[3ae81e1] | 1 | <?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
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| 2 | <!DOCTYPE sect1 PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook XML V4.5//EN"
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| 3 | "http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.5/docbookx.dtd" [
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| 4 | <!ENTITY % general-entities SYSTEM "../../general.ent">
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| 5 | %general-entities;
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| 6 | ]>
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| 7 |
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| 8 | <sect1 id="postlfs-firmware" xreflabel="About Firmware">
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| 9 | <?dbhtml filename="firmware.html"?>
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| 10 |
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| 11 | <sect1info>
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| 12 | <othername>$LastChangedBy: bdubbs $</othername>
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| 13 | <date>$Date: 2012-03-13 13:19:34 -0500 (Tue, 13 Mar 2012) $</date>
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| 14 | </sect1info>
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| 15 |
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| 16 | <title>About Firmware</title>
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| 17 |
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| 18 | <indexterm zone="postlfs-firmware">
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| 19 | <primary sortas="e-lib-firmware">/lib/firmware</primary>
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| 20 | </indexterm>
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| 21 |
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| 22 | <para> On some recent PCs it can be necessary, or desirable, to load firmware
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| 23 | to make them work at their best. The kernel contains a directory, <filename
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| 24 | class="directory">/lib/firmware</filename>, where the kernel or kernel
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| 25 | drivers look for firmware images.</para>
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| 26 |
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| 27 | <para>Preparing firmware for multiple different machines, as a distro would
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| 28 | do, is outside the scope of this book.</para>
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| 29 |
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| 30 | <para>Currently, most firmware can be found at a <userinput>git</userinput>
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| 31 | repository: <ulink
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| 32 | url="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/firmware/linux-firmware.git/tree/"/>.
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| 33 | For convenience, the LFS Project has created a mirror, updated daily, where
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[cc8ccd9] | 34 | these firmware files can be accessed via <userinput>wget</userinput> or a web
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[3ae81e1] | 35 | browser at <ulink
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| 36 | url="http://anduin.linuxfromscratch.org/sources/linux-firmware/"/>.</para>
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| 37 |
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[fc03210] | 38 | <para>To get the firmware, either point a browser to one of the above
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[3ae81e1] | 39 | repositories and then download the item(s) which you need, or install
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| 40 | <userinput>git</userinput> and clone that repository.</para>
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| 41 |
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| 42 | <para>For some other firmware, particularly for Intel microcode and certain
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| 43 | wifi devices, the needed firmware is not available in the above repository.
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| 44 | Some of this will be addressed below, but a search of the Internet for needed
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| 45 | firmware is sometimes necessary.</para>
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| 46 |
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| 47 | <para>Firmware files are conventionally referred to as blobs because you cannot
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| 48 | determine what they will do. Note that firmware is distributed under various
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| 49 | different licenses which do not permit disassembly or reverse-engineering.</para>
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| 50 |
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| 51 | <para>Firmware for PCs falls into four categories:</para>
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| 52 |
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| 53 | <itemizedlist spacing="compact">
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| 54 | <listitem>
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| 55 | <para>Updates to the CPU to work around errata, usually referred to as
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| 56 | microcode.</para>
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| 57 | </listitem>
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| 58 | <listitem>
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| 59 | <para>Firmware for video controllers. On x86 machines this seems to only
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| 60 | apply to ATI devices : Radeons require firmware to be able to use KMS
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| 61 | (kernel modesetting - the preferred option) as well as for Xorg. For
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| 62 | earlier radeon chips (before the R600), the firmware is still in the
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| 63 | kernel.</para>
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| 64 | </listitem>
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| 65 | <listitem>
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| 66 | <para>Firmware updates for wired network ports. Mostly they work even
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| 67 | without the updates, but one must assume that they will work better with
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| 68 | the updated firmware.</para>
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| 69 | </listitem>
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| 70 | <listitem>
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| 71 | <para>Firmware for other devices, such as wifi. These devices are not
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| 72 | required for the PC to boot, but need the firmware before these devices
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| 73 | can be used.</para>
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| 74 | </listitem>
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| 75 | </itemizedlist>
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| 76 |
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| 77 | <note><para>Although not needed to load a firmware blob, the following
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| 78 | tools may be useful for determining, obtaining, or preparing the needed
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| 79 | firmware in order to load it into the system:
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| 80 | <xref linkend="cpio"/>,
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| 81 | <xref linkend="git"/>,
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| 82 | <xref linkend="pciutils"/>, and
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| 83 | <xref linkend="wget"/></para></note>
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| 84 |
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| 85 | <para condition="html" role="usernotes">User Notes:
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| 86 | <ulink url="&blfs-wiki;/aboutfirmware"/></para>
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| 87 |
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| 88 | <sect2 id="cpu-microcode">
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| 89 | <title>Microcode updates for CPUs</title>
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| 90 |
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| 91 | <para>In general, microcode can be loaded by the BIOS or UEFI, and it might
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| 92 | be updated by upgrading to a newer version of those. On linux, you can also
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| 93 | load the microcode from the kernel if you are using an AMD family 10h or
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| 94 | later processor (first introduced late 2007), or an intel processor from
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| 95 | 1998 and later (Pentium4, Core, etc), if updated microcode has been
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| 96 | released. These updates only last until the machine is powered off, so they
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| 97 | need to be applied on every boot.</para>
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| 98 |
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| 99 | <para>There are two ways of loading the microcode, described as 'early' and
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| 100 | 'late'. Early loading happens before userspace has been started, late
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| 101 | loading happens when userspace has started. Not surprisingly, early loading
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| 102 | is preferred, (see e.g. an explanatory comment in a kernel commit noted at
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| 103 | <ulink url="https://lwn.net/Articles/530346/">x86/microcode: Early load
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| 104 | microcode </ulink> on LWN.) Indeed, it is needed to work around one
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| 105 | particular erratum in early intel Haswell processors which had TSX enabled.
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| 106 | (See <ulink
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| 107 | url="http://www.anandtech.com/show/8376/intel-disables-tsx-instructions-erratum-found-in-haswell-haswelleep-broadwellyi/">
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| 108 | Intel Disables TSX Instructions: Erratum Found in Haswell, Haswell-E/EP,
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| 109 | Broadwell-Y</ulink>.) Without this update glibc can do the wrong thing in
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| 110 | uncommon situations.</para>
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| 111 |
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| 112 | <para>It is much simpler to begin by building a kernel which boots on
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| 113 | your hardware, try late microcode loading to see if there is an update (in
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| 114 | many cases the BIOS or UEFI will have already applied any update), and then
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| 115 | take the extra steps required for early loading.</para>
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| 116 |
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| 117 | <para>This means you will be reconfiguring your kernel if you use early
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| 118 | loading, so keep the built source around to minimise what gets rebuilt, and
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| 119 | if you are at all uncertain, add your own identifier (A,B, etc) to the end
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| 120 | of the EXTRAVERSION in the kernel configuration, e.g. "EXTRAVERSION -A" if
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| 121 | nothing was set.</para>
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| 122 |
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| 123 | <para>To confirm what processor(s) you have (if more than one, they will be
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[fc03210] | 124 | identical) look in /proc/cpuinfo.</para>
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[3ae81e1] | 125 |
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| 126 | <sect3 id="intel-microcode">
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| 127 | <title>Intel Microcode for the CPU</title>
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| 128 |
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| 129 | <bridgehead renderas="sect4">Required Package</bridgehead>
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| 130 | <para role='required'>
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| 131 | <ulink url='http://fedorahosted.org/released/microcode_ctl/'/></para>
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| 132 |
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| 133 | <para>For intel CPUs an extra package, microcode_ctl, is required. The
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| 134 | package chosen is the version hosted at fedora — there is an
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| 135 | alternative version at github from the same packager, but that still
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| 136 | includes a redundant old version of an AMD microcode container, and also
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| 137 | requires the unzip package.</para>
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| 138 |
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| 139 | <para>Download the latest version from the link above; when last checked,
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| 140 | this was 2.1-7 and is updated when intel releases new microcode.</para>
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| 141 |
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| 142 | <para>This package reformats the microcode supplied by intel into a
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| 143 | format which the kernel can apply. The program
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| 144 | <userinput>intel-microcode2ucode</userinput> is built and invoked by the
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| 145 | Makefile to create the individual firmware blobs, so there is no reason
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| 146 | to install it.</para>
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| 147 |
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| 148 | <para>Begin by extracting the tarball and changing to the directory it created.
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| 149 | Then change to the source diirectory and run:</para>
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| 150 |
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| 151 | <screen><userinput>make</userinput></screen>
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| 152 |
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| 153 | <para>This creates various blobs with names in the form XX-YY-ZZ. Now you
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| 154 | need to determine your processor's identity, to see if there is any
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| 155 | microcode for it. Determine the decimal values of the cpu family, model
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| 156 | and stepping by running:</para>
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| 157 |
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| 158 | <screen><userinput>head -n7 /proc/cpuinfo</userinput></screen>
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| 159 |
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| 160 | <para>Now convert the cpu family, model and stepping to pairs of hexadecimal
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| 161 | digits. For a SandyBridge i3-2120 (described as Intel(R) Core(TM) i3-2120
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| 162 | CPU) the relevant values are cpu family 6, model 42, stepping 7 so in
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| 163 | this case the required identification is 06-2a-07. A look at the blobs
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| 164 | will show that there is one for this CPU (although it might
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| 165 | have already been applied by the BIOS). If there is a blob for your
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| 166 | system then test if it will be applied by copying it (replace <XX-YY-ZZ>
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[fc03210] | 167 | by the identifier for your machine) to where the kernel can find it:</para>
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[3ae81e1] | 168 |
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| 169 | <screen><userinput>mkdir -pv /lib/firmware/intel-ucode
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| 170 | cp -v <XX-YY-ZZ> /lib/firmware/intel-ucode</userinput></screen>
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| 171 |
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| 172 | <para>Now that the intel microcode has been prepared, use the following
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| 173 | options when you configure the kernel to try late loading of the intel
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| 174 | microcode:</para>
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| 175 |
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| 176 | <screen><literal>Processor type and features --->
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| 177 | <M> CPU microcode loading support [CONFIG_MICROCODE]
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| 178 | [*] Intel microcode loading support [CONFIG_MICROCODE_INTEL]</literal></screen>
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| 179 |
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| 180 | <para>After you have successfully booted the new system, use the command
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| 181 | <userinput>dmesg | grep microcode</userinput> and study the results to
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| 182 | see if the message new patch_level appears. This example from the
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| 183 | SandyBridge i3:</para>
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| 184 |
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| 185 | <screen><literal>[ 0.059906] perf_event_intel: PEBS disabled due to CPU errata, please upgrade microcode
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| 186 | [ 2.603083] microcode: CPU0 sig=0x206a7, pf=0x2, revision=0x23
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| 187 | [ 2.669378] microcode: CPU0 sig=0x206a7, pf=0x2, revision=0x23
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| 188 | [ 2.669994] microcode: CPU0 updated to revision 0x29, date = 2013-06-12
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| 189 | [ 2.670069] microcode: CPU1 sig=0x206a7, pf=0x2, revision=0x23
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| 190 | [ 2.670139] microcode: CPU1 sig=0x206a7, pf=0x2, revision=0x23
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| 191 | [ 2.670501] microcode: CPU1 updated to revision 0x29, date = 2013-06-12
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| 192 | [ 2.670509] microcode: CPU2 sig=0x206a7, pf=0x2, revision=0x23
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| 193 | [ 2.670540] microcode: CPU2 sig=0x206a7, pf=0x2, revision=0x23
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| 194 | [ 2.670917] microcode: CPU2 updated to revision 0x29, date = 2013-06-12
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| 195 | [ 2.670955] microcode: CPU3 sig=0x206a7, pf=0x2, revision=0x23
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| 196 | [ 2.670988] microcode: CPU3 sig=0x206a7, pf=0x2, revision=0x23
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| 197 | [ 2.671348] microcode: CPU3 updated to revision 0x29, date = 2013-06-12
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| 198 | [ 2.671356] perf_event_intel: PEBS enabled due to microcode update
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| 199 | [ 2.671412] microcode: Microcode Update Driver: v2.00 <tigran@aivazian.fsnet.co.uk>, Peter Oruba</literal></screen>
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| 200 |
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| 201 | <para>If the microcode was not updated, there is no new microcode for
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| 202 | this system's processor. If it did get updated, you can now proceed to <xref
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| 203 | linkend='early-microcode'/>.</para>
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| 204 |
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| 205 | </sect3>
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| 206 |
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| 207 | <sect3 id="and-microcode">
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| 208 | <title>AMD Microcode for the CPU</title>
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| 209 |
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| 210 | <para>Begin by downloading a container of firmware for your CPU family
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| 211 | from <ulink
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| 212 | url='http://anduin.linuxfromscratch.org/sources/linux-firmware/amd-ucode/'/>.
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| 213 | The family is always specified in hex. Families 10h to 14h (16 to 20)
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| 214 | are in microcode_amd.bin. Families 15h and 16h have their own containers.
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| 215 | Create the required directory and put the firmware you downloaded into
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| 216 | it as the <systemitem class="username">root</systemitem> user:</para>
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| 217 |
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| 218 | <screen><userinput>mkdir -pv /lib/firmware/amd-ucode
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| 219 | cp -v microcode_amd* /lib/firmware/amd-ucode</userinput></screen>
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| 220 |
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| 221 | <para>When you configure the kernel, use the following options to try
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| 222 | late loading of AMD microcode:</para>
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| 223 |
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| 224 | <screen><literal>Processor type and features --->
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| 225 | <M> CPU microcode loading support [CONFIG_MICROCODE]
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| 226 | [*] AMD microcode loading support [CONFIG_MICROCODE_AMD]</literal></screen>
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| 227 |
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| 228 | <para>After you have successfully booted the new system, use the command
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| 229 | <userinput>dmesg | grep microcode</userinput> and study the results to see
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| 230 | if the message new patch_level appears, as in this example from an old
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| 231 | Athlon(tm) II X2:</para>
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| 232 |
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| 233 | <screen><literal>[ 4.183907] microcode: CPU0: patch_level=0x010000b6
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| 234 | [ 4.184271] microcode: CPU0: new patch_level=0x010000c8
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| 235 | [ 4.184278] microcode: CPU1: patch_level=0x010000b6
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| 236 | [ 4.184283] microcode: CPU1: new patch_level=0x010000c8
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| 237 | [ 4.184359] microcode: Microcode Update Driver: v2.00 <tigran@aivazian.fsnet.co.uk>, Peter Oruba</literal></screen>
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| 238 |
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| 239 | <para>If the microcode was not updated, there is no new microcode for
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| 240 | this system's processor. If it did get updated, you can now proceed to <xref
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| 241 | linkend='early-microcode'/>.</para>
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| 242 |
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| 243 | </sect3>
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| 244 |
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| 245 | <sect3 id="early-microcode">
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| 246 | <title>Early loading of microcode</title>
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| 247 |
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| 248 | <para>If you have established that updated microcode is available for
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| 249 | your system, it is time to prepare it for early loading. This requires
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| 250 | an additional package, <xref linkend='cpio'/>, as well as changes to
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| 251 | the kernel config and the creation of an initrd which will need to be
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| 252 | added to grub.cfg.</para>
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| 253 |
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| 254 | <para>It does not matter where you prepare the initrd, and once it is
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| 255 | working you can apply the same initrd to later LFS systems or newer
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| 256 | kernels on this same machine, at least until any newer microcode is
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| 257 | released. Use the following commands:</para>
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| 258 |
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| 259 | <screen><userinput>mkdir -p initrd/kernel/x86/microcode
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| 260 | cd initrd</userinput></screen>
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| 261 |
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| 262 | <para>For an AMD machine, use the following command (replace
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| 263 | <MYCONTAINER> with the name of the container for your CPU's
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| 264 | family):</para>
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| 265 |
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| 266 | <screen><userinput>cp -v /lib/firmware/amd_ucode/<MYCONTAINER> kernel/x86/microcode/AuthenticAMD.bin</userinput></screen>
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| 267 |
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| 268 | <para>Or for an Intel machine copy the appropriate blob using this command:</para>
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| 269 |
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| 270 | <screen><userinput>cp -v /lib/firmware/intel-ucode/<XX-YY-ZZ> kernel/x86/microcode/GenuineIntel.bin</userinput></screen>
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| 271 |
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| 272 | <para>Now prepare the initrd:</para>
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| 273 |
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| 274 | <screen><userinput>find . | cpio -o -H newc > /boot/microcode.img</userinput></screen>
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| 275 |
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| 276 | <para>You will now need to reconfigure and rebuild your kernel. It is
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| 277 | safer to either add/change the EXTRAVERSION in the kernel's configuration
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| 278 | and install the newer kernel with a new name, or else (unless you have a
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| 279 | machine which requires an early firmware update) wait for the next
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| 280 | SUBLEVEL kernel release so that you can fall back to the existing kernel
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| 281 | in the event that something goes wrong.</para>
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| 282 |
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| 283 | <para>You will also need to add a new entry to /boot/grub/grub.cfg and
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| 284 | here you should add a new line after the linux line within the stanza.
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| 285 | If /boot is a separate mountpoint: </para>
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| 286 |
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| 287 | <screen><userinput>initrd /microcode.img</userinput></screen>
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| 288 |
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| 289 | <para>or this if it is not:</para>
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| 290 |
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| 291 | <screen><userinput>initrd /boot/microcode.img</userinput></screen>
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| 292 |
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| 293 | <para>You must also change the kernel config:</para>
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| 294 |
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| 295 | <screen><literal>General Setup --->
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| 296 | [y] Initial RAM filesystem and RAM disk (initramfs/initrd) support [CONFIG_BLK_DEV_INITRD]
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| 297 | [y] CPU microcode loading support [CONFIG_MICROCODE]</literal></screen>
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| 298 |
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| 299 | <para>Retain the setting for INTEL or AMD microcode. When you have saved
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| 300 | the .config file, either CONFIG_MICROCODE_INTEL_EARLY=y or
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| 301 | CONFIG_MICROCODE_AMD_EARLY=y should be set, together with
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| 302 | CONFIG_MICROCODE_EARLY=y.</para>
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| 303 |
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| 304 | <para>When you have installed and booted this kernel, you should check
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| 305 | the output of dmesg to confirm that the early load worked. The places and
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| 306 | times where this happens are very different in AMD and Intel machines.
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| 307 | First, an Intel example where a development kernel is being tested,
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| 308 | showing that the first notification comes before the kernel version is
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| 309 | mentioned:</para>
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| 310 |
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| 311 | <screen><literal>[ 0.000000] CPU0 microcode updated early to revision 0x29, date = 2013-06-12
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| 312 | [ 0.000000] Linux version 4.0.0-rc6 (ken@jtm1) (gcc version 4.9.2 (GCC) )
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| 313 | #3 SMP PREEMPT Mon Mar 30 21:26:02 BST 2015
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| 314 | [ 0.000000] Command line: BOOT_IMAGE=/vmlinuz-4.0.0-rc6-sda13 root=/dev/sda13 ro
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| 315 | ...
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| 316 | [ 0.103091] CPU1 microcode updated early to revision 0x29, date = 2013-06-12
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| 317 | [ 0.113241] #2
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| 318 | [ 0.134631] #3
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| 319 | [ 0.147821] x86: Booted up 1 node, 4 CPUs
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| 320 | [ 0.147936] smpboot: Total of 4 processors activated (26338.66 BogoMIPS)
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| 321 | ...
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| 322 | [ 0.272643] microcode: CPU0 sig=0x206a7, pf=0x2, revision=0x29
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| 323 | [ 0.272709] microcode: CPU1 sig=0x206a7, pf=0x2, revision=0x29
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| 324 | [ 0.272775] microcode: CPU2 sig=0x206a7, pf=0x2, revision=0x29
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| 325 | [ 0.272842] microcode: CPU3 sig=0x206a7, pf=0x2, revision=0x29
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| 326 | [ 0.272941] microcode: Microcode Update Driver: v2.00 <tigran@aivazian.fsnet.co.uk>, Peter Oruba</literal></screen>
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| 327 |
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| 328 | <para>A second AMD example is where the machine was running a stable
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| 329 | kernel on an older version of LFS. Note that here there is no mention of
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| 330 | the previous microcode version — compare this output to the AMD
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| 331 | late loading messages (above) from the same machine:</para>
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| 332 |
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| 333 | <screen><literal>[ 0.000000] Linux version 3.18.11 (ken@milliways) (gcc version 4.9.1 (GCC) )
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| 334 | #4 SMP Thu Apr 9 21:51:05 BST 2015
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| 335 | [ 0.000000] Command line: BOOT_IMAGE=/vmlinuz-3.18.11-sda5 root=/dev/sda5 video=800x600 ro
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| 336 | ...
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| 337 | [ 0.584009] Trying to unpack rootfs image as initramfs...
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| 338 | [ 0.584092] microcode: updated early to new patch_level=0x010000c8
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| 339 | ...
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| 340 | [ 0.586733] microcode: CPU0: patch_level=0x010000c8
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| 341 | [ 0.586778] microcode: CPU1: patch_level=0x010000c8
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| 342 | [ 0.586866] microcode: Microcode Update Driver: v2.00 <tigran@aivazian.fsnet.co.uk>, Peter Oruba</literal></screen>
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| 343 |
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| 344 | </sect3>
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| 345 |
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| 346 | </sect2>
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| 347 |
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| 348 | <sect2 id="ati-video-firmware">
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| 349 | <title>Firmware for ATI video chips (R600 and later)</title>
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| 350 |
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| 351 | <para>These instructions do NOT apply to old radeons before the R600
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| 352 | family. For those, the firmware is in the kernel's <filename
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| 353 | class='directory'>/lib/firmware/</filename> directory. Nor do they apply if
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| 354 | you intend to avoid a graphical setup such as Xorg and are content to use
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| 355 | the default 80x25 display rather than a framebuffer. </para>
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| 356 |
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| 357 | <para> Early radeon devices only needed a single 2K blob of firmware.
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| 358 | Recent devices need several different blobs, and some of them are much
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| 359 | bigger. The total size of the radeon firmware directory is over 500K — on a
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| 360 | large modern system you can probably spare the space, but it is still
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| 361 | redundant to install all the unused files each time you build a system.</para>
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| 362 |
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| 363 | <para>A better approach is to install <xref linkend='pciutils'/> and then
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| 364 | use <userinput>lspci</userinput> to identify which VGA controller is
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| 365 | installed.</para>
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| 366 |
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| 367 | <para>With that information, check the RadeonFeature page of the Xorg wiki
|
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| 368 | for <ulink url="http://wiki.x.org/wiki/RadeonFeature/#index5h2">Decoder
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| 369 | ring for engineering vs marketing names</ulink> to identify the family (you
|
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| 370 | may need to know this for the Xorg driver in BLFS — Southern Islands and
|
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| 371 | Sea Islands use the radeonsi driver) and the specific model.</para>
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| 372 |
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| 373 | <para>Now that you know which controller you are using, consult the
|
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| 374 | <ulink url="https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Radeon#Firmware">Radeon</ulink> page
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| 375 | of the Gentoo wiki which has a table listing the required firmware blobs
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| 376 | for the various chipsets. Note that Southern Islands and Sea Islands chips
|
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| 377 | use different firmware for kernel 3.17 and later compared to earlier
|
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| 378 | kernels. Identify and download the required blobs then install them:</para>
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| 379 |
|
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| 380 | <screen><userinput>mkdir -pv /lib/firmware/radeon
|
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| 381 | cp -v <YOUR_BLOBS> /lib/firmware/radeon</userinput></screen>
|
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| 382 |
|
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| 383 | <para>There are actually two ways of installing this firmware. BLFS, in the
|
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| 384 | 'Kernel Configuration for additional firmware' section part of the <xref
|
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| 385 | linkend="xorg-ati-driver"/> section gives an example of compiling the
|
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| 386 | firmware into the kernel - that is slightly faster to load, but uses more
|
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| 387 | kernel memory. Here we will use the alternative method of making the radeon
|
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| 388 | driver a module. In your kernel config set the following: </para>
|
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| 389 |
|
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| 390 | <screen><literal>Device Drivers --->
|
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| 391 | Graphics support --->
|
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| 392 | Direct Rendering Manager --->
|
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| 393 | <*> Direct Rendering Manager (XFree86 ... support) [CONFIG_DRM]
|
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| 394 | <m> ATI Radeon [CONFIG_DRM_RADEON]</literal></screen>
|
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| 395 |
|
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| 396 | <para>Loading several large blobs from /lib/firmware takes a noticeable
|
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| 397 | time, during which the screen will be blank. If you do not enable the
|
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| 398 | penguin framebuffer logo, or change the console size by using a bigger
|
---|
| 399 | font, that probably does not matter. If desired, you can slightly
|
---|
| 400 | reduce the time if you follow the alternate method of specifying 'y' for
|
---|
| 401 | CONFIG_DRM_RADEON covered in BLFS at the link above — you must specify each
|
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| 402 | needed radeon blob if you do that.</para>
|
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| 403 |
|
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| 404 | </sect2>
|
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| 405 |
|
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| 406 | <sect2 id="nic-firmware">
|
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| 407 | <title>Firmware for Network Interfaces</title>
|
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| 408 |
|
---|
| 409 | <para>The kernel likes to load firmware for some network drivers,
|
---|
| 410 | particularly those from Realtek (the /lib/linux-firmware/rtl_nic/) directory,
|
---|
| 411 | but they generally appear to work without it. Therefore, you can boot the
|
---|
| 412 | kernel, check dmesg for messages about this missing firmware, and if
|
---|
| 413 | necessary download the firmware and put it in the specified directory in
|
---|
| 414 | /lib/firmware so that it will be found on subsequent boots. Note that with
|
---|
| 415 | current kernels this works whether or not the driver is compiled in or
|
---|
| 416 | built as a module, there is no need to build this firmware into the kernel.
|
---|
| 417 | Here is an example where the R8169 driver has been compiled in but the
|
---|
| 418 | firmware was not made available. Once the firmware had been provided, there
|
---|
| 419 | was no mention of it on later boots. </para>
|
---|
| 420 |
|
---|
| 421 | <screen><literal>dmesg | grep firmware | grep r8169
|
---|
| 422 | [ 7.018028] r8169 0000:01:00.0: Direct firmware load for rtl_nic/rtl8168g-2.fw failed with error -2
|
---|
| 423 | [ 7.018036] r8169 0000:01:00.0 eth0: unable to load firmware patch rtl_nic/rtl8168g-2.fw (-2)</literal></screen>
|
---|
| 424 |
|
---|
| 425 | </sect2>
|
---|
| 426 |
|
---|
| 427 | <sect2 id="other-firmware">
|
---|
| 428 | <title>Firmware for Other Devices</title>
|
---|
| 429 |
|
---|
| 430 | <para> Identifying the correct firmware will typically require you to
|
---|
| 431 | install <xref linkend='pciutils'/>, and then use
|
---|
| 432 | <userinput>lspci</userinput> to identify the device. You should then search
|
---|
| 433 | online to check which module it uses, which firmware, and where to obtain
|
---|
| 434 | the firmware — not all of it is in linux-firmware.</para>
|
---|
| 435 |
|
---|
| 436 | <para>If possible, you should begin by using a wired connection when you
|
---|
| 437 | first boot your LFS system. To use a wireless connection you will need to
|
---|
| 438 | use a network tools such as <xref linkend='wireless_tools'/> and <xref
|
---|
| 439 | linkend='wpa_supplicant'/>.</para>
|
---|
| 440 |
|
---|
| 441 | <para>Firmware may also be needed for other devices such as some SCSI
|
---|
| 442 | controllers, bluetooth adaptors, or TV recorders. The same principles
|
---|
| 443 | apply.</para>
|
---|
| 444 |
|
---|
| 445 | </sect2>
|
---|
| 446 |
|
---|
| 447 | </sect1>
|
---|