Is CoreBoot just a meme or actually worthwhile?

Is CoreBoot just a meme or actually worthwhile?

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youtube.com/watch?v=pGipRmEd2Es
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Bump for interest.
Does it remove Intel Management botnettery? It'd be worthwhile for that alone.

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It leaves some of the ME but removes much of it, I believe it only runs at boot time with Coreboot

>What is me_cleaner
You don't need Coreboot for that.

I've never heard of this, is it likely to brick my mobo?

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Depends on what you want it for. It's fast as shit (on most boards anyway, my server still takes ~40 seconds to POST) and will let you embed an entire OS in the BIOS chip if you have the space. I've got a T400 with basic set of CLI tools, networking, media player, and web browser built in. I can connect to wifi and download and install Gentoo from scratch to a blank drive while watching youtube videos without any external media.

Yeah, cripples it pretty badly and removes networking capabilities, but still not entirely dead.

True, but CB has other neat features, like EFI booting on hardware too old to come with it from the factory, or vice-versa if you like.

Coreboot is not related to the ME. The ME is its own thing. Running me_cleaner against your BIOS is entirely optional, but you do gain some benefits in Coreboot by doing so, such as more space in the BIOS filesystem that was previously used by the ME.

YMMV is what I hear. Most cases of people running me_cleaner are successful assuming you do everything correctly

If your machine is supported by libreboot, it will run without any ME blobs, laptops newer than core 2 (like sandy bridge and ivy bridge) need an ME blob to run, otherwise they will reset after 30 minutes of use. me_cleaner can strip majority of the blob (which in some cases can be over 5 MiB in side) and (hopefully) remove a significant part of malicious functionality.

I prefer to run me_cleaner on the image before I split it up and put it into coreboot.

As for coreboot itself, it's definitely worth it. In my case, it makes my T420 WAY better with compatibility with newer CPUs (using a quadcore that would come with a W530 in it right now, it's a huge update), no whitelists for minipcie devices, and faster boot times. You can set up pretty much any payload you want, one person put windows 3.1 onto their firmware chip along with seabios, I run just GNU GRUB on mine.

The ME still runs 24/7 but is stripped down to its bare parts necessary only to get the computer to boot. On my Thinkpad x230 with Coreboot and a stripped ME, the intelmetool says the ME is permanently stuck loading its kernel that no longer exists.

There's always a possiblity, but if you buy a cheap CH341A programmer (literally $5) + SOIC-8 clip, you can recover in case you brick your motherboard.

If you want better security, removed/neutered always-on backdoor co-processor, genuine control over your hardware's initialization, faster boot times, unlocked hardware features that were disabled by the OEM BIOS (EG; overclocking), and a cool boot screen image, then yes.

It depends on the device. Core2duo machines can have the ME completely removed and still function, whereas anything newer still requires a few parts of it for hardware initialization. Past that, it can be stripped and "disabled" with a government entity-exclusive flag called the HAP bit.

True, but many OEM BIOS/UEFI setups require specific features of the ME, meaning the BIOS may not function properly (or at all) after it's been removed/disabled.

Sure, but you'd be flashing from an external flasher, so as long as you have a backup of your original flash image, you're fine.

Yeah, it's stuck in a while loop. Good enough that the machine thinks it's been initialized so it won't turn itself off after 30 minutes.

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>Depends on what you want it for. It's fast as shit (on most boards anyway, my server still takes ~40 seconds to POST) and will let you embed an entire OS in the BIOS chip if you have the space. I've got a T400 with basic set of CLI tools, networking, media player, and web browser built in. I can connect to wifi and download and install Gentoo from scratch to a blank drive while watching youtube videos without any external media.
Sounds a bit exaggerated, but I'm not entirely skeptical. Mind elaborating this further? Where can I find some more information about doing this?

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Hes doesnt actually do that but it is technically possible, you only have around 6MB~ free depending on the BIOS chip, in those 6MB you could add coreboot payloads, and im not sure linux could fit onto 6MB

I've been wanting to write up a proper blog post that explains in detail exactly how/what I've done but I haven't got around to it yet.

The short of it is that you can use GRUB2 as your main payload, then just add a normal kernel and initrd to the filesystem on your flash chip. So, I squeezed a kernel with all the drivers I need and an initrd with busybox, mplayer, and netsurf all into about 6MB.

I made a couple really shitty demo videos when someone asked about it before:
youtube.com/watch?v=pGipRmEd2Es
youtube.com/watch?v=DYYAzEcp0t8


...you'd be surprised what you can fit in 6MB. I'm also working on cramming a C compiler in it, but it's kinda hard to do much with no headers.

|DESIRE TO KNOW MORE INTENSIFIES]
Fuck user, this is amazing, I need to know more, highly interested!

A bit off the thread but can anyone tell me why ARM systems never got a standard boot method like BIOS or UEFI?

That's some CIA nigger level stuff right there. Very nice.

Ok, what do you want to know?
I haven't done much with it for a while due to a shit job with shit hours and shit pay for a shit company has been sucking the life out of me for a couple years, but I literally quit today so maybe I'll have some motivation to do something soon.

I don't know much about it, but isn't U-boot kinda the standard for things like that?

>I haven't done much with it for a while due to a shit job with shit hours and shit pay for a shit company has been sucking the life out of me for a couple years, but I literally quit today so maybe I'll have some motivation to do something soon.
You did the right thing, user, don't worry. Better just leave shit jobs as soon as possible, don't fall into the "climbing the ranks" outdated boomer meme.

>Ok, what do you want to know?
Well, the >post that explains in detail exactly how/what I've done

Pic unrelated

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Oh. Well, I haven't written all that up yet.

I did recently finally figure out the issue I was having with the blog software I plan to use, so I can actually start writing it up now. Maybe I'll do that later today.

The shit job I just left was a 12 hour night shift and I haven't been to bed yet, so I'll probably at least sleep a while before doing anything but I might get started on that later today. Maybe.

When I do get around to it, I'll probably upload a new/better video with a link to my blog so if you want, you can watch the aforementioned youtube channel for updates.

I'd like to interject for a moment and say on behalf of the lurkers, we hope you share with us your gentoomenly knowledge while you figure out your new life direction.

This. Make sure to keep us updated on this, make a thread to let us know or something.

While you checking out your channel I noticed you had a Mazda RX-8. I have one as well and I love it. Absolute man of taste. I hope to hear from you again soon user. Take care

Maybe i wasn't being specific enough, im asking why a lot of devices, especially arm-based android phones dont have standardized boot interfaces and why we need custom roms for each one?