Trouble getting Android to boot on custom board

Hi Rocco,

Could you please reproduce the issue on supported platforms like BeagleBoneBlack, Am335x SK or AM335X EVM with JB 4.2.2? Otherwise, it would be challenging for us to support you effectively.

I have attempted to build the MLO and u-boot using both command line tools and Code Composer using the files downloaded from the TI site following the guides provided.  I have not been able to generate an MLO file that will boot Android on an AM335x Starter Kit.  If I use the MLO file from the included SD card along with the u-boot I built Android will start.  I guess until I get this figured out it doesn't make sense to attempt to bring it up on a custom board.

Hi Rocco,

Could you share the following information:

• What is your development environment? Ubuntu? Virtual Machine?
• What are the commands you type when building the MLO?
• What are the commands you type when building u-boot?
• Which toolchain are you using?

What is your development environment? Ubuntu? Virtual Machine?

- Ubuntu

What are the commands you type when building the MLO?

What are the commands you type when building u-boot?

- from the TI-Android-ICS-4.0.3-DevKit-3.0.1 DevelopersGuide

  $ make CROSS_COMPILE=arm-eabi- distclean
  $ make CROSS_COMPILE=arm-eabi- am335x_evm_config
  $ make CROSS_COMPILE=arm-eabi- 

• This command will generate the MLO and the u-boot Image "u-boot.img"

Which toolchain are you using?

 - arm-eabi-4.4.3

I also built the MLO and u-boot using Code Composer with similar results.  I was able to step through the MLO code.  When it tries to determine which device to use to load u-boot it looks like it is returning an invalid device.

Hi Rocco,

Thanks for these information, I confirm you are using the right commands to build the MLO. Could you answer those questions:

• Which revision of the AM335x EVK are you using? We just verified the MLO build on a Rev1.5C and it worked great.
• Do you confirm that copy/pasting the prebuilt MLO in the SDCard works as expected?
• Which SDCard port are you using? Is it the one labeled J13?
• Do you see anything on the serial output? U-Boot SPL informations should be displayed before loading u-boot from media.

Hi Rocco,

Sorry I provided the revision of our EVM board, the starter kit that has been used is a rev1.1A/rev1.2b as well and we confirm the SDCard port is named J4.

I'm not sure to understand the error you see on the serial console, could send the log of what appears on the serial output?

Hi Rocco,

It seems that you are not building the right version of U-Boot. If you look at the U-Boot version, it should say "U-Boot SPL 2013.01" whereas yours says "2011.09". Please make sure you retrieved the source code as explained in the Developer's Guide.

I downloaded the code from the TI site and followed the Developer's guide.  How can I make sure I get the correct code?

Hi Rocco,

Please try the pre-built images for JellyBean 4.2.2 as I'm not sure of the content of your included SDCard:

http://downloads.ti.com/sitara_android/esd/TI_Android_DevKit/TI_Android_JB_4_2_2_DevKit_4_1_1/exports/TI_Android_JB_4.2.2_DevKit_4.1.1_am335xevm_sk.tar.gz

By looking at the MLO and u-boot you can see those images are 2013.01 and not 2011:

$ hexdump -C am335xevm_sk/Boot_Images/MLO | grep 2013
00015850 4c 20 32 30 31 33 2e 30 31 2e 30 31 2d 30 30 31 |L 2013.01.01-001|

$ hexdump -C am335xevm_sk/Boot_Images/u-boot.img | grep 2013
00000020 55 2d 42 6f 6f 74 20 32 30 31 33 2e 30 31 2e 30 |U-Boot 2013.01.0|

Then by looking at the JellyBean manifest file you can see the U-Boot version downloaded is the following:

https://gitorious.org/rowboat/u-boot/source/6d40c2a2b5e6a1243da890c3b36bf3d89e275940: