August 2023: New coreboot, SeaBIOS and GRUB revisions in Libreboot (testers needed!)

Leah Rowe

6 August 2023

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Article published by: Leah Rowe

Date of publication: 6 August 2023

Testing needed. I’ve already tested this update on a few boards myself, but the more the merrier! I’m planning a new Libreboot release some time in the next eight weeks or so; could be sooner, or could be a bit later. ETA somewhere between late August to late September (perhaps early October) of this year; the most recent stable release of Libreboot came out on 25 June 2023.

To receive these updates, you must use Git for now. See: how to download Libreboot from Git

Introduction

SeaBIOS and GRUB updates

For all mainboards that provide GRUB or SeaBIOS revisions, new versions of these payloads are now used in Libreboot, as implemented by these patches:

Coreboot update

The default cbtree is now based upon coreboot from 2 August 2023, where previously it was based upon coreboot from 17 February 2023. Patch: https://browse.libreboot.org/lbmk.git/commit/?id=705149a3e089fb99e671a47b0acd3a30378dd659

Of note: the HP 8300 USDT port is merged upstream, and included in this revision, so Libreboot’s patch for it is no longer needed, and has been removed (Libreboot previously supported this board out of tree, but now it uses the upstream code).

This update affects the following build targets, in Libreboot’s lbmk which is the automated build system used to produce releases:

d510mo_16mb, d510mo, e6400_4mb, g43t-am3_16mb, g43t-am3, ga-g41m-es2l, hp2560p_8mb, hp2570p_16mb, hp8200sff_4mb, hp8200sff_8mb, hp8300usdt_16mb, hp9470m_16mb, macbook11_16mb, macbook11, macbook21_16mb, macbook21, qemu_arm64_12mb, qemu_x86_12mb, r400_16mb, r400_4mb, r400_8mb, r500_4mb, t400_16mb, t400_4mb, t400_8mb, t420_8mb, t420s_8mb, t430_12mb, t440pmrc_12mb, t500_16mb, t500_4mb, t500_8mb, t520_8mb, t530_12mb, t60_16mb_intelgpu, t60_intelgpu, w500_16mb, w500_4mb, w500_8mb, w530_12mb, w541mrc_12mb, x200_16mb, x200_4mb, x200_8mb, x220_8mb, x230_12mb, x230_16mb, x230edp_12mb, x230t_12mb, x230t_16mb, x301_16mb, x301_4mb, x301_8mb, x60_16mb and x60.

This only affects the default coreboot tree used in Libreboot; the haswell tree (libre MRC on T440p/W541), cros (gru chromebooks) and fam15h trees used on KGPE-D16/KCMA-D8/KFSN4-DRE have not yet been updated.

I’m planning to merge Angel’s libre MRC patches into default at some point, re-basing them on the newer coreboot release, but this is done yet; unless, of course, these patches upstream (on coreboot gerrit) are improved and/or merged soon. I already covered fam15h AMD boards in a previous post - I plan to eventually use Dasharo (based on newer coreboot) instead of 4.11_branch on these boards. The cros boards need work - lots more testing, and many of them must be re-added again based on said testing.

Testing needed!

I want to get as much testing done now as possible, ready for the next release, which will still be marked as a testing release anyway; the next stable release is a long way off, as much new work is planned for Libreboot.

Apply to become a tester

If you wish to provide such testing, please read the following page:

Apply to become board maintainer/tester for Libreboot

If you can get coreboot logs, those will be useful. Email them to me or submit them attached in issue reports on the bug tracker; if you have any issues, we need to know. Coreboot tends to audit very carefully and updates are usually smooth, but testing is one of Libreboot’s main purposes, to provide stable releases based on coreboot.

How to download

To receive these updates, you must use Git for now. See: how to download Libreboot from Git

Build from source

This update, since it is not yet available pre-compiled in a release, must be compiled from source. See:

How to compile Libreboot from source

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