U-Boot: using nand write to flash an ubi image, ubi part fails

[Lars Michael <lh_post@yahoo.com>]

Hello,

Using mkfs.ubifs and ubinize I have created an image with 5 volumes. In Linux I could flash it using "ubiformat /dev/mtd1 -f /root/ubi.img" and attach it using "ubiattach /dev/ubi_ctrl -m 1". It worked.

In production I would prefer to write the image from U-Boot. So in U-Boot I used "nand erase" then "nand write" to flash the image. Then I want to attach by "ubi part" command - but this fails: "UBI error: ubi_init: UBI error: cannot initialize UBI, error -17"

Then I booted Linux (via nfs) and tried to re-format+attach, but now it fails. Format complains about eraseblock contents and missing erase counters: 

ubiformat: warning!: 1099 of 2036 eraseblocks contain non-ubifs data
ubiformat: warning!: only 937 of 2036 eraseblocks have valid erase counter

The ubiattach now reports lots of:
...
UBI error: check_corruption: PEB 0 contains corrupted VID header, and the data does not contain all 0xFF, this may be a non-UBI PEB or a severe VID header corruption which requires manual inspection

UBI warning: process_eb: valid VID header but corrupted EC header at PEB 4
...

I realize that the U-Boot 'nand erase' does not preserve the erase counters. So what would be the correct way to erase and write in U-Boot? And why is the ubiformat not able to correct the problems?

My kernel is 2.6.29 patched with 165 patched from the ubi back port tree.
U-Boot is 2009.08 with ubifs support, but I am not sure if there are relevant patches. The CPU is a v4 ColdFire and 256MB Micron NAND.

Any help is appreciated, thanks. Below are the detailed listing:


-> mtd

device nand0 <NAND>, # parts = 2
 #: name		size		offset		mask_flags
 0: u-boot              0x00100000	0x00000000	0
 1: ubi                 0x0ff00000	0x00100000	0

active partition: nand0,0 - (u-boot) 0x00100000 @ 0x00000000

defaults:
mtdids  : nand0=NAND
mtdparts: mtdparts=NAND:1m(u-boot),-(ubi)

-> nand erase ubi

NAND erase: device 0 offset 0x100000, size 0xff00000
Erasing at 0x100000 --   0% complete.
<cut>
Erasing at 0xfd60000 --  99% complete.
Skipping bad block at  0x0ff80000                                          

Skipping bad block at  0x0ffa0000                                          

Skipping bad block at  0x0ffc0000                                          

Skipping bad block at  0x0ffe0000                                          

OK

Using FEC0 device
TFTP from server 10.28.151.113; our IP address is 10.28.151.112
Filename '/twr5441x/ubi.img'.
Load address: 0x40010000
Loading: *\b#################################################################
	 #################################################################
<cut>
	 #################################################################
	 ########################################################
done
Bytes transferred = 58064896 (3760000 hex)
-> md 40010000 100

40010000: 55424923 01000000 00000000 00000000    UBI#............
40010010: 00000800 00001000 27162ae3 00000000    ........'.*.....
40010020: 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000    ................
40010030: 00000000 00000000 00000000 7d780a89    ............}x..
40010040: ffffffff ffffffff ffffffff ffffffff    ................
<cut>
400113f0: 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000    ................
-> nand write ${loadaddr} 100000 ${filesize}

NAND write: device 0 offset 0x100000, size 0x3760000
 58064896 bytes written: OK
-> ubi part ubi

Creating 1 MTD partitions on "nand0":
0x000000100000-0x000010000000 : "mtd=1"
UBI: attaching mtd1 to ubi0
UBI: physical eraseblock size:   131072 bytes (128 KiB)
UBI: logical eraseblock size:    126976 bytes
UBI: smallest flash I/O unit:    2048
UBI: VID header offset:          2048 (aligned 2048)
UBI: data offset:                4096
UBI warning: process_lvol: volume table copy #1 is corrupted
UBI: create volume table (copy #1)
UBI: volume table was restored
UBI: volume 5 ("datafs") re-sized from 133 to 1316 LEBs
UBI: attached mtd1 to ubi0
UBI: MTD device name:            "mtd=1"
UBI: MTD device size:            255 MiB
UBI: number of good PEBs:        2036
UBI: number of bad PEBs:         4
UBI: max. allowed volumes:       128
UBI: wear-leveling threshold:    4096
UBI: number of internal volumes: 1
UBI: number of user volumes:     5
UBI: available PEBs:             0
UBI: total number of reserved PEBs: 2036
UBI: number of PEBs reserved for bad PEB handling: 20
UBI: max/mean erase counter: 5/0
UBI error: ubi_init: cannot attach mtd1
UBI: mtd1 is detached from ubi0
UBI error: ubi_init: UBI error: cannot initialize UBI, error -17
UBI init error -17
exit not allowed from main input shell.

------------------

[root@M54418TWR root]# ubiformat /dev/mtd1 -f /root/ubi.img
ubiformat: mtd1 (NAND), size 267386880 bytes (255.0 MiB), 131072 eraseblocks of 131072 bytes (128.0 KiB), min. I/O size 2048 bytes

libscan: scanning eraseblock 0 --  0 % complete  
...
libscan: scanning eraseblock 2039 -- 100 % complete  
ubiformat: 303 eraseblocks have valid erase counter, mean value is 0
ubiformat: 643 eraseblocks are supposedly empty
ubiformat: bad eraseblocks: 2036, 2037, 2038, 2039
ubiformat: warning!: 1090 of 2036 eraseblocks contain non-ubifs data
ubiformat: continue? (yes/no)  yes
ubiformat: warning!: only 303 of 2036 eraseblocks have valid erase counter
ubiformat: erase counter 0 will be used for all eraseblocks
ubiformat: note, arbitrary erase counter value may be specified using -e option
ubiformat: continue? (yes/no)  yes
ubiformat: use erase counter 0 for all eraseblocks

ubiformat: flashing eraseblock 0 --  0 % complete  
...
ubiformat: flashing eraseblock 442 -- 100 % complete  

ubiformat: formatting eraseblock 443 --  0 % complete  
...
ubiformat: formatting eraseblock 2039 -- 100 % complete  

[root@M54418TWR root]# ubiattach /dev/ubi_ctrl -m 1
UBI: attaching mtd1 to ubi0

UBI: physical eraseblock size:   131072 bytes (128 KiB)

UBI: logical eraseblock size:    126976 bytes

UBI: smallest flash I/O unit:    2048

UBI: VID header offset:          2048 (aligned 2048)

UBI: data offset:                4096

UBI error: check_corruption: PEB 0 contains corrupted VID header, and the data does not contain all 0xFF, this may be a non-UBI PEB or a severe VID header corruption which requires manual inspection

UBI warning: process_eb: valid VID header but corrupted EC header at PEB 4

UBI warning: process_eb: valid VID header but corrupted EC header at PEB 7

UBI warning: process_eb: valid VID header but corrupted EC header at PEB 8

UBI warning: process_eb: valid VID header but corrupted EC header at PEB 12

UBI error: check_corruption: PEB 16 contains corrupted VID header, and the data does not contain all 0xFF, this may be a non-UBI PEB or a severe VID header corruption which requires manual inspection

UBI warning: process_eb: valid VID header but corrupted EC header at PEB 22

...


Thanks,

- Lars