DM355 Linux Kernel Flashing steps

Steve,

I have not used sfh_DM35x utility to write the Linux Kernel in the past, I normally use u-boot for this, please see http://wiki.davincidsp.com/index.php?title=Writing_Kernel_Image_to_NAND_Flash 

Thanks for the reply. Unfortunately writing the linux kernel (or anything) over ethernet won't be an option to me, as our prototype product boards have only a serial port. I'll need a way to write the kernel over serial.

Incidentally I have tried loading the EVM kernel over ethernet, the Linux host is running tftp-server and the kernel image is in the right place:

Hit any key to stop autoboot:  0
DM355 EVM # setenv serverip 192.168.0.61
DM355 EVM # setenv bootfile uImage
DM355 EVM # dhcp
BOOTP broadcast 1
DHCP client bound to address 192.168.0.220
TFTP from server 192.168.0.61; our IP address is 192.168.0.220
Filename 'uImage'.
Load address: 0x80700000
Loading: T T T T T T T T T T T T T T T T
Retry count exceeded; starting again

The EVM's got an IP address OK, though while the transfer is trying to run I can't ping the EVM which I might expect to work.

But as I say, ethernet is not really an option, serial loading is most likely needed.

Actually I might have found a way to do this. I discovered that U-Boot on the DVEVM has a utility 'loadb' which allows file transfer using the Kermit protocol. I've now managed to download the kernel to the DVEVM serially using loadb and a terminal program. Takes about 15 minutes though, but seems to get it there.

This is great news, but 15 min is a bit slow.  I was planning on trying this with the serial flashing utility when I got to the office later today; it seems it should be possible, but wanted to try it before suggesting it.

The Sfh/Sft combination utility can be used to flash in the kernel - but this is quite a bit of work BUT, it is doable.

The Sft (which is the program that runs on the target) does have nand support so it knows how to write to NAND - you'll need to know the offset into NAND where you want to write the kernel, and then setup a custom command in the SFH and SFT to receive the uImage, write it into NAND. Now NOTE, that sft uses HW ECC to write in the images it receives (u-boot and ubl usually) since the RBL ARM bootloader uses HW ECC to read in the data. HOWEVER, u-boot might be configured for either Soft ECC (software ECC) or HW ECC; check this before you go ahead with the modifications.

Finally, you'll need to setup the u-boot environment variables (include/configs/davinci.h has some default u-boot env. vars defined, u can change this) to ensure it reads in the kernel after power on, something like "nboot 0x87000000 0 [offset into nand]"

Hi,

I am trying to update uImage and ramdisk.gz into NAND Flash of my dm355 over Serial.

Is there a wiki page explaining the steps?

I have already installed sfh/sft on my linux desktop pc and it works for updating ubl/uboot apps.

Many thanks