Strange boot issues with Lenovo Ideapad Slim 3i Chromebook Plus

Support
1

First of all I have to say, how impressed I am with all you folks. This project is spectacular and I just had to jump into the fun.

I picked up a Lenovo Ideapad Slim 3i Chromebook Plus on the cheap during a recent sale and decided to see if I could get Debian or PopOS running on it. I had great success with the entire process up until the reboot after installing Linux. The problem I have sounds incredibly similar to the issue laid out in the following post - Flashed Lenovo Ideapad Slim 3i Chromebook Now Unrecognized Platform - Unable to Update

It looks like s1gnate and chipmonger were able to have some success with it. For me:

  • Both Debian and PopOS will randomly work or not work on boot
  • Sometimes I get crc errors during the boot process and sometimes I don’t
  • Coreboot bios screen reads 0MB of RAM
  • My board name according to chrome://version/ is pujjoteen15w_cbx
  • In the VT-2 and Recovery Mode screen my board name comes up as PUJJOTEEN-JQLW
  • When the MrChromebox script gets run, it tells me that my board name is PUJJOTEEN-JQLW

I’m at a bit of a loss at this point. Looking over the MrChromebox functions.sh script, line 817 looks like it is doing the right thing, but I’m just not sure what’s up with the disparity in the board name. Maybe that’s normal? Maybe there should be an entry for PUJJOTEEN15W_CBX in the functions script? I’m a bit out of my element when it comes to board names and UEFI stuff.

Can anyone point me in the right direction or what additional information should I include to better troubleshoot?

Thanks in advance kings and queens of the Chrultrabook realm!

2

B to bump, hooray!! :stuck_out_tongue:

3

Looking over the supported devices, I am realizing that even though “Lenovo Ideapad Slim 3i Chromebook” is listed, the specific model I have is not. i.e. “Lenovo Ideapad Slim 3i Chromebook Plus”

I would still very much like to get Debian functioning on this little beast. Does anyone know of a good resource for logical next steps to add support to this machine?

4

See Services and Support on Mrchromebook’s site, section “Firmware Requests,” which states in part:

Adding support for new devices (eg, Braswell-based Chromebooks) often requires actually having hardware to debug, so if one is able to loan/donate hardware for development purposes, that will definitely speed things along.

5

Thank you! I shall open a issue on the MrChromebox/firmware github to see if we can attempt to make progress over there.