RT1170 Evalboard copy to SDRAM and start

[pete2001]

Hello,

we are evaluating the MIMXRT1170 EVK Board. The planned product should copy program and data from QSPI Flash into the extern SDRAM, and start from there. My questions:

a) Are there any KSDK examples, that demonstrates this? Can create the correct start headers and vectors at the begin of the QSPI flash, and the internal bootrom will copy a memory region to ext SDRAM and start there? Or supports the bootrom only XIP?

b) It looks like, that AN12238 ("i.MX RT Flashloader Use Case") for the RT1050 describes a similar scenario to copy the code into RAM and execute there.

I found the following: "NOTE: While RT does support booting to SDRAM using these steps, we recommend using XIP from serial NOR on the FlexSPI interface when possible. The FlexSPI controller is connected to a 64 bit internal bus, but the SEMC which is the SDRAM controller on RT uses a 32 bit bus. So XIP from FlexSPI will usually provide better performance than booting code to SDRAM."

When comparing QSPI Flash (4-bit, 133Mhz) on the RT1170 Evalboard  and the ext SDRAM (16-bit, 200Mhz) the SDRAM should be much faster. Am I correct?

Best Regards,

Peter

[VineeshM]

Hello, Do we have a solution for this thread? I mean - "copy program and data from QSPI Flash into the extern SDRAM, and start from there"

[kennethkong852]

I am also facing this challenge right now that I have spent most of my time for past week or two researching methods to do this on my i.MX RT1062 setup.

Per my understanding the suggested method of using MCUBootUtility is probably the only way to achieve this. But it may not be feasible to do that outside of the EVK, i.e. on custom boards. 

Is there perhaps any hex file that will give the proper contents for such IVT and Boot Data that would be suitable for allowing the application to be executed in RAM?  Assuming there is one, what we can do then is simply combining the application code after it to form an image to load in flash?

[pete2001]

Hello,
a) what "below figure" do you mean in your reply?
b) Are there really no ready KSDK examples, that include the correct linker settings, and produce a binary, that the Boot-ROM copies into the EVK SDRAM and executes there? I hoped, that there would be at least an example.

Best Regards,
Peter

[jeremyzhou · Accepted solution]

Hi,
Thanks for your reply.
a) what "below figure" do you mean in your reply?
-- Sorry, I forgot to attach the below figure.

b) Are there really no ready KSDK examples, that include the correct linker settings, and produce a binary, that the Boot-ROM copies into the EVK SDRAM and executes there? I hoped, that there would be at least an example.
-- No, it's impossible to generate a NON-XIP boot image via configuring the linker setting, and I'd like to refer to the thread to generate a suitable boot image.
Have a great day,
TIC

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[jeremyzhou]

Hi,

Thank you for your interest in NXP Semiconductor products and for the opportunity to serve you.
a) Are there any KSDK examples, that demonstrates this? Can create the correct start headers and vectors at the begin of the QSPI flash, and the internal bootrom will copy a memory region to ext SDRAM and start there? Or supports the bootrom only XIP?
-- According to your proposal, the NON-XIP boot mode is suited to your application and the below figure shows the workflow of the NON-XIP boot.
b) When comparing QSPI Flash (4-bit, 133Mhz) on the RT1170 Evalboard and the ext SDRAM (16-bit, 200Mhz) the SDRAM should be much faster. Am I correct?
-- Yes, you're right.

Have a great day,
TIC

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- We are following threads for 7 weeks after the last post, later replies are ignored
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