Upgrade the firmware via USB cable

Introduction

This article describes how to upgrade the firmware file on the host to the flash memory of the development board through the USB cable. When upgrading, you need to choose the appropriate upgrade mode according to the host operating system and firmware type.

Prepare Tools

• EC-A3399ProC development board
• Firmware
• host computer
• Type-C data cable

Prepare Firmware

The firmware can be obtained by compiling the SDK, or you can download the public firmware (unified firmware) from the Resource download.There are two types of firmware files:

• A single unified firmware

The unified firmware is a single file packaged and merged by all files such as the partition table, bootloader, uboot, kernel, system and so on. The firmware officially released by Firefly adopts a unified firmware format. Upgrading the unified firmware will update the data and partition table of all partitions on the motherboard, and erase all data on the motherboard.

• Multiple partition images

That is, files with independent functions, such as partition table, bootloader, and kernel, are generated during the development phase. The independent partition image can only update the specified partition, while keeping other partition data from being destroyed, it will be very convenient to debug during the development process.

Through the unified firmware unpacking / packing tool, the unified firmware can be unpacked into multiple partition images, or multiple partition images can be merged into a unified firmware.

Install the Upgrade Tool

Windows Operating System

• Install RK USB driver

Download Release_DriverAssistant.zip, extract, and then run the DriverInstall.exe inside . In order for all devices to use the updated driver, first select Driver uninstall(驱动卸载) and then select Driver install(驱动安装).

• Download and run AndroidTool's RKDevTool.exe

Note : Different firmware may use different versions of tools, please download the corresponding version according to the Instructions for writing with USB cable (important).

Linux Operating System

There is no need to install device driver under Linux. Please refer to the Windows section to connect the device.

• Linux_Upgrade_Tool

Note : Different firmware may use different versions of tools, please download the corresponding version according to the Instructions for writing with USB cable (important).

Download Linux_Upgrade_Tool, And install it into the system as follows for easy invocation:

unzip Linux_Upgrade_Tool_xxxx.zip
cd Linux_UpgradeTool_xxxx
sudo mv upgrade_tool /usr/local/bin
sudo chown root:root /usr/local/bin/upgrade_tool
sudo chmod a+x /usr/local/bin/upgrade_tool

Enter Upgrade mode

Usually we upgrade firmware in two modes, namely Loader mode and MaskRom mode. Before we can write the firmware, we need to connect the device and put the board into upgradable mode.

Loader mode

Hardware way into Loader mode

Connect the device and press the RECOVERY button to enter the Loader mode. The steps are as follows:

• Disconnect the power adapter first

• Type-C data cable connect the device and the host.

  

• Press and hold the RECOVERY button on the device.

  

• plug in

• After about two seconds, release the RECOVERY button.

Software way into Loader mode

After Type-C data cable is connected, run the following command on the serial debugging terminal or adb shell to the board:

reboot loader

Check the Loader mode

How to determine whether the board is in Loader mode, we can check through the tool

Windows Operating System

The AndroidTool displays the prompt Found One LOADER Device at the bottom

if the "Enter Loader mode" operation is performed, and the LOADER prompted by the upgrade tool is not displayed, check whether the Windows host computer you to discover new hardware and configure the driver. Open the Device manager and a new device Rockusb Device will appear, as shown below. If not, you can go back to the previous step to reinstall the driver.

Linux Operating System

After running upgrade_tool, you can see a Loader prompt in the connected device

firefly@T-chip:~/severdir/down_firmware$ sudo upgrade_tool
List of rockusb connected
DevNo=1 Vid=0x2207,Pid=0x330c,LocationID=106    Loader
Found 1 rockusb,Select input DevNo,Rescan press <R>,Quit press <Q>:q

MaskRom mode

To enter MaskRom mode, please refer to MaskRom mode.

Upgrade the firmware

Windows Operating System

Upgrade unified firmware - update.img

The steps to update the unified firmware update.img are as follows:

1.Switch to the Upgrade Firmware page.

2.Press the Firmware button to open the firmware file to be upgraded. The upgrade tool displays detailed firmware information.

3.Press the Upgrade button to start the upgrade.

4.If the upgrade fails, you can try to erase the Flash by pressing the EraseFlash button first, and then upgrade.Be sure to erase the upgrade according to Instructions for writing with USB cable (important)

Linux Operating System

Upgrade unified firmware - update.img

sudo upgrade_tool uf update.img

# erase flash : Using the ef parameter requires the loader file or the corresponding update.img to be specified.
# update.img :The ubuntu firmware you need to upgrade.
sudo upgrade_tool ef update.img
# upgrade again
sudo upgrade_tool uf update.img