title: Flashing the X200 with a BeagleBone Black x-toc-enable: true ...

This guide is for those who want Libreboot on their ThinkPad X200 while they still have the original Lenovo BIOS present. This guide can also be followed (adapted) if you brick your X200, to know how to recover.

Note that this document doesn't cover the X200S or X200 Tablet; they will use a different flash chip than the X200, which requires several additional steps to install Libreboot on them (including complete removal of the motherboard). For instructions on installing Libreboot onto an X200 Tablet, see this document.

X200 laptops with Libreboot pre-installed

If you don't want to install Libreboot yourself, companies exist that sell these laptops with it pre-installed, along with a free GNU+Linux distribution.

Flash Chip Size

Run this command on x200 to find out flash chip model and its size:

# flashrom -p internal -V

Recording the MAC Address

On the X200, the MAC address for the onboard gigabit Ethernet chipset is stored inside the flash chip, along with other configuration data.

Keep a note of the MAC address before disassembly; this is very important, because you will need to insert this into the Libreboot ROM image before flashing it. It will be written in one of these locations:

Accessing the Flash Chip

Remove these screws:\

Gently push the keyboard towards the screen, then lift it off, and optionally disconnect it from the board:\

Disconnect the cable of the fingerpring reader, and then pull up the palm rest, lifting up the left and right side of it:\

This shows the location of the flash chip, for both SOIC-8 and SOIC-16:\

Lift back the tape that covers a part of the flash chip, and then connect the clip:\

On pin 2 of the BBB, where you have the ground (GND), connect the ground to your PSU:\

Connect the 3.3V DC supply from your PSU to the flash chip (via the clip):\

Now, you should be ready to install Libreboot.

Initial BBB configuration {#bbb_setup}

Refer to bbb_setup.md for how to set up the BBB for flashing.

The following shows how to connect the clip to the BBB (on the P9 header), for SOIC-16 (clip: Pomona 5252):

POMONA 5252 (correlate with the BBB guide)
===  front (display) on your X200 ====
 NC              -       - 21
 1               -       - 17
 NC              -       - NC
 NC              -       - NC
 NC              -       - NC
 NC              -       - NC
 18              -       - 3.3V (PSU)
 22              -       - NC - this is pin 1 on the flash chip
===  back (palmrest) on your X200 ===
This is how you will connect. Numbers refer to pin numbers on the BBB, on the plugs near the DC jack.
Here is a photo of the SOIC-16 flash chip. Pins are labelled:

The following shows how to connect the clip to the BBB (on the P9 header), for SOIC-8 (clip: Pomona 5250):

POMONA 5250 (correlate with the BBB guide)
===  left side of the X200 (where the VGA port is) ====
 18              -       - 1
 22              -       - NC
 NC              -       - 21
 3.3V (PSU)      -       - 17 - this is pin 1 on the flash chip. in front of it is the screen.
===  right side of the X200 (where the audio jacks are) ===
This is how you will connect. Numbers refer to pin numbers on the BBB, on the plugs near the DC jack.
Here is a photo of the SOIC-8 flash chip. The pins are labelled:

Look at the pads in that photo, on the left and right. Those are for SOIC-16. Would it be possible to remove the SOIC-8 and solder a SOIC-16
chip on those pins?

Flashrom binaries for ARM (tested on a BBB) are distributed in Libreboot_util. Alternatively, Libreboot also distributes flashrom source code which can be built.

Test that flashrom works:

# ./flashrom -p linux_spi:dev=/dev/spidev1.0,spispeed=512

In this case, the output was:

flashrom v0.9.7-r1854 on Linux 3.8.13-bone47 (armv7l)
flashrom is free software, get the source code at http://www.flashrom.org
Calibrating delay loop... OK.
Found Macronix flash chip "MX25L6405(D)" (8192 kB, SPI) on linux_spi.
Found Macronix flash chip "MX25L6406E/MX25L6436E" (8192 kB, SPI) on linux_spi.
Found Macronix flash chip "MX25L6445E/MX25L6473E" (8192 kB, SPI) on linux_spi.
Multiple flash chip definitions match the detected chip(s): "MX25L6405(D)", "MX25L6406E/MX25L6436E", "MX25L6445E/MX25L6473E"
Please specify which chip definition to use with the -c <chipname> option.

Backup the Factory ROM

Here is how to backup the factory ROM; you'll want to do this, both for reverse-engineering purposes, as well as if you need to reinstall the vendor ROM for any reason (e.g., updating the EC firmware):

# ./flashrom -p linux_spi:dev=/dev/spidev1.0,spispeed=512 -r factory.rom
# ./flashrom -p linux_spi:dev=/dev/spidev1.0,spispeed=512 -r factory1.rom
# ./flashrom -p linux_spi:dev=/dev/spidev1.0,spispeed=512 -r factory2.rom

Note: the -c option is not required in Libreboot's patched flashrom, because the redundant flash chip definitions in flashchips.c have been removed.

Now compare the 3 images:

# sha512sum factory*.rom

If the hashes match, then just copy one of them (the factory.rom) to a safe place (on a drive connected to another system, not the BBB). This is useful for reverse engineering work, if there is a desirable behaviour in the original firmware that could be replicated in coreboot and Libreboot.

Change the MAC address inside the ROM

Follow the instructions at ../hardware/gm45_remove_me.html#ich9gen to change the MAC address inside the Libreboot ROM image, before flashing it. Although there is a default MAC address inside the ROM image, this is not what you want. Make sure to always change the MAC address to one that is correct for your system.

Flashing Libreboot

Now flash it:

# ./flashrom -p linux_spi:dev=/dev/spidev1.0,spispeed=512 -w path/to/Libreboot/rom/image.rom -V

You might see errors, but if it says Verifying flash... VERIFIED at the end, then it's flashed and should boot. If you see errors, try again (and again, and again); the message Chip content is identical to the requested image is also an indication of a successful installation.

Example output from running the command (see above):

flashrom v0.9.7-r1854 on Linux 3.8.13-bone47 (armv7l)
flashrom is free software, get the source code at http://www.flashrom.org
Calibrating delay loop... OK.
Found Macronix flash chip "MX25L6405(D)" (8192 kB, SPI) on linux_spi.
Reading old flash chip contents... done.
Erasing and writing flash chip... FAILED at 0x00001000! Expected=0xff, Found=0x00, failed byte count from 0x00000000-0x0000ffff: 0xd716
ERASE FAILED!
Reading current flash chip contents... done. Looking for another erase function.
Erase/write done.
Verifying flash... VERIFIED.

Wi-Fi

The X200 typically comes with an Intel wireless chipset, which does not work without proprietary software. For a list of wireless chipsets that work without proprietary software, see ../hardware/#recommended_wifi.

Some X200 laptops come with an Atheros chipset, but this is 802.11g only.

It is recommended that you install a new wireless chipset. This can only be done after installing Libreboot, because the original firmware has a whitelist of approved chips, and it will refuse to boot if you use an 'unauthorized' wireless card.

The following photos show an Atheros AR5B95 being installed, to replace the Intel chip that this X200 came with:

WWAN

If you have a WWAN/3G card and/or sim card reader, remove them permanently. The WWAN-3G card has proprietary firmware inside; the technology is identical to what is used in mobile phones, so it can also track your movements.

Not to be confused with Wi-Fi, which is fine.

Intel Turbo Memory

Some X200 devices were sold with Intel Turbo Memory installed in the top-most mini PCI-e slot. This has been shown to be ineffective at disk caching or battery saving in most use cases. While there are Linux drivers available, it is blacklisted in at least GNU+Trisquel, and possibly other free operating systems. It should probably be removed.

Memory (RAM)

You need DDR3 SODIMM PC3-8500 RAM installed, in matching pairs (speed/size). Non-matching pairs won't work. You can also install a single module (meaning, one of the slots will be empty) in slot 0.

NOTE: according to users reports, non matching pairs (e.g. 1+2 GiB) might work in some cases.

Make sure that the RAM you buy is the 2Rx8 density.

In this photo, 8GiB of RAM (2x4GiB) is installed:

Boot it!

You should see something like this:

Now install GNU+Linux.

Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License Version 1.3 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation with no Invariant Sections, no Front Cover Texts, and no Back Cover Texts. A copy of this license is found in ../fdl-1.3.md

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