[ECOS] Re: Redboot on Assabet (fwd)

[Nicolas Pitre <nico@cam.org>]

[ forwarded to the eCos mailing list where the RedBoot development
  is happening ]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 07 Jun 2001 19:43:53 +0200
From: Jordi Colomer <jco@ict.es>
To: Nicolas Pitre <nico@CAM.ORG>, linux-arm-kernel@lists.arm.linux.org.uk
Subject: Re: Redboot on Assabet

> > Hi,
> >
> > I have downloaded and written Nico's Redboot image for the
> > Assabet. Right after the Jflash programming, and even after
> > a reset, Redboot boots up normally, but after a power-up,
> > it doesn't. Not a single character shows up on the terminal.
>
> Don't forget the 38400 baud rate...

No. It is ok.

>
> > Using a boundary-scan tester, the pin samples of the
> > StrongArm show that it is continously accessing the first
> > words of the flash (addresses 0x00000010 and 0x0000000C).
> >
> > I can't figure out why it boots after a reset, but not
> > after a power-up. Maybe Redboot is not fully initializing
> > the CPU ?
>
> Can't tell.  It works pretty well for me and apparently for others as well.
> Looks strange.  Are you sure your hardware is OK?  Is your flash socketed?
>

Well, the assabet works great with a bootldr and a 2.4.3 linux kernel.
The flash does not have a socket. The neponset is not attached.

> > To restore the Assabet, I must rewrite "bootldr" and then
> > "Redboot" again.
>
> Are you sure RedBoot is correctly flashed?
>

Yes, it is. I use my own boundary-scan tool (similar to Jflash) to
readback
the contents of the flash into a file. There are no differences with the
original
redboot.bin file.

Note that RedBoot initially does work ok : I can ping a machine, load
and flash
a file and even reset the assabet. But, when I power the board off and
on,
redboot doesn't run (minicom is still in 38400 baud). The flash still
verifies
against redboot.bin.

That makes me wonder if there are any registers (?) in the
strongArm/assabet that
are not affected by a CPU reset. Maybe the previous execution of bootldr
initialized them properly , but redboot doesn't. Just an hypothesis...

Another member in this list reported me that he hasn't faced this
problem with
his assabet. He is using a binary image of redboot compiled by himself
from
older eCos sources. Unfortunately, I cannot use his .ecc file because it
is
too old for my current version of eCos, which was downloaded last
tuesday.

On the other hand, I cannot rebuild redboot using your .ecc file
because the 'cpp' of the arm-elf toolchain returns a "too many input
files"
error. If I use the Netwinder toolchain, objcopy generates a huge binary
file
padded with zeroes from 0x00000000 to 0x50000000 (the virtual address of
the
flash).

Jordi Colomer.