[U-Boot] USB fatload fails to load rootfs

[U-Boot] USB fatload fails to load rootfs

[Chuck Wical]

I am trying to load rootfs.ext2.gz.uboot from usb using fatload but when it
reaches a point in writing the file to memory a reset occurs of the CPU.  If
I load this file using tftp it works fine.  Here are the commands I am using:

loadaddr=0x21000000

tftp $(loadaddr) rootfs.ext2.gz.uboot

usb start
fatload usb 0 $(loadaddr) rootfs.ext2.gz.uboot

The version of U-Boot used is 2009.11.1 and upgrading at this point may be
an issue.  Before a bunch of questions are asked I inherited this project,
it is mature and works, I have no documentation, and I am simply trying to
copy a file from usb to memory.  Nothing more, nothing fancy.

My searches on the web have not yielded any possible solutions or good
explanations of the usb subsystem in U-Boot so I am hoping someone can
provide some possible solutions or information I can read.

Thanks!

Chuck

[U-Boot] USB fatload fails to load rootfs

[Romain Izard]

On 2013-08-28, Chuck Wical <chuck.wical@amanomcgann.com> wrote:
> I am trying to load rootfs.ext2.gz.uboot from usb using fatload but
> when it reaches a point in writing the file to memory a reset occurs
> of the CPU.  If I load this file using tftp it works fine.  Here are
> the commands I am using:
>
> loadaddr=0x21000000
>
> tftp $(loadaddr) rootfs.ext2.gz.uboot
>
> usb start fatload usb 0 $(loadaddr) rootfs.ext2.gz.uboot
>
> The version of U-Boot used is 2009.11.1 and upgrading at this point
> may be an issue.  Before a bunch of questions are asked I inherited
> this project, it is mature and works, I have no documentation, and I
> am simply trying to copy a file from usb to memory.  Nothing more,
> nothing fancy.
>
> My searches on the web have not yielded any possible solutions or good
> explanations of the usb subsystem in U-Boot so I am hoping someone can
> provide some possible solutions or information I can read.
>
The FAT reading code in old versions of U-Boot is quite sensitive to
external conditions. In my experience, changing the compiler for a
source tree based on the 2007 U-Boot code from GCC 4.3.3 to GCC 4.7.3
produced the same issue as the one you described. Surprisingly, the
issue only occurred for the rootfs, and not the kernel, which was a
smaller file.

Unfortunately for you, our answer to this issue was the finalization of
the porting of our platform to the U-Boot mainline, which does not has
those problems.

Best regards,
-- 
Romain Izard

[U-Boot] USB fatload fails to load rootfs

[Chuck Wical]

Romain Izard <romain.izard.pro <at> gmail.com> writes:

> 
> On 2013-08-28, Chuck Wical <chuck.wical <at> amanomcgann.com> wrote:
> > I am trying to load rootfs.ext2.gz.uboot from usb using fatload but
> > when it reaches a point in writing the file to memory a reset occurs
> > of the CPU.  If I load this file using tftp it works fine.  Here are
> > the commands I am using:
> >
> > loadaddr=0x21000000
> >
> > tftp $(loadaddr) rootfs.ext2.gz.uboot
> >
> > usb start fatload usb 0 $(loadaddr) rootfs.ext2.gz.uboot
> >
> > The version of U-Boot used is 2009.11.1 and upgrading at this point
> > may be an issue.  Before a bunch of questions are asked I inherited
> > this project, it is mature and works, I have no documentation, and I
> > am simply trying to copy a file from usb to memory.  Nothing more,
> > nothing fancy.
> >
> > My searches on the web have not yielded any possible solutions or good
> > explanations of the usb subsystem in U-Boot so I am hoping someone can
> > provide some possible solutions or information I can read.
> >
> The FAT reading code in old versions of U-Boot is quite sensitive to
> external conditions. In my experience, changing the compiler for a
> source tree based on the 2007 U-Boot code from GCC 4.3.3 to GCC 4.7.3
> produced the same issue as the one you described. Surprisingly, the
> issue only occurred for the rootfs, and not the kernel, which was a
> smaller file.
> 
> Unfortunately for you, our answer to this issue was the finalization of
> the porting of our platform to the U-Boot mainline, which does not has
> those problems.
> 
> Best regards,


Thank you Roman for the response.  You stated exactly what I am seeing, it
is only the rootfs file that fails while the uImage and etc.jffs2 files copy
and write to nand with no problem.

You will have to forgive my lack of knowledge on U-Boot since I have only
been working on this specific task that involves U-Boot for about a week now
so I have been on a steep learning curve.  You mentioned U-Boot mainline not
having this issue.  Could you direct me to where I can find this so I can
take a look?

My concern is the cross-compiler that was created by a third party may not
be compatible with newer versions of U-Boot and I would need to go through
the patches to see if there was anything custom created.  As you probably
understand this is time consuming work, especially with the learning curve I
am on.  

Again many thanks for the response!

Chuck

[U-Boot] USB fatload fails to load rootfs

[Stefano Babic]

Hi Chuck,

On 29/08/2013 15:32, Chuck Wical wrote:

> My concern is the cross-compiler that was created by a third party may not
> be compatible with newer versions of U-Boot and I would need to go through
> the patches to see if there was anything custom created.  As you probably
> understand this is time consuming work, especially with the learning curve I
> am on.  

Do you really need some special cross-compiler ? Which is your platform
? What about, at least to compile u-boot, to take one ready-to-use
cross-compiler ?

Best regards,
Stefano Babic

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