Intel microcode

Article description::This article describes the process of updating the microcode on Intel processors.

Kernel
You need to activate the following kernel options:

Software
You can now install the microcode

And a tool to manipulate it

Configuration
After emerging, generate the microcode cpio archive using :

Grub 1.x
Add the generated microcode to your kernel command line as an initrd parameter (this should be done even if you don't use an initrd image in order to boot, the microcode update merely leverages the initrd hooks):

Grub 2.x
Change this small section of from:

To this:

Regenerate your with:

Reboot and you're all done.

Verification
Here is an example of a CPU with no available microcode updates or the system was not configured to load them properly:

Here is the same CPU but with microcode updates being applied successfully:

Kernel
You need to activate the following kernel options:

Software
You can now install :

OpenRC
You can now start microcode-ctl:

To start microcode-ctl at boot time, add it your boot runlevel:

systemd
See: Systemd. Simply make sure that the Microcode loader is set as a module in the kernel configuration as noted above. You don't need to add a service or do anything else.

Software
You can install the officially published microcode package and let it automatically processed by

And you can use this tool to identify your actual CPU signature(s)

To find the appropriate filename(s) for the listed signature(s) usi:

The signature found in the microcode bundle 49, so the filename to use is intel-ucode/06-3c-03

Kernel
You need tho enable and configure the following kernel options:

Rebuild and install your kernel the same way you normally would.

Verification
After the next reboot, you should see something like this: