Hello coreboot community,

as an open source fan I recently get to know coreboot and really like the idea 
behind.
Sadly I bought my computer HW before learning more on libre friendly hardware 
that
respects your freedom. Now I try to figure out if I could do one or both of
a) installing coreboot , b) remove /disable ME from my zotac mini PC,
or I had to look out for already supported HW to do so.

I use a zotac CI 640 nano fanless mini PC with kaby lake Intel Core i5-8250U 
and intel
UHD grafics. https://www.zotac.com/product/mini_pcs/ci640-nano#spec

In the process of cleaning FW I got stuck while figuring out, what is the 
relevant flash IC
storing the bios. Form running linux I could read an 8MB flashrom with flashrom 
tool and
internal programmer.

While reading, flashrom reported chipset "Intel Kaby Lake U w/ iHDCP2.2 Prem."
and gave the warning "SPI configuration lockdown activated".  The programmer
flashchip was reported as "Opaque flash chip" 8192kB.
At least ME Cleaner worked with not errors on the captured fw image.

Problem: I want to flash the modified image back to the IC using a raspberry 4b
with gpio spi setup using a SOIC8 clip. But I could not manage to find the 
correct
IC on the mainboard. I kept looking for SOIC8 200mil with some "25" signature
and found only a GD25Q20C(2M-bit)Serial flash chip, that I could successfully
read with raspberry spi setup. However, it contains only 256k data. strings 
showed
me lots of HDMI related stuff.

I have created a list of chips I found while disassembling and some pics.
I hope that someone more experienced could explain me how the 8MB fw is
stored on this zotac and if it is "safely" possible to rewrite it. I it is to 
difficult or
dangerous, as beginner I will stick with new hardware from already supported
hw list.

The "promising" IC chips I found were
a - 1 piece of "G labeled" AH1815 25Q2 1BT EE455, I think it is related to the
     GigaDevice GD25Q20C(2M-bit)I found on web.  this chip I managed to read 
out..
b - 12 pieces of SOIC8 150mil (or samller?) : M B07 N03 EKH 1409 (Macronix? 
could not find anything:/ )
c - 1 piece of Issi  IS25LQ020: 256K x 8 (2 Mbit) (maybe related to USB-C 
extension module)
d - 1 piece of RT9059 GSP6E TOC, which I think could be a RichTek ultra low 
power voltage regulator?
e - 4 pieces of "P labeled" 6982 GA9C1E ICs, I do not know what they are, maybe 
some MOSFET?
f  - 1 piece of "P labeled" 4435 GL9B2E SOIC8 200mil which I know nothing about

Pics of the mainboard front and back are here:
https://pasteboard.co/JJjQqQO.jpg
https://pasteboard.co/JJjRjLU.jpg
https://pasteboard.co/JJjRCDt.jpg

Any suggestion how to go on or stop it anyway would be appreciated.

kind regards,

Peter Mueller
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