashrom from source code, and always used a packaged release version, please continue doing so for now. Release candidate is not a release yet, it is possible some bugs will be found in RC1 and we will have RC2 to fix those. Watch the mailing list for further announcements. If you are a developer and building flashrom from source is an acceptable level of risk for you (because you've done that before, tried new features from head before, have been developing / testing your own patches, or tried / tested patches from other people in community), then please feel free to use v1.3.0-rc1. Your help with testing and reporting bugs is highly appreciated! No test case is too small: even if you can run one specific scenario, it is an important contribution, and yes it helps! A special case of the above: if you are a developer and work in a company that is using flashrom: if you could contribute to testing v1.3.0-rc1 that would be really great! Perhaps (that's me "thinking aloud") it is possible to point an automated tests suite to v1.3.0-rc1 and run the tests? How to report a bug or successful testing: there are few options. First option is to post on the mailing list (feel free to reply on this thread, or create a new thread). Second option is to add a comment to a ticket "Testing for release v1.3" https://ticket.coreboot.org/issues/378. This would require an account in bugtracker (coreboot account is fine). Thirdly, of course, you can fix a bug and send a patch! :) Please set a topic "for_1.3.x" And finally, What's new since 1.2? We've done ~1000 commits in ~3 years! The full exact list of "what's new" is under construction, will be ready later :) Meanwhile, here is a very high-level unordered overview: meson support expanded, and documentation is added build systems improvements, for both of them new programmers added new chips added unit tests misc cleanups / refactorings removing global state / fixing memory leaks write-protect and write-protect emulation in dummyflasher MAINTAINERS file build script for jenkins upgraded flashrom_tester improvements manpage grew more info ... Two features dropped from release: promontory support displaying progress in libflashrom operations Due to the bugs that won't be possible to fix/test in time for 1.3. Bug-fixes are planned for the release after (1.3+1). Thanks heaps everyone, for testing, using flashrom, and supporting the release process in any other way! It is so much appreciated. Happy holidays to everyone! -- Anastasia.

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-VV dump from an FM25Q128A
by Michael Colton 24 Feb '23

24 Feb '23

Love this tool! Thanks for your work! Here's the output from this chip, as requested. -Michael

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flashrom February 2023