AM3358: Unable to write Ti sdk onto eMMC IC

Hi Aravind,

Aravind C D said:

The same tar file I am able to load onto other boards without any error.

Are the other boards in the same design as the failing AM3358 board? If so how many boards passed and how many boards failed?

Do you use the same SD card or different cards when flashing these AM3358 boards?

Hi Liu,

All boards are having same design and manufactured by same vendor. Out of 28 boards, 19 were successful and 9 got failed. I am using the same SD cards for all the boards. 

Hi Aravind,

Since only some of the boards failed in the eMMC flashing process, the issue might be hardware/board related. Please provide the following information for review.

- the console log showing the flashing error message.

- the board schematics showing the eMMC and SD card design.

Hi Liu,

Please find the attached Error logs and required schematics of eMMC and SD card.emmc_SD.pdf

Hi Aravind,

What is the tar command you use?

What is the file size of the tarball?

What is the DDR size on your board?

Hi Liu,

1. Tar command used: tar -xmvf <name of tar file> -C root/

2. Tarball size - 433MB

3. We are using 2 DDR (MT41K512M8DA-107AAT) each having a size of 512MB.

Hi Aravid,

We need to figure out if the problem in on SDcard, or DDR.

Since your board has 1GB DDR, it probably can fit the tarball file in tmpfs. Please

- first copy the tarball file to /dev/shm/

- then untar /dev/shm/<tarball> to eMMC

to see if the failure still happens.

Hi Liu,

I have tried to copy tarball file to /dev/shm/ using WinScp, but it fails giving an error 'Host not communicating for more than 10s'. Further the communication with kernal is lost and I am forced to restart the board to establish an ethernet connection again.

Hi Aravind,

I initially wanted you to copy the tarball from the sdcard to /dev/shm/, but your SCP test is okay, it shows errors without accessing the sdcard, which tells the problem is likely not in the sdcard module itself. Now I am thinking the problem might be in the unstable system power supplies or DDR.

Can you please first run memtester test on your failing board to see if reports any error?

# memtester 32M

Hi Liu,

Can you share relevant details on how to execute the memtester test for the failing boards.

Hi Liu,

Please find the attached log files for memtester test done on 2 different failing boards. dex_026.txtdex_027.txt

Hi Aravind,

The memtester logs show DDR test failures. I am routing your query to our DDR expert for further comments.

Aravind,

you may need to make changes to your DDR configuration based on a custom board design.  Please follow the guidance in this doc and fill out the spreadsheet to generate a new DDR configuration to build into your code: https://www.ti.com/lit/pdf/sprack4

Regards,

James

Hi JJD,

I understand there were failures in the memtester logs. Could you tell me why we have to change DDR configuration when we have already dispatched 19 numbers of the same board without any configuration change.

Have you stress tested those 19 over full operating temperature?  You may have something marginal in your configuration that in certain conditions will pass.  

When you can confirm a proper configuration, and still get failures, you may need to start looking at assembly issues and/or design issues.  Can you provide schematic of the DDR interface?  What memory are you using?

Regards,

James