IUCODE_TOOL(8) iucode_tool manual IUCODE_TOOL(8)
NAME
iucode_tool - Tool to manipulate Intel® IA-32/X86-64 microcode bundles
SYNOPSIS
iucode_tool [options] [[-ttype] filename|dirname] ...
DESCRIPTION
iucode_tool is an utility that can load Intel® processor microcode data
from files in both text and binary microcode bundle formats.
It can output a list of the microcodes in these files, merge them, up-
load them to the kernel (to upgrade the microcode in the system proces-
sor cores) or write some of them out to a file in binary format for
later use.
iucode_tool will load all microcodes in the specified files and directo-
ries to memory, in order to process them. Duplicated and outdated mi-
crocodes will be discarded. It can read microcode data from standard
input (stdin), by specifying a file name of “-” (minus sign).
Microcode data files are assumed to be in .dat text format if they have
a .dat suffix, and to be in binary format otherwise. Standard input
(stdin) is assumed to be in .dat text format. The -t option can be used
to change the type of the files specified after it, including for stdin.
If a directory is specified, all files whose names do not begin with a
dot will be loaded, in unspecified order. Nested directories are
skipped.
Empty files and directories are ignored, and will be skipped.
You can select which microcodes should be written out, listed or up-
loaded to the kernel using the -S, -s, --date-before and --date-after
options. Should none of those options be specified, all microcodes will
be selected.
You can upload the selected microcodes to the kernel, write them out to
a file (in binary format), to a Linux early initramfs archive, to per-
processor-signature files in a directory, or to per-microcode files in a
directory using the -w, --write-earlyfw, -k, -K, and -W options.
iucode_tool will identify microcodes in its output and error messages
using a “n/k” notation, where “n” is the bundle number, and “k” is the
microcode number within that bundle. The output of the --list-all op-
tion when processing multiple input files is the best example of how it
works.
For more information about Intel processor microcodes, please read the
included documentation and the Intel manuals listed in the SEE ALSO sec-
tion.
OPTIONS
iucode_tool accepts the following options:
-q, --quiet
Inhibit usual output.
-v, --verbose
Print more information. Use more than once for added verbosity.
-h, -?, --help
List all available options and their meanings.
--usage
Show summary of options.
-V, --version
Show version of program.
-t type
Sets the file type of the following files. type can be:
b binary format. This is the same format used by the kernel
driver and the BIOS/EFI, which is described in detail by
the Intel 64 and IA-32 Architectures Software Developer's
Manual, Volume 3A, section 9.11.
d Intel microcode .dat text format. This is the format nor-
mally used by Intel to distribute microcode data files.
r recover microcode in binary format. Search uncompressed
generic binary files for microcodes in Intel microcode bi-
nary format to recover. Note: It can find microcode that
will not pass strict checks, and thus cause iucode_tool to
exit if the --no-strict-checks or --ignore-broken options
are not in effect.
a (default) iucode_tool will use the suffix of the file name
to select the file type: .dat text format for files that
have a .dat suffix, and binary type otherwise. Note that
for stdin, .dat text format is assumed.
--downgrade
When multiple versions of the microcode for a specific processor
are available from different files, keep the one from the file
loaded last, regardless of revision levels. Files are always
loaded in the order they were specified in the command line.
This option has no effect when just one file has been loaded.
--no-downgrade
When multiple versions of the microcode for a specific processor
are available from different files, keep the one with the highest
revision level. This is the default mode of operation.
--strict-checks
Perform strict checks on the microcode data. It will refuse to
load microcodes and microcode data files with unexpected size and
metadata. It will also refuse to load microcode entries that
have the same metadata, but different payload. This is the de-
fault mode of operation.
--no-strict-checks
Perform less strict checks on the microcode data. Use only if
you happen to come across a microcode data file that has microco-
des with weird sizes or incorrect non-critical metadata (such as
invalid dates), which you want to retain. If you just want to
skip those, use the --ignore-broken option.
--ignore-broken
Skip broken microcode entries when loading a microcode data file,
instead of aborting program execution. If the microcode entry
has an unsupported format or had its header severely corrupted,
all remaining data in the file will have to be ignored. In that
case, using a file type of recover microcode in binary format
(-tr option) is recommended, as it can skip over badly mangled
microcode data.
--no-ignore-broken
Abort program execution if a broken microcode is found while
loading a microcode data file. This is the default mode of oper-
ation.
-s ! | [!]signature[,[pf_mask][,[lt:|eq:|gt:]revision]]
Select microcodes by the specified signature, processor flags
mask (pf_mask), and revision.
If the processor flags mask is specified, it will select only mi-
crocodes that are suitable for at least one of the processor flag
combinations present in the mask.
If the revision is specified, optionally prefixed by one of the
“eq:”, “lt:” or “gt:” operators, it will select only microcodes
that have that same revision (if no operator, or if the “eq:” op-
erator is used), or microcodes that have a revision that is less
than (“lt:” operator), or greater than (“gt:” operator), the one
specified.
Specify more than once to select more microcodes. This option
can be combined with the --scan-system option to select more mi-
crocodes. If signature is prefixed with a “!” (exclamation
mark), it will deselect microcodes instead. Ordering matters,
with later -s options overriding earlier ones, including
--scan-system.
When specifying signature and pf_mask, hexadecimal numbers must
be prefixed with “0x”, and octal numbers with “0”. Decimal num-
bers must not have leading zeros, otherwise they would be inter-
preted as octal numbers.
The special notation -s! (with no signature parameter) instructs
iucode_tool to require explicit inclusion of microcode signatures
(using the non-negated form of -s, or using --scan-system).
-S, --scan-system[=mode]
Select microcodes by scanning online processors on this system
for their signatures.
This option can be used only once, and it can be combined with
the -s option to select more microcodes. The microcodes selected
by --scan-system can also be deselected by a later -s !signature
option.
The optional mode argument (accepted only by the long version of
the option) selects the strategy used to scan processors:
0 or auto
Currently the same as fast, but this might change in fu-
ture versions if Intel ever deploys multi-signature sys-
tems that go beyond mixed-stepping. This is the default
mode of operation, for backwards compatibility with previ-
ous versions of iucode_tool.
1 or fast
Uses the cpuid instruction to detect the signature of the
processor iucode_tool is running on, and selects all step-
pings for that processor's type, family and model. Sup-
ports mixed-stepping systems.
2 or exact
Uses kernel drivers to scan the signature of every online
processor directly. This mode supports multi-signature
systems. This scan mode will be slow on large systems
with many processors, and likely requires special permis-
sions (such as running as the root user). Should the scan
fail for any reason, as a fail-safe measure, it will issue
an warning and consider all possible steppings for every
signature it did manage to scan successfully.
--date-before=YYYY-MM-DD and --date-after=YYYY-MM-DD
Limit the selected microcodes by a date range. The date must be
given in ISO format, with four digits for the year and two digits
for the month and day and “-” (minus sign) for the separator.
Dates are not range-checked, so you can use --date-af-
ter=2000-00-00 to select all microcodes dated since January 1st,
2000.
--loose-date-filtering
When a date range is specified, all revisions of the microcode
will be considered for selection (ignoring just the date range,
all other filters still apply) should any of the microcode's re-
visions be within the date range.
--strict-date-filtering
When a date range is specified, select only microcodes which are
within the date range. This is the default mode of operation.
-l, --list
List selected microcode signatures to standard output (stdout).
-L, --list-all
List all microcode signatures while they're being processed to
standard output (stdout).
-k[device], --kernel[=device]
Upload selected microcodes to the kernel. Optionally, the device
path can be specified (default: /dev/cpu/microcode). This update
method is deprecated: it will be removed eventually from the ker-
nel and from iucode_tool.
-K[directory], --write-firmware[=directory]
Write selected microcodes with the file names expected by the
Linux kernel firmware loader. Optionally, the destination direc-
tory can be specified (default: /lib/firmware/intel-ucode).
-wfile, --write-to=file
Write selected microcodes to a file in binary format.
--write-earlyfw=file
Write selected microcodes to an early initramfs archive, which
should be prepended to the regular initramfs to allow the kernel
to update processor microcode very early during system boot.
-Wdirectory, --write-named-to=directory
Write selected microcodes to the specified directory, one microc-
ode per file, in binary format. The file names reflect the mi-
crocode signature, processor flags mask and revision.
--write-all-named-to=directory
Write every microcode to the specified directory, one microcode
per file, in binary format. The file names reflect the microcode
signature, processor flags mask and revision. This is the only
way to write out every revision of the same microcode.
--overwrite
Remove the destination file before writing, if it exists and is
not a directory. The destination file is not overwritten in-
place. Hardlinks will be severed, and any existing access per-
missions, ACLs and other extended attributes of the old destina-
tion file will be lost.
--no-overwrite
Abort if the destination file already exists. This is the de-
fault mode of operation. Do note that iucode_tool does not fol-
low non-directory symlinks when writing files.
--mini-earlyfw
Optimize the early initramfs cpio container for minimal size. It
will change the cpio block size to 16 bytes, and remove header
entries for the parent directories of the microcode data file.
As a result, the microcode data file will not be available to the
regular initramfs, and tools might complain about the non-stan-
dard cpio block size.
This will typically reduce the early initramfs size by 736 bytes.
--normal-earlyfw
Optimize the early initramfs size for tool compatibility. This
is the default mode of operation. The microcode data file will
be available inside the regular initramfs as well.
NOTES
iucode_tool reads all data to memory before doing any processing. It
enforces a sanity limit of a maximum of 1GiB worth of binary microcode
data per microcode data file.
All informational and error messages are sent to standard error
(stderr), while user-requested output (such as output generated by the
list options) is sent to standard output (stdout).
iucode_tool creates files with permissions 0644 (rw-r--r--), modified by
the current umask.
iucode_tool's selected microcode listing and microcode output files are
sorted first by processor signature (in ascending order), and then by
processor flags mask (in descending order).
When multiple revisions of a microcode are selected, the older ones will
be skipped. Only the newest selected revision of a microcode (or the
last one in load order when the --downgrade option is active) will be
written to a file or uploaded to the kernel.
Intel microcode data files, both in binary and text formats, can be con-
catenated to generate a bigger and still valid microcode data file.
iucode_tool does not follow symlinks when writing microcode data files.
It will either refuse to write the file and abort (default mode of oper-
ation), or (when the --overwrite option is active) it will remove the
target symlink or file (and therefore breaking hardlinks) before writing
the new file.
iucode_tool does follow directory symlinks to locate the directory to
write files into.
Linux Notes
Before Linux v4.4, the microcode update driver was split in two parts:
the early microcode update driver (which gets microcode data from the
initramfs) and the late microcode update driver, which could be a module
and got microcode data from the firmware subsystem. The two drivers
were unified in Linux v4.4.
The microcode update driver needs to be present in the system at all
times to ensure microcode updates are reapplied on resume from suspend
and CPU hotplug. Do not unload the microcode module, unless you really
know better. Since Linux v4.4, the late microcode driver cannot be a
module anymore and will always be present in the system when enabled.
Updating microcode early is safer. It can only be done at boot and it
requires an initramfs, but it is strongly recommended: late microcode
updates (which read microcode data from /lib/firmware) cannot safely
change visible processor features.
Early microcode updates are available since Linux v3.9. They can safely
change visible processor features (such as the microcode updates that
disabled Intel TSX instructions on Intel Haswell cores do). They re-
quire an uncompressed initramfs image with the microcode update data in
/kernel/x86/microcode/GenuineIntel.bin. This uncompressed initramfs im-
age must come before any compressed initramfs image(s), and it has an
special name: early initramfs.
The microcode update data inside the early initramfs image must be
aligned to a 16-byte boundary due to a bug in several versions of the
Linux kernel early microcode update driver. This requires special steps
when creating the initramfs archive with the microcode data, and will be
handled automatically by the iucode_tool --write-earlyfw option.
Since Linux v4.2, it is also possible to build a kernel with the microc-
ode update data as built-in firmware, using the CONFIG_FIRMWARE_IN_KER-
NEL facility. This feature is not yet mature as of Linux v4.2.8,
v4.4.11, v4.5.5 and v4.6, and might not work in every case.
The /dev/cpu/microcode update interface has been deprecated and should
not be used. It has one special requirement: each write syscall must
contain whole microcode(s). It can be accessed through iucode_tool
--kernel.
Up to Linux v3.5, late microcode updates were required to be triggered
per-core, by writing the number 1 to /sys/devices/system/cpu/*/microc-
ode/reload for every cpu. Depending on kernel version, you must either
trigger it on every core to avoid a dangerous situation where some cores
are using outdated microcode, or the kernel will accept the request only
for the boot processor and use it to trigger an update on all system
processor cores.
Since Linux v3.6, the late microcode update driver has a new interface
that explicitly triggers an update for every core at once when the num-
ber 1 is written to /sys/devices/system/cpu/microcode/reload.
EXAMPLES
Updating files in /lib/firmware/intel-ucode:
iucode_tool -K/lib/firmware/intel-ucode \
/lib/firmware/intel-ucode \
/tmp/file-with-new-microcodes.bin
Processing several compressed files at once:
zcat intel-microcode*.dat.gz | iucode_tool -l -
zcat intel-microcode*.bin.gz | iucode_tool -l -tb -
Selecting microcodes and creating an early initramfs:
iucode_tool --scan-system \
--write-earlyfw=/tmp/early.cpio \
/lib/firmware/intel-ucode
iucode_tool -s 0x106a5 -s 0x106a4 -l /lib/firmware/intel-ucode
Using the recovery loader to load and to update microcode in an early
initramfs:
iucode_tool -L -tr /boot/intel-ucode.img
iucode_tool -Ll -S --write-earlyfw=/boot/intel-ucode.img.new \
-tr /boot/intel-ucode.img -tb /lib/firmware/intel-ucode && \
mv /boot/intel-ucode.img.new /boot/intel-ucode.img
BUGS
Microcode with negative revision numbers is not special-cased, and will
not be preferred over regular microcode.
The downgrade mode should be used only for microcodes with the same
processor flags mask. It cannot handle the corner cases where modifying
a processor flags mask would be required to force the kernel to load a
lower revision of a microcode, and iucode_tool will issue an warning
when that happens. So far, this has not proved to be a relevant limita-
tion as changes to the processor flags mask of post-launch, production
microcode updates are very rare.
The loader version microcode metadata field is ignored by iucode_tool.
This shouldn't cause problems as long as the same signature never needs
more than a single type of loader.
Files are not replaced atomically: if iucode_tool is interrupted while
writing to a file, that file will be corrupted.
SEE ALSO
The Intel 64 and IA-32 Architectures Software Developer's Manual, Volume
3A: System Programming Guide, Part 1 (order number 253668), section
9.11.
AUTHOR
Henrique de Moraes Holschuh <hmh@hmh.eng.br>
IUCODE_TOOL 2.3.1 2018-01-28 IUCODE_TOOL(8)
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