Re: [flashrom] trouble flashing EN25S64 on Lenovo N21 chromebook

[Kyle Stanevich]

Hi,

This is just a follow up email. I was wondering what the status is of
support for the EN25S64 bios chip. I have tried to flash it many times and
it always fails. See my message below for more details.

I would like to help out with any testing for this chip, however if I don't
hear back from you soon, I will probably be returning the laptop I have
which contains the EN25S64 chip.

Thanks,
Kyle Stanevich
On Oct 4, 2015 6:22 PM, "Kyle Stanevich"  wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I am still having trouble flashing the EN25S64 chip on my Lenovo N21
> chromebook. I have connected a raspberry pi to the EN25S64 on the Lenovo
> N21 motherboard chip via this clip (
> http://www.amazon.com/Qunqi-Soic8-Flash-Clips-Programmer/dp/B014IXR9RG).
> On the raspberry pi (which is running raspbian) I run the command "sudo
> ./flashrom -VVV -p linux_spi:dev=/dev/spidev0.0 -w ~/Downloads/bios.bin". I
> have removed the write protect screw, but I don't think that matters
> because I am connecting to the chip directly.
>
> I have tried to compile google's (chromiumos') version of flashrom, but I
> could not get it to compile due to many errors. Therefore, I am using the
> latest version of flashrom which compiles fine.
>
> It seams to me that the problem is there is something not working
> correctly writing/erasing/reading to the chip. Erase functions 1 through 3
> all fail when using the command shown above. It hangs up on erase function
> 2 for a very long time. I had to run it overnight until erase function 2
> failed. I have tried running the same command again, and it is currently
> still stuck at "Trying erase function 2... 0x000000-0x7fffff:E". It has
> been stuck at this line for 16 hours, with the raspberry pi at 100% cpu
> usage the entire time.
>
> The line "This flash part has status UNTESTED for operations: PROBE READ
> ERASE WRITE" indicates to me that this chip has not yet been tested. I
> would like to help out with testing for this chip since I have one and have
> the hardware required to flash it. What can I do to help out?
>
> Thanks,
> Kyle Stanevich
>
> On Sat, Oct 3, 2015 at 3:56 PM, Stefan Tauner <
> [e-mail]> wrote:
> > On Sat, 3 Oct 2015 10:13:36 -0700
> > Kyle Stanevich  wrote:
> > > Hi,
> > >
> > > I have attached all the output from my command line. Hopefully it will
> > > be useful for you.
> > >
> > > Do you think that I will ever have a chance to flash this chip, or
> > > should I go and buy another laptop?
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > first of all you should not reboot before fixing the issue.
> > If you made a backup first, you should try to write that instead.
> > If that works you are at least safe...
> >
> > I am not familiar with the N21 but you probably have to disable a write
> > protection. Also, chromebooks work best with google's (chromiumos')
> > version of flashrom.