Newsletter Archives

• Patching embedded code

  Posted on February 24, 2025 at 02:45 CST by Susan Bradley • Comment in the Forums

  

  ISSUE 22.08 • 2025-02-24

  PATCH WATCH

  

  By Susan Bradley

  I’m here to state that patching firmware is easy.

  Easy, that is, if you can get over a big hurdle — knowing what device you have and where to find the proper firmware update.

  If you have a home-built or custom-built computer, often the hardest part is remembering which motherboard and accessory cards were installed. Then something turns out to be not quite right, and you’re in a pickle.

  Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (22.08.0, 2025-02-24).
  This story also appears in our public Newsletter.

  Patch Watch BIOS, Drivers, Firmware, Firmware Update, Newsletters, Patch Lady Posts, Printers, Surface firmware update, System Information Viewer

• Designed for maintenance?

  Posted on August 26, 2024 at 02:44 CDT by Ben Myers • Comment in the Forums

  BEN’S WORKSHOP

  

  By Ben Myers

  Continued advances in computer technology have had a positive effect on the gear we use — faster, less power-hungry, lighter in weight, smaller and more secure than a decade ago. But maintaining and repairing modern computers present new challenges.

  The processor chips regularly produced today have up to 10 billion transistors incorporating many and varied computing cores, on-board cache memory, and a graphics subsystem and other circuitry to talk to devices attached to the computer — all etched on silicon wafers at a spacing less than 10 nanometers, or 0.0000003937 inches. Chipsets supporting the processors and circuit traces on motherboards are smaller and closer together, allowing for smaller motherboards, too. Memory and storage have grown by multiples of two with every processor generation. Computers such as the older seven-slot Gigabyte board inside an older large tower, once state of the art in 2010, have become the province of high-end gaming and specialized use.

  Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.35.0, 2024-08-26).

  Ben's Workshop Apple, BIOS, HiRens, Newsletters, Repairability, Repairs, UEFI

• Finding the Achilles’ heel of TPM

  Posted on July 8, 2024 at 02:45 CDT by Ben Myers • Comment in the Forums

  

  ISSUE 21.28 • 2024-07-08

  BEN’S WORKSHOP

  

  By Ben Myers

  Eclypsium, a security firm, recently discovered a vulnerability in the system-board firmware supporting the Trusted Platform Mode (TPM) for a wide range of Intel processors.

  As described by an Eclypsium blog entry, it is “a high impact vulnerability (CVE-2024-0762 with a reported CVSS of 7.5) in the Phoenix SecureCore UEFI firmware that runs on multiple families of Intel Core desktop and mobile processors.”

  Read the full story in our Plus Newsletter (21.28.0, 2024-07-08).
  This story also appears in our public Newsletter.

  Ben's Workshop AMI, BIOS, CVE-2024-0762, Firmware Update, InsydeH2O, Intel, Intel Lake, Newsletters, Phoenix, UEFI

• Locked out of his own PC’s Desktop!

  Posted on June 28, 2021 at 02:42 CDT by Fred Langa • Comment in the Forums

  LANGALIST

  

  By Fred Langa

  There’s no such thing as a small permissions problem in Windows! When things go wrong, they can go very, very wrong, as today’s first reader-submitted question illustrates.

  In this issue’s second question, a reader wonders whether he should try updating his PC’s firmware (i.e., BIOS/UEFI and similar low-level hardware) via Windows’ Device Manager.

  And in the third, a reader seeks help when his device fails to restart after a power outage.

  Read the full story in the AskWoody Plus Newsletter 18.24.0 (2021-06-28).

  AskWoody Plus Newsletter, LangaList AskWoody Plus Newsletter, BIOS, LangaList, permissions, Power