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With x86 machines, you can use the SeaBIOS or the GNU boot loader named GRUB as a payload. On ARM systems, you can use the U-Boot payload (coreboot still initialises hardware). An x86/x86_64 U-Boot UEFI payload is also available.

This article will teach you how to install Canoeboot, on any of the supported laptop, desktop and server motherboards of Intel/AMD x86/x86_64 and ARM64 platform. Canoeboot is a Free Software project that replaces proprietary BIOS/UEFI firmware.

ALWAYS remember to make a backup of the current flash, when overwriting it, regardless of what firmware you currently have and what firmware you’re re-flashing it with; this includes updates between Canoeboot releases. Use the -r option in flashprog instead -w, to read from the flash.

Refer to the following article:
Externally rewrite 25xx NOR flash via SPI protocol

You are strongly advised to have an external flashing setup, and make sure it works, before attempting internal flashing. This, in addition to making a backup of the current flash contents, prior to flashing, whether you dump externally or internally - if only external flashing is available, then it’s usually the case that only external dumping is available too.

Help is available on Canoeboot IRC and other channels.

Before actually reading the installation guides, please ensure that your system is fully supported by Canoeboot. More information about the Canoeboot build system can be found in the cbmk maintenance manual.

Canoeboot currently supports the following systems:

• Sony Playstation (PS1/PSX)

• ASUS KFSN4-DRE motherboard
• ASUS KGPE-D16 motherboard

• Acer G43T-AM3
• Apple iMac 5,2
• ASUS KCMA-D8 motherboard
• Dell OptiPlex 780 variants e.g. MT, USFF
• Gigabyte GA-G41M-ES2L motherboard
• Intel D510MO and D410PT motherboards
• Intel D945GCLF

• Apple MacBook1,1 and MacBook2,1
• Dell Latitude E4300, E6400, E6400 XFR and E6400 ATG
• Lenovo ThinkPad R400
• Lenovo ThinkPad R500
• Lenovo ThinkPad T400 / T400S
• Lenovo ThinkPad T500 / W500
• Lenovo ThinkPad T60, X60, X60S, X60 Tablet (with Intel GPU)
• Lenovo ThinkPad X200 / X200S / X200 Tablet

• ASUS Chromebook Flip C101 (gru-bob)
• Samsung Chromebook Plus (v1) (gru-kevin)

• Qemu x86 and arm64

Before internal flashing, you must first disable /dev/mem protections. Make sure to re-enable them after you’re finished.

See: Disabling /dev/mem protection

Canoeboot ROM images are named like this: payload_board_inittype_displaytype_keymap.rom

The payload option can be SeaBIOS, SeaGRUB or U-Boot. If GRUB is available on a given board, in flash, both SeaBIOS and SeaGRUB are provided; SeaBIOS images still have GRUB available via the SeaBIOS menu, and SeaGRUB means that SeaBIOS automatically loads GRUB from flash first (but you can still choose something else, by pressing ESC in SeaBIOS when prompted).

Inittype can be libgfxinit, vgarom or normal. The libgfxinit option means coreboot provides native video initialisation, for onboard graphics. The vgarom option means coreboot executes a VGA option ROM for video initialisation. The normal option means coreboot provides no video initialisation, via VGA ROM or native code.

Displaytype can be txtmode or corebootfb - if inittype is normal, this is ignored because txtmode is assumed.

If payload is seabios instead of seagrub, no keymaps are inserted into flash and only US QWERTY is assumed, otherwise the keymap refers to what is used in GRUB on seagrub payload setups.

If you use a libgfxinit image on a desktop machine, you can still insert a graphics card and it’ll work just fine; its own VGA option ROM will be executed instead, if the primary payload is SeaBIOS, whether that be pure SeaBIOS or a SeaGRUB setup.

Obviously, free EC firmware would be preferable, but it is not the case on all machine. We would like to have free EC firmware on more machines, but for now, we must rely on the vendor in a lot of cases. The EC is usually on a separate flash, so you wouldn’t think about it unless you knew it was there; this is exactly why it’s mentioned, so that you think about it, because proprietary software is bad.

In many cases, the EC firmware must be updated on a separate IC to the main boot flash, and this can usually only be done with the vendor’s own tool, running from the vendor boot firmware, and usually only on Windows, because they provide EC and BIOS/UEFI updates in the same utility. Find out what you need to do for your machine before installing Canoeboot.

It is recommended that you update to the latest EC firmware version. The EC firmware

Updating the EC can sometimes provide benefit depending on the vendor. For example, they might fix power issues that could then enhance battery life.

See: http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/BIOS_update_without_optical_disk

Otherwise, check the Lenovo website to find the update utility for your motherboard.

The same wisdom applies to other laptop vendors.

Non-laptops typically do not have embedded controllers in them.

In general, if Canoeboot is already running, you can skip towards the final section on this page, which provides general internal flashing instructions. Internal flashing is when you flash the target machine from the target machine, inside an operating system running on it.

Some boards require special steps, even if Canoeboot is already running, for example if you locked down the flash.

Therefore, before following generic guides, make sure to check first whether your board has special instructions, otherwise use the generic guide at the end of this article.

On all Intel platforms except X4X (e.g. Gigabyte GA-G41M-ES2L) and i945 ones (e.g. ThinkPad X60, ThinkPad T60, MacBook2,1), an Intel Flash Descriptor is used. If the board has Intel gigabit ethernet, the MAC address is included in flash, and can (must) be changed prior to installation.

You can use nvmutil to change the MAC address. You will perform this modification to the ROM image, before flashing it.

This is referred to informally as Secure canoeBoot.

Full flash lockdown is possible, with cryptographic verification of your GNU/Linux kernel and other files, using special features in the GRUB payload.

There are also some Intel X4X platforms that use an ICH10 southbridge, supported in Canoeboot, but these are flashed in a descriptorless setup, which means that the MAC address is irrelevant (either there will be an Intel PHY module that is now unusable, and you use an add-on card, or it doesn’t use an Intel PHY module and the onboard NIC is usable).

See: GRUB hardening / Secure canoeBoot

If you already did this, it’s possible that you may no longer be able to flash internally. If that is the case, you must flash externally.

Unless otherwise stated, in sections pertaining to each motherboard below, an existing Canoeboot installation can be updated via internal flashing, without any special steps; simply follow the general internal flashing guide, in the final section further down this page.

If you have an existing Canoeboot installation but you locked down the flash, updating it will require external flashing.

If you currently have the factory firmware, you probably need to flash externally; on some machines, internal flashing is possible, usually with special steps required that differ from updating an existing installation.

The next sections will pertain to specific motherboards, where indicated, followed by general internal flashing instructions where applicable.

See: Dell Latitude flashing guide

This applies to all supported Dell Latitude models. Remember to update the MAC address with nvmutil, before flashing.

If you’re running one of these with Lenovo BIOS, you must externally flash Canoeboot, because the original firmware restricts writes to the flash.

There machines all use SOIC8/SOIC16 flash ICs. Refer to pages specifically for each machine:

• ThinkPad X200
• ThinkPad T400
• ThinkPad R400
• ThinkPad T500/W500 (R500 is similar)

NOTE: T400S, X200S and X200 Tablet require different steps, because these have WSON8 flash ICs on them, which will require some soldering. Please read the external flashing guide in the section pertaining to WSON.

You can find WSON8 probes online, that are similar to a SOIC8/SOIC16 clip. Your mileage may very, but WSON8 has the same pinout as SOIC8 so you might have some luck with that.

See: External flashing guide - both boards are compatible with the same image.

Internal flashing is possible, from factory BIOS to Canoeboot, but special steps are required.

See: Gigabyte GA-G41M-ES2L installation guide

See: Acer G43T-AM3

MacBook 1,1 requires external flashing. MacBook 2,1 can always be flashed internally. iMac 5,2 can be flashed internally.

Also check the Macbook2,1 hardware page

You must flash it externally (DIP-8 section) - also look at the KGPE-D16 hardware page.

Further information is available on the KCMA-D8 page.

KGPE-D16 installation is essentially the same, with the same type of flash IC (DIP-8). Refer to the external flashing guide.

This board uses LPC flash in a PLCC32 socket. This coreboot page shows an example of the push pin as a proof of concept: http://www.coreboot.org/Developer_Manual/Tools#Chip_removal_tools

See: ASUS KFSN4-DRE guide

Hot-swap the flash IC with another one while it’s running, and flash it internally.

See: Intel D945GCLF flashing guide

Only the Intel GPU is compatible. Do not flash the ATI GPU models.

External flashing guides:

• ThinkPad X60
• ThinkPad X60 Tablet
• ThinkPad T60

These machines can also be flashed internally, by exploiting a bug in the original Lenovo BIOS. If there’s a BIOS password at boot, you should just flash externally.

Internal flashing instructions:

First, please ensure that your CR2032/CMOS battery is working. This is what powers the SRAM containing BIOS settings, and it powers the real-time clock. It also holds the BUC.TS value - this is what we need.

BUC (Backup Control) register contains a bit called Top Swap (TS). The 64KB bootblock at the top of flash is complemented by a backup Top Swap just above it. The one at the end can’t be flashed internally while Lenovo BIOS is running, but the rest of it can be flashed (everything above the main bootblock).

By setting the TS bit, you can make the machine boot from the backup bootblock.

Download the Libreboot 20160907 utils archive, and in there you will find these binaries:

• flashprog
• flashprog_i945_sst
• flashprog_i945_mx

You’ll also find the bucts tool. Run it as root:

./bucts 1

Now run both of these as root:

./flashrom_i945_sst -p internal -w coreboot.rom
./flashrom_i945_mx -p internal -w coreboot.rom

You’ll see a lot of errors. This is normal. You should see something like:

Reading old flash chip contents... done.
Erasing and writing flash chip... spi_block_erase_20 failed during command execution at address 0x0
Reading current flash chip contents... done. Looking for another erase function.
spi_block_erase_52 failed during command execution at address 0x0
Reading current flash chip contents... done. Looking for another erase function.
Transaction error!
spi_block_erase_d8 failed during command execution at address 0x1f0000
Reading current flash chip contents... done. Looking for another erase function.
spi_chip_erase_60 failed during command execution
Reading current flash chip contents... done. Looking for another erase function.
spi_chip_erase_c7 failed during command execution
Looking for another erase function.
No usable erase functions left.
FAILED!
Uh oh. Erase/write failed. Checking if anything has changed.
Reading current flash chip contents... done.
Apparently at least some data has changed.
Your flash chip is in an unknown state.

If you see this, rejoice! It means that the flash was successful. Please do not panic. Shut down now, and wait a few seconds, then turn back on again.

The main bootblock still isn’t flashed, but you can shut down, wait a few seconds and boot up again. When you do, you’ll have Canoeboot. Please make sure to flash a second time, like so:

flashprog -p internal -w coreboot.rom

Canoeboot recommends flashprog now, which is a fork of flashrom, but we used flashrom in the 2016 release. The macronix/ssh flashrom binaries there are specifically patched; check the Libreboot 20160907 source code for the actual patches. The patches modify some flash chip definitions in flashrom, to exploit the bug in Lenovo BIOS enabling internal flashing.

You must ensure that the second flash is performed, upon reboot, because otherwise if the CR2032 battery dies, bucts will be reset and it will no longer boot.

When you’ve done the second flash, which includes overwriting the main bootblock, set bucts back to zero:

./bucts 0

The second flash can be done by simply following the general internal flashing guide further down on this page.

See: Chromebook flashing instructions

NOTE: The generic flashing instructions (later on this page) apply only to the x86 machines, because the Chromebooks still use flashrom with the -p host argument instead of -p internal when flashing, and you typically need to flash externally, due to Google’s security model.

Canoeboot can be used on QEMU (virtual machine), which is useful for debugging payloads and generally trying out Canoeboot, without requiring real hardware.

See: Canoeboot QEMU guide

NOTE: This mainly applies to the x86 machines.

Please check other sections listed above, to see if there is anything pertaining to your motherboard. Internal flashing means that you boot GNU/Linux or BSD on the target machine, and run flashprog there, flashing the machine directly.

If you can’t flash internally, you must flash externally.

Internal flashing is often unavailable with the factory firmware, but it is usually possible when Canoeboot is running (barring special circumstances).

Flash chip size

Use this to find out:

flashprog -p internal

In the output will be information pertaining to your boot flash.

Howto: read/write/erase the boot flash

How to read the current chip contents:

sudo flashprog -p internal:laptop=force_I_want_a_brick,boardmismatch=force -r dump.bin

You should still make several dumps, even if you’re flashing internally, to ensure that you get the same checksums. Check each dump using sha1sum

How to erase and rewrite the chip contents:

sudo flashprog -p internal:laptop=force_I_want_a_brick,boardmismatch=force -w canoeboot.rom

NOTE: force_I_want_a_brick is not scary. Do not be scared! This merely disables the safety checks in flashprog. Flashprog and coreboot change a lot, over the years, and sometimes it’s necessary to use this option. If you’re scared, then just follow the above instructions, but remove that option. So, just use -p internal. If that doesn’t work, next try -p internal:boardmismatch=force. If that doesn’t work, try -p internal:boardmismatch=force,laptop=force_I_want_a_brick. So long as you ensure you’re using the correct ROM for your machine, it will be safe to run flashprog. These extra options just disable the safetyl checks in flashprog. There is nothing to worry about.

If successful, it will either say VERIFIED or it will say that the chip contents are identical to the requested image.

Markdown file for this page: https://canoeboot.org/docs/install/index.md

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