Hi all,
I work with kontron based COM boards. We currently use their home (DOS) tools fptup and jidacmos to update the bios of our boards. These tools work correctly but they must be run separatly from the rest of the "factory" tools used to prepare the machines. Our current factory tools use Linux to correctly update the different firmwares and softwares we run on the machines. The only missing part is the BIOS.
So I am searching a way to integrate the BIOS update procedure to our standard update procedure to simplify to whole process.
That being said, I tried the flashrom utility. I works for updating the BIOS image, but doesn't seem to be able to update the configuration part of the BIOS. The result is an updated BIOS version with a wrong configuration (which fails to boot correctly).
Searching a little deeper, I found that to succesfully update the BIOS on these boards, you not only have to update the BIOS image but you also need to "pre-configure" it correctly. This is done by executing the jidacmos DOS utility using the following cmds:
jidacmos rtc /clean jidacmos eep /clean
So my question is: What is this jidacmos utility? Kontron doesn't give much details about it.
You guys have any idea of how I could reproduce the behaviour of the jidacmos utility (cleaning the rtc and EEPROM I suppose)?
Any info would be appreciated!
Regards,
Marc
Tech info: Board model: SU9300 Chipset: ICH9M The board uses the: AT25DF321 chip.
Hi Marc,
On 15.02.2010 18:00, Marc Ferland wrote:
I work with kontron based COM boards. We currently use their home (DOS) tools fptup and jidacmos to update the bios of our boards.
Kontron developers contributed to flashrom in the past, and AFAIK they are using a slightly modified flashrom version inhouse which can do incremental writes. Mainline flashrom is now catching up with that (we had to convert drivers for >200 chips first, and that took more time than we had hoped).
flashrom [...] works for updating the BIOS image, but doesn't seem to be able to update the configuration part of the BIOS. The result is an updated BIOS version with a wrong configuration (which fails to boot correctly).
Searching a little deeper, I found that to succesfully update the BIOS on these boards, you not only have to update the BIOS image but you also need to "pre-configure" it correctly. This is done by executing the jidacmos DOS utility using the following cmds:
jidacmos rtc /clean jidacmos eep /clean
Just to make sure I understand you correctly: Do you run jidacmos before or after the BIOS update? And does it touch the BIOS update file or the flash chip or the NVRAM?
So my question is: What is this jidacmos utility? Kontron doesn't give much details about it.
You guys have any idea of how I could reproduce the behaviour of the jidacmos utility (cleaning the rtc and EEPROM I suppose)?
Heh. EEPROM and CMOS are probably the most abused terms for a piece of computer hardware that's called NVRAM nowadays. On some modern machines, the term EEPROM actually is correct because there's no NVRAM anymore and firmware/BIOS stores everything in the flash chip (saves a few cents).
nvramtool may be useful for your task (which looks like clearing NVRAM), but if there is no NVRAM in your machine, editing the BIOS image before flashing may be the way to go.
Regards, Carl-Daniel
At Tue, 16 Feb 2010 04:41:35 +0100, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
Hi Marc,
On 15.02.2010 18:00, Marc Ferland wrote:
I work with kontron based COM boards. We currently use their home (DOS) tools fptup and jidacmos to update the bios of our boards.
Kontron developers contributed to flashrom in the past, and AFAIK they are using a slightly modified flashrom version inhouse which can do incremental writes. Mainline flashrom is now catching up with that (we had to convert drivers for >200 chips first, and that took more time than we had hoped).
flashrom [...] works for updating the BIOS image, but doesn't seem to be able to update the configuration part of the BIOS. The result is an updated BIOS version with a wrong configuration (which fails to boot correctly).
Searching a little deeper, I found that to succesfully update the BIOS on these boards, you not only have to update the BIOS image but you also need to "pre-configure" it correctly. This is done by executing the jidacmos DOS utility using the following cmds:
jidacmos rtc /clean jidacmos eep /clean
Just to make sure I understand you correctly: Do you run jidacmos before or after the BIOS update? And does it touch the BIOS update file or the flash chip or the NVRAM?
I run jidacmos after the BIOS update, and no the BIOS isn't updated.
So my question is: What is this jidacmos utility? Kontron doesn't give much details about it.
You guys have any idea of how I could reproduce the behaviour of the jidacmos utility (cleaning the rtc and EEPROM I suppose)?
Heh. EEPROM and CMOS are probably the most abused terms for a piece of computer hardware that's called NVRAM nowadays. On some modern machines, the term EEPROM actually is correct because there's no NVRAM anymore and firmware/BIOS stores everything in the flash chip (saves a few cents).
nvramtool may be useful for your task (which looks like clearing NVRAM), but if there is no NVRAM in your machine, editing the BIOS image before flashing may be the way to go.
I've continued my search, and it looks like a JIDA32 kernel driver exits along with a jidacmos utility for linux. I wonder why I didn't see that before!
From the readme.txt: The jidacmos linux tool enables you to save and restore the CMOS settings of all supported Kontron CPU boards from within a Linux environment.
I'll also take a look at nvramtool.
Thanks for your time,
Marc
On 16.02.2010 18:09, Marc Ferland wrote:
At Tue, 16 Feb 2010 04:41:35 +0100, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
nvramtool may be useful for your task (which looks like clearing NVRAM), but if there is no NVRAM in your machine, editing the BIOS image before flashing may be the way to go.
I've continued my search, and it looks like a JIDA32 kernel driver exits along with a jidacmos utility for linux. I wonder why I didn't see that before!
From the readme.txt: The jidacmos linux tool enables you to save and restore the CMOS settings of all supported Kontron CPU boards from within a Linux environment.
I'll also take a look at nvramtool.
Judging from the readme, nvramtool should be usable as a full replacement for jidacmos (at least the Linux variant), and nvramtool doesn't need a kernel driver at all.
Regards, Carl-Daniel
On 2/16/10 7:31 PM, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
The jidacmos linux tool enables you to save and restore the CMOS settings of all supported Kontron CPU boards from within a Linux environment.
I'll also take a look at nvramtool.
Judging from the readme, nvramtool should be usable as a full replacement for jidacmos (at least the Linux variant), and nvramtool doesn't need a kernel driver at all.
The Kontron boards use an i2c eeprom to back up nvram afaik. I think that's what jidacmos is about.
I sniffed the smbus that is easily accessible with the headers of my 986lcd-m but there's only SPD-ROM traffic on that bus.
Kontron: Any information on this would be appreciated.
Best regards, Stefan
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Carl-Daniel Hailfinger -
Marc Ferland -
Stefan Reinauer