[flashrom] flashrom not "seeing" W25Q128FV

[Ivan Ivanov]

Hi Yaron, its very interesting why MOSI voltage is low. Have you tried
disconnecting the peripheral devices like RAM ? about Bus Pirate -
which firmware you have? (Bus Pirate old firmware is not good quality,
its much more stable if you flash a new "Community Firmware" to it -
github BusPirate/Bus_Pirate ) Also please try getting CH341A - it is
very cheap flasher which should be reliable thanks to its' simplicity.
Another idea: there are small circuit boards called " Step-Up Voltage
Regulator " - some versions of them convert 0.5-3.3V to 3.3V ---
however if you increase the voltage, it would be less current (maybe
not enough to transmit a signal). Still I really hope that you could
flash it without complicating a setup by adding the new boards... Best
regards, Ivan

2017-11-24 17:56 GMT+03:00 Yaron Shragai <yshragai.firmware at gmail.com>:
> Thank you Ivan.
>
> As I mentioned, I did try with/without the board plugged in, and
> with/without the VCC pin connected to the programmer.  (I also tried, on an
> identical board that still has a booting BIOS, powering it on to a point
> that likely has no BMC traffic.)
>
> One thing that we have determined, using a scope, is that the VCC pin does
> likely get appropriate voltage, but the signals on the MOSI pin are not at a
> high enough voltage: The voltage at the MOSI pin, when signals are being
> sent, is about 1/2 VCC.  This explains why it almost always isn't successful
> at finding the chip, but every once in a while, on a rare occasion, it is.
> So now the question is, why is the voltage on the MOSI pin too low - what is
> pulling it down.
>
> I'm getting identical results with both the Dediprog SF100 and a Bus Pirate
> (not sure which version).  And I did try the trick on the Bus Pirate where
> you apply the VCC voltage to the Bus Pirate's VUP (pull-up voltage) pin, and
> used the flashrom argument to turn on the pull-ups.
>
> Thanks,
> Yaron
>
>
> On Wed, Nov 22, 2017 at 10:29 AM, Ivan Ivanov <qmastery16 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>  Hi Yaron, please read about the In-System Programming. It could be
>> that the peripheral devices of your motherboard are consuming some
>> percentage of the power that was aimed to power a BIOS chip during the
>> access - because of that, there is not enough power for a BIOS chip
>> and your attempts are failing. What to do:
>>
>> I) You could try to reduce the amount of peripheral devices - e.g.
>> disconnect the RAM modules from your system and try again
>>
>> II) Also you can try to power a BIOS chip by the motherboard :
>> 1) disconnect a VCC wire from your programmer, also disconnect WP and
>> HOLD just in case
>> 2) disconnect all the boot devices from your motherboard
>>  3) connect a clip to a BIOS chip
>> 4) connect a power adapter to your motherboard and turn it on
>>  5) just in case, wait 5 minutes so that all the initialization
>> processes will be completed
>> 6) read the contains of a BIOS chip a few times
>> 7) compare the checksums of read files, if they are the same - erase
>> the BIOS chip (by filling it with FF's), turn off the motherboard,
>> then turn it on again, wait 5 minutes - then flash your desired binary
>> image to this BIOS chip
>>
>>  III) Alternatively you may want to de-solder a BIOS chip from
>> motherboard and connect it to your programmer with DIP adapter, but
>> probably could be avoided if you do I) or II) successfully
>>
>>  IV) Try a different programmer, e.g. CH341A which is super cheap
>> simple hardware fully supported by flashrom - should be reliable
>>
>> I wish you good luck, sadly Supermicro X10DRT-Lis not supported by
>> coreboot open source BIOS - hopefully you will be able to get a better
>> hardware one day...
>>
>> Best regards,
>>
>> 2017-11-21 17:57 GMT+03:00 Yaron Shragai <yshragai.firmware at gmail.com>:
>> > Hello,
>> > I am trying to use flashrom to program a Winbond W25Q128FV chip, on a
>> > Supermicro X10DRT-L mobo, with a Dediprog SF 100.
>> >
>> > I am running flashrom from an Ubuntu VM on a Win10 laptop as well as
>> > from a
>> > Minnowboard Max system running Ubuntu.
>> > I am running flashrom v0.9.9-rc1-r1942, installed via apt.
>> > I am connecting to the chip via a SOIC clip.
>> >
>> > I should note that I have looked at the product support data on the
>> > flashrom
>> > web site.  It lists full support for the W25Q128FV.  It does not list
>> > the
>> > X10DRT-L mobo.
>> >
>> > flashrom almost never "sees" the flash chip (output: "No EEPROM/flash
>> > device
>> > found.").
>> >
>> > I say "almost", b/c it did see it a couple of times (out of, I would
>> > say,
>> > ~100 tries) - which was enough for me to read out the pre-existing
>> > content,
>> > and write to it an image that has effectively bricked it. :-)  So, now
>> > I'm
>> > trying to flash the pre-existing content back...  (There is no
>> > documented
>> > way to force the X10DRT-L to use the recovery block, and I have yet to
>> > find
>> > an undocumented way...)
>> >
>> > I have tried with the system board plugged in and unplugged, and with
>> > and
>> > without connecting the VCC pin to the programmer.
>> >
>> > I have been using these two command lines, at various times:
>> > flashrom -p dediprog
>> > flashrom -p dediprog:voltage=3.5
>> >
>> > When I add -VVV, the following relevant lines appear in the output:
>> >
>> > Probing for Winbond W25Q128.V, 16384 kB: programmer_map_flash_region:
>> > mapping W25Q128.V from 0x00000000ff000000 to 0x0000000000000000
>> > dediprog_spi_send_command, writecnt=1, readcnt=3
>> > RDID returned 0xff 0xff 0xff. RDID byte 0 parity violation.
>> > probe_spi_rdid_generic: id1 0xff, id2 0xffff
>> > programmer_unmap_flash_region: unmapped 0x0000000000000000
>> >
>> > ...and further down...
>> >
>> > Probing for Winbond unknown Winbond (ex Nexcom) SPI chip, 0 kB:
>> > dediprog_spi_send_command, writecnt=1, readcnt=3
>> > RDID returned 0xff 0xff 0xff. RDID byte 0 parity violation.
>> > probe_spi_rdid_generic: id1 0xff, id2 0xffff
>> >
>> > One more datapoint: When I connect my laptop -> Dediprog -> to the flash
>> > chip on the Minnowboard Max (Micron 25Q064A), it does recognize the
>> > chip.
>> >
>> > Any advice would be appreciated!
>> >
>> > Thanks,
>> > Yaron
>> >
>> > _______________________________________________
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>> > flashrom at flashrom.org
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>
>