Board:msi/ms7260

The MSI MS-7260 (K9N Neo), revision 1.0

This page describes how to use LinuxBIOS on the MSI MS-7260 (K9N Neo) mainboard.

The mainboard

So far we have verified that revision 1.0 of the mainboard has a socketed PLCC32 ROM chip (512KB).

If you have any other revision of the board, please contact us on the mailing list and let us know if it has a socketed (and PLCC-type) ROM chip.

Status

The respective patch is not yet committed, but it's available in the mailing list archives.

Device/functionality	Status	Comments
CPU	Works	I'm using an AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 3600+, both cores work fine.
RAM	Works	It seems some combinations of DIMMs and RAM slots don't work. Using only one DIMM works for me.
IDE	Works	—
SATA	Untested	—
USB	Works	—
On-board ethernet	Works	—
On-board audio	Works	—
PCI add-on cards	Not working	There seem to be problems with PCI add-on cards. This is being investigated.
PCI Express add-on cards	Untested	—
Floppy	Untested	—
Serial port (COM1)	Works	—
Parallel port	Untested	—
PS/2 keyboard	Untested	—
PS/2 mouse	Untested	—
Mainboard sensors	Untested	—

Building LinuxBIOS

Build a LinuxBIOS payload, e.g. FILO, and copy the resulting file to /tmp/filo.elf.

$ cp payload.file /tmp/filo.elf

Checkout LinuxBIOS:

$ svn co svn://linuxbios.org/repos/trunk/LinuxBIOSv2

Build the LinuxBIOS image, containing the payload.

$ cd LinuxBIOSv2/targets
$ ./buildtarget msi/ms7260
$ cd msi/ms7260/ms7260
$ make

Write the LinuxBIOS image onto your ROM chip using flashrom:

$ flashrom -wv linuxbios.rom

WARNING: This will overwrite your current BIOS! Make sure you know what you're doing! You should have a way to revert back to the original BIOS in case anything goes wrong. It's a good idea to have a spare ROM chip which contains the original proprietary BIOS. Read the FAQ for more information. If in doubt, contact the mailing list.

Note: At the moment flashrom does not work in the MS-7260 (when booted using the original BIOS). Thus, I'm flashing the ROM chip in a different mainboard where flashrom works. However, flashrom works just fine once the MS-7260 is booted using LinuxBIOS.

TODO

• Test the devices marked as "Untested" in the above status table.
• Fix flashrom to also work when the board is booted using the proprietary BIOS.
• Fix the issues with PCI add-on cards.

This work is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or any later version. This work is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.