ECC support in Intel Atom e38xx when Coreboot BIOS + FSP are used

[KNovi1]

Hello!

Custom BIOS (Coreboot) are built for motherboard with Intel Atom e38xx. It's works well when ECC support is off (DDR3L is chosen as "memory type" in FSP options via Intel BCT utility). It's dying in FSP when I choose DDR3ECC as "memory type" - post-code 0x2F gotten.

What must I do to enable ECC with FSP Gold 4? Second DIMM is disabled, second SPD Bus address is 0x0 now (I read about this in documentation), but It's not helps.

Another question: as I thought, Intel FSP must enable ECC by himself when SPD chip parsed through smbus. Am I right?

Thank you all for reading this question!

Novikov Konstantin

[Alberto_R_Intel]

KNovi1, Thank you for posting in the Intel® Communities Support.

In order for us to provide the most accurate assistance to your inquiry, we just wanted to verify a few details about your platform:

What is the model of the board?

What is the complete model of the Intel® Atom Processor?

If this is a laptop, what is the model of it?

Just to make sure, what does it mean "FSP" "BCT"?

Which Windows version are you using?

Regards,

Alberto R.

Intel Customer Support Technician

A Contingent Worker at Intel

[Alberto_R_Intel]

KNovi1, I just wanted to check if you saw the information posted previously and if you need further assistance on this matter?

Regards,

Alberto R.

Intel Customer Support Technician

A Contingent Worker at Intel

[KNovi1]

Hello!

Sorry for delay, I had some troubles with auth.

Here's the answers:

> What is the model of the board?

> What is the complete model of the Intel® Atom Processor?

I'm not sure, that I can tell you about the model of the board cause of my work. It's some custom motherboard with Intel Atom E3825/E3845 (two revisions).

But this board uses AMI BIOS as standard BIOS, ECC works with it very well. So, problem not because of hardware issues, I hope.

> If this is a laptop, what is the model of it?

No, it's desktop motherboard.

>Just to make sure, what does it mean "FSP" "BCT"?

Intel FSP - Intel provided binary for hardware init (primarily, memory init). https://github.com/IntelFsp/FSP

Intel BCT - Intel provided software for reconfiguring Intel FSP. https://github.com/IntelFsp/BCT

> Which Windows version are you using?

Windows 7 x32 Professional

Also, I need to check this: ECC requires 72-bit data width (64-bit data + 8-bit for ECC), but I can enable only 64-bit data width via Intel BCT in my FSP binary. Am i right, that when I set 64-bit data width and DDR3ECC type of memory in my FSP, It's enables additional 8 data lines by itself?

Thank you, Alberto, for your answer and attention.

[Alberto_R_Intel]

Hello KNovi1, No problem at all, you are very welcome, thank you very much for letting us know those details.

In this case, since both, the Intel Atom® Processor E3825 and the Intel Atom® Processor E3845 belong to an embedded architecture:

https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/78474/intel-atom-processor-e3825-1m-cache-1-33-ghz.html

https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/78475/intel-atom-processor-e3845-2m-cache-1-91-ghz.html

The best thing to do in order to gather the information you are looking for will be to submit your inquiry either in our Intel® Emebbeded Community Support or in our Intel® Resource and Design Center for further assistance on this matter:

https://forums.intel.com/s/topic/0TO0P00000018NFWAY/embedded-intel-atom?language=en_US

https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/design/resource-design-center.html

Regards,

Alberto R.

Intel Customer Support Technician

A Contingent Worker at Intel