FAQ: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 15:24, 5 December 2009

Q: flashrom doesn't seem to work on my board, what can I do?

First of all, check if your chipset, ROM chip, and mainboard are supported (see tables above, or use flashrom -L).
If your board has a jumper for BIOS flash protection (check the manual), disable it.
Should your BIOS menu have a BIOS flash protection option, disable it.
If you run flashrom on a Linux system with kernels >= 2.6.27 there are two issues you have to check:
- See next question: X86_PAT and nopat
- See next question: CONFIG_STRICT_DEVMEM
See this page for instructions on how to test flashrom support properly (this may be risky, make sure you have a working backup flash chip).

Q: I get 'Can't mmap memory using /dev/mem: Invalid argument'

Q: How do I use flashrom?

Please see the flashrom(8) manpage.

Q: Is there a flashrom Live CD?

See Flashrom/Live CD.

@@ Line 5: / Line 5: @@
 * Should your BIOS menu have a BIOS flash protection option, disable it.
 * If you run flashrom on a Linux system with kernels >= 2.6.27 there are two issues you have to check:
-** TODO: '''X86_PAT''' and '''nopat'''
+** See next question: '''X86_PAT''' and '''nopat'''
-** TODO: '''CONFIG_STRICT_DEVMEM'''
+** See next question: '''CONFIG_STRICT_DEVMEM'''
 * See [[Board Testing HOWTO#Flashrom|this page]] for instructions on how to test flashrom support properly (this may be risky, make sure you have a working backup flash chip).
+'''Q: I get 'Can't mmap memory using /dev/mem: Invalid argument''''
+* [http://www.coreboot.org/pipermail/coreboot/2008-December/043708.html Please check that your kernel doesn't have CONFIG_STRICT_DEVMEM set, as it will stop flashrom from working.]
+* [http://www.coreboot.org/pipermail/coreboot/2008-December/043497.html Another poster reported that CONFIG_X86_PAT will also stop flashrom from working. Please try booting with the nopat kernel parameter to temporarily disable it.]
 '''Q: How do I use flashrom?'''