BBAI-64 stuck in boot prompt or loop

General Discussion
1

Hello.

After a failed update, my BB-AI-64 won’t boot anymore. I’m now trying to flash it with the 11.3 flasher https://debian.beagle.cc/images/bbai64-emmc-flasher-debian-11.3-xfce-arm64-2022-06-14-10gb.img.xz

No LED flashing, LED6 is on solid, blinks once every 10 seconds or so. I hooked up a serial cable to look at the messages.

When I boot holding BOOT, I eventually get Gave up waiting for root file system device. followed with a (initramfs) prompt waiting for commands but the keyboard is unresponsive (both through serial and direct USB) so I’m stuck there.

Here is the serial output of the boot attempt from SD card:

boot_loop_prompt.txt (47.9 KB)

If I attempt to boot without the SD card, it loops forever, usually after [ 2.239875] xhci-hcd xhci-hcd.0.auto: new USB bus registered, assigned bus n▒. The▒ doesn’t always show up at the same spot in that line but always in the xhci-hcd line. One step in the boot is Hit any key to stop autoboot: but again, the keyboard does nothing… so I can’t try that.

Here is the serial output of the boot attempt without SD card:

boot_loop.txt (82.6 KB)

I’ve tried with other images, different SD card but no luck. At this point, I just want a fresh install, nothing fancy. Any suggestion would be great!

Thanks

2

For your board grab a flasher from here Debian 11.x (Bullseye) - Monthly Snapshots (ARM64)

3

Hi @RobertCNelson . Thanks for your suggestion. Unfortunately it’s still behaving the same way:

boot_loop_11p7.txt (17.7 KB)

Let me know if you can think of anything else.
Thanks!

4

How are you powering the board ?

Usually bad power is the root cause of unstable/rebooting systems. The BBAI-64 is quite power hungry compared to the other BBB boards and requires a good clean power supply.

5

Ah Yeah, so partially fixed…

It’s detecting and loading the proper board now!

Model: BeagleBoard.org BeagleBone AI-64 R5
Board: BBONEAI-64-B0- rev B0

But this is one of the fun deals on the tda4 architecture and the r5 binaries, the eMMC is still loading the initial u-boot with a bad memory timings…

With the microSD flashed plugged in and powered on

  • Hold RESET and “USER/BOOT”
  • Let go of RESET
  • LED should light up.
  • Let go of “USER/BOOT”

let the flasher flash the eMMC so you have the newer version of u-boot…

Regards,

6

Hi @benedict.hewson . I use a 5V/6A benchtop power supply, that should be enough power. Thanks for the idea, though, let me know if you think of anything else!

7

It does report the right board when I boot with this button sequence, so that IS progress. But it still endlessly loops:

boot_loop_11p7_buttons.txt (12.2 KB)

As you can see in the log, after I let go of the BOOT button, it goes back to reporting the wrong board on the next loop. Kind of makes sense since it’s booting on the eMMC when BOOT isn’t pressed.

Thanks for your help!