OLPC Firmware Q2B61

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OLPC Firmware B2 Production Release Q2B61 - 2007-02-02

This is the firmware for the production build of the B2 boards. It will also work on B1 and ATest. Do not use it on pre-B1 boards - it will brick them because of the EC microcode.

This firmware revision was not built with the usual procedure, because it is an emergency respin for a problem discovered late in the production run. At the time this image was needed, the build machine was offline for maintenance. This image was constructed by manually (i.e. with the "dd" command) splicing the new EC release image with the Open Firmware and LinuxBIOS portions from the previous production release (Q2B51), manually hex-editing the signature string (Q2B61), and re-computing the CRC.

File:Olpc-Q2B61.rom

MD5: ebfaa510f04fe290f006cef62d25176e olpc-Q2B61.rom


Changes since Q2B51

  • EC: PQ2B61

Problem statement from Mary Lou Jepsen:

The EC can not identify the battery type, and so the EC is letting the battery overcharge. 5 batteries in the 600 units made so far have been found to be in between 60 and 70C.

Proposed Fix: EC will add one more protection in case it can’t read the battery type:- when the temperature is over 52C it will cut off charging (this so Li-Fe-P can also be tested in B2s).


  • OFW svn commit 132

The OFW and LinuxBIOS in this firmware release is bitwise identical to that in Q2B51.

Installation Caveats

  • If you have a B1 system:
  1. Perform the auto-reinstall procedure at http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Autoreinstallation_image before upgrading to this firmware version
  2. DO NOT use olpcflash to write new firmware images. Doing so will erase the manufacturing data that was added at the factory.
  • After you reflash, you must power cycle by physically removing power from the system. A warm-start or button-induced restart is not sufficient. Please remove both the battery pack and wall adapter for 10 seconds.

ATest users only: If you use olpcflash to write this image, you must use the --brick option.
Example: olpcflash --brick -w image.rom
This will update your EC code.

Known issues

  • Auto-repeat is slow on some USB keyboards
  • NVRAM storage for configuration variables is not yet implemented.
  • JFFS2 does not handle ECC
  • The boot menu is incomplete
  • Directory symlinks have a problem.

ATest -- Infineon RAMs

A version of this firmware for Atest/Infineon RAMs has not been released. If you have an ATest board with Infineon RAMs, use Q2B51-CL2.5 instead. The EC changes related to battery charging are not relevant for ATest boards.