March 1999 - OpenBIOS - mail.coreboot.org

uniFLASH
by Stephan Mueller March 16, 1999

March 16, 1999

> > I've got a pascal-program called UniFLASH, really good. With a > I'm interested, i just work on a Eprom programmen and that thing we'll > be wellcome ;) i sent the url to everybody. (www.bios.be) Ciao, Stephan [SpaceNet-Systems]

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uniFLASH, EEPROM vs. Flash
by Stephan Mueller March 16, 1999

March 16, 1999

> > Booting with orig. Bios, switching to second chip, flashing > > openBIOS, reboot. Testing, switching back to orig. Bios, reset. > Excellent summary. Switching should be from the front panel of the > computer. Thanx. :))) > > Why switching RW? RW is only interpreted by the Chip which has it's > > CE-Pin enabled. > Yes! thanks, I get it. The motherboard takes care of the other chip > control pins. (but we should check datasheets just to make sure) www.amd.com (there are sheets for the AMD flash-devices) > Can someone give me a EEPROM part number please? (I don't have any > motherboards (yet), and my computer belongs to the University and > cannot be dismantled) we aren't using EEPROMs, we are using Flash-memories (a small difference). But anyway: AM28F020, AM28F010 (2 popular AMD-flashs) look at the page of uniFLASH i sent everybody. There is uniflash with a list of supported flashs and chipsets. > > I've got a pascal-program called UniFLASH, really good. With a huge > > database of chips and algorithms (including the > > Chipset-programming!). If somebody is interested i can > > give you the URL. > Is it designed to use with a particular programmer? or for motherboard > BIOS flashing? Would be a useful resource either way. > Can I have a look at it? I sent the URL to everybody. (www.bios.be) It's used to flash a bios onto the board, if u like INCLUDING the bootblock, it's free, it's with sourcecode, it's not GPLed, you can do whatever you like the only thing the author wants is to credit him. I can build a nice interface for uniflash and make it the "openBIOS-flash-tool" :))) Ciao, Stephan [SpaceNet-Systems]

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AW: AW: List of popular chipsets
by Stephan Mueller March 15, 1999

March 15, 1999

> yes, pls. send URL http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/pvanleeuwen/index.htm or, if it's not working: http://ping.be (there's a reference) Ciao, Stephan [SpaceNet-Systems]

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AW: List of popular chipsets
by Stephan Mueller March 15, 1999

March 15, 1999

> You can add 440LX to that list of yours. did it. :) > You will manually switch the line to CE and RW of the existing bios > chip and have another similar chip with switched control lines on a > PCI card. PCI? No, ISA-Bus. The BIOS is connected to the ISA-Bus via a 74 245 (addressdecoder). The ISA-Bus is connected to the PCI-Bus via the PCI/ISA-Bridge. > The computer will initially be booted from the original BIOS and a > program will be written to the new BIOS in the same way as a > conventional BIOS upgrade is performed, by manipulating the CE and RW > lines of both chips. Booting with orig. Bios, switching to second chip, flashing openBIOS, reboot. Testing, switching back to orig. Bios, reset. > Is my understanding correct? > I realise that RW can be 2 pins, just different implementation. Why switching RW? RW is only interpreted my the Chip which has it's CE-Pin enabled. (i think so) > Also, I am good at figuring out IC datasheets. Which chips are most > commonly used for flash BIOS? I've got a pascal-program called UniFLASH, really good. With a huge database of chips and algorithms (including the Chipset-programming!). If somebody is interested i can give you the URL. Ciao, Stephan [SpaceNet-Systems]

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Gigabyte has dual BIOS motherboards
by James Oakley March 15, 1999

March 15, 1999

I just came across an interesting feature on some new Gigabyte motherboards (www.gigabyte.com.tw) They have dual flash ROMs on them. One is a backup BIOS. Seems interesting. Does anybody have one of these boards? It might be interesting to find out how they're hooked up and how you switch to the second ROM. James Oakley jfunk(a)roadrunner.nf.net

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List of popular chipsets
by Stephan Mueller March 15, 1999

March 15, 1999

Hi! I wish everybody to quote back, so we can make a list of the most popular chipsets used in our development-environment. We can try to build interfaces for the most popular boards first. Here are my Boards: FIC VA503+ Via Apollo MVP3 FIC PT2200 Intel 430HX FIC PT2006 Intel 430VX FIC VB601 Intel 440BX Noname Intel 430FX I hope we can build a list that way. Ciao, Stephan [SpaceNet-Systems]

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Here's a plan
by David J. Coffin March 14, 1999

March 14, 1999

Proposed OpenBIOS Boot Specification Pre-boot: OpenBIOS performs the following steps: * Switch the CPU to 32-bit protected mode. * Detect the DRAM and set chipset registers accordingly. * Enable devices on the Super I/O (floppy, COM ports, etc.) * Scan the PCI bus and allocate requested resources. * Look for known boot devices: floppy, IDE, ATAPI, various SCSI cards, and anything else that might be bootable. * Select one of these devices. Read the first sector into memory and jump to it. Some sort of setup utility will be added later, probably similar to Sun's command-line boot PROMs. For now, all op- tions will be set at compile time. Boot Sector: The boot sector begins execution with the CPU in 32-bit protected mode, privilege level zero, interrupts disabled, A20 gate on. The CS, DS, ES, and SS selectors all have base address 0, limit 0xFFFFFFFF. All except CS are read/write. EBX and EIP contain the base address of the boot sector. Addresses below this belong to OpenBIOS. Do not modify them as long as you need to use the OpenBIOS services. ESP points to the top of DRAM, and your initial stack. Services: The service routines are accessed by loading AX with the desired service and calling the Service Entry Point, at 0x000FFFE0. * Read Sectors from Boot Device * AX = 0x0000 EDX = Starting sector number ECX = Sector count ESI = Address to store the first sector read Sectors are counted in a linear fashion, starting from zero. Since each sector is 512 bytes, the OS kernel must reside within the first two terabytes of the boot device. OpenBIOS does not write to block devices. That must be done from the OS kernel. * Read Data from Console Device * AX = 0x0100 ECX = Max number of bytes to read ESI = Address to store incoming bytes * Write Data to Console Device * AX = 0x0101 ECX = Number of bytes to write ESI = Address of data to write The "console device" may be either a monitor and keyboard, or a serial port. For now, consider it a dumb ASCII terminal, although more capabilities might be added later. What other services do we need? Special addresses: The OpenBIOS ROM image starts at 0xE0000 or 0xF0000 depen- ding on the hardware. It might be copied into shadow RAM. The following addresses are defined; all others are reserved: 0x000FFF80 The BIOS ID string, up to 96 bytes long. The first eight bytes must be "OpenBIOS", so that LILO will know which boot loader to install. The string also contains the version number, motherboard name, and a list of features supported by this BIOS. 0x000FFFE0 Service Entry Point 0x000FFFF0 CPU Reset Vector Basic Techniques: For the last 2.5 years, I've worked at Unicore Software, building custom versions of Award BIOS and (the nearly defunct) MR BIOS. Here are the basics: You need one computer for building BIOSes and another for testing them. It's nice if they have separate monitors and keyboards. I use a $500 ROM emulator, connected to my workstation by a serial cable. A cheaper alternative would be to insert a ZIF socket between the ROM chip and the motherboard. Boot up with the "good chip", swap in the "test chip" (after the good chip has copied itself to shadow RAM), flash your code onto the test chip, and reboot. If your test motherboard has one of those wafer-thin PSOP flash chips with microscopic pins, forget it. Intel loves to make flash-proof motherboards, and then code the BIOS to reject any non-Intel CPU. You will need some sort of debugging output long before you figure out how to turn on the the video card. I use three ISA postcards displaying I/O writes to ports 80h, 84h, and 300h. Unicore has stopped selling these cards, so these few leftovers are very precious to me. They bear the inscription "ORCHID UNIO993 REV B". If they can't be bought, I'll write up a design spec and post it. One possibility I haven't explored is sending debug data out the serial port. Overall Strategy: Buy one of the new "Super 7" motherboards with the VIA Apollo chipset and a socketed flash chip. For starters, hard- code the Super I/O and PCI settings to match the original BIOS. Write code to read (not write) a floppy disk, and write a sim- ple boot sector to test it. Then do the same for IDE. In a few weeks, depending on your programming skill, you'll have a bootable (albeit highly un-portable) BIOS. Linux should still work fine, with a few changes to the boot loader. Don't tell me about booting DOS & Windows--I work with 16-bit BIOS code every day and it is a *nightmare*. Linux didn't get where it is today by cloning Windows, and we won't get anywhere by imitating Award or Phoenix. Dave Coffin 3/9/99 -- David Coffin Evening: 781-397-9932 967 Salem Street Daytime: 978-686-6468x341 Malden, MA 02148-4515 E-mail: dcoffin(a)shore.net

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Needhams PB-10 Prom programmer
by Dave March 12, 1999

March 12, 1999

Has anyone on the list had experiance with Needhams PB-10 Prom programmer? I am thinking about purchasing one for BIOS development so I am looking for comments, good, bad, ugly.... Dave PS. For info: http://www.needhams.com/home.htm

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Getting x86 PROM code running.
by Phil King March 10, 1999

March 10, 1999

Greetings Folks - I've been lurking on the list for a while, but there's been some call as to how to get started doing PROM start-up code on an x86 so I figured I'd pitch in what I've been doing, with the hope of getting some feedback from others. My situation: I'm designing an AMD ELAN SC-410 based embedded system, and I want to write the firmware that will initialize the hardware and then launch my application. The app code is a 32 bit protected mode widget that makes no use of any operating system or BIOS calls. Thus my startup code is just that: code to start the processor off, initialize the hardware, switch to protected mode, and then run my app. Here's my current coding flow. It is, I realize, somewhat crude, but it works so far. It might get you started, and I'd love to hear feedback and suggestions. All my code is, as yet, being written in assembly. I'm using MASM to assemble it, and specifying a .TINY memory model, so I end up with a .COM file (which, although intended to be run by DOS at 1000:0100, is really a relocatable binary.) My memory device of choice is a 29F040B, which is a 512KB device (addressed from 0x00000 to 0x7FFFF. I load the .COM file as a binary into my PROM programmer buffer at location 0x70000. This maps, in the system memory space, to 0xF0000. Then I hand edit the buffer, starting at address 0x7FFF0, where I put EA 00 00 00 F0. This is JMP F000:0000 at system address FFFF0. At power-on, the CS:IP initializes to F000:FFF0 and executes the JMP to the start of my .COM file. And off I go... Right now I'm just fiddling with the hardware initialization, writing diagnostic codes out to port 0x300 and watching for them on the ISA bus. Anyway, I hope this might get some people started. If you have any suggestions, I'd love to hear them. Cheers! Phil King pking(a)netschools.net

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Re: what we need
by Dave March 10, 1999

March 10, 1999

At 05:00 PM 2/26/99 -500, you wrote: >..... How do I use this stuff (all >the way back at step one: plug in power supply) so we can "get >some product out the door"? Is there anyone on the mailing list >that can tell us what to do? Welcome to the list. Sounds like you are pretty much in the same position that I am. I have a pretty good background in Motherboard design, some software design experience and no BIOS design experience. So I am working on getting past square one, which is - how do I compile code and burn it into a prom. I do have the prom programmer. I just need to figure out how to get my Microsoft compiler to generate x86 code that can be put into an EPROM. I have been told by a number of people that it can be done. As soon as I learn how I will post it to the list. Dave

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