HOWTO U-Boot

From NAS-Central Buffalo - The Linkstation Wiki

Revision as of 01:35, 24 July 2006

WARNING! These instructions are for the Kurobox only. U-Boot for the Linkstation has been reported to work on some Linkstation hardware. Goto linkstationwiki:Projects/u-boot_bootloader for instructions and information regarding U-Boot on the Linkstation. If you are using a Linkstation DO NOT USE THESE INSTRUCTIONS AS THEY HAVE NOT BEEN SPECIFICALLY TESTED WITH LINKSTATION HARDWARE.

WARNING! THE NIJINO U-BOOT BOOTLOADER IS NOT FULLY TESTED, ALTHOUGH IT HAS BEEN INSTALLED SUCCESSFULLY ON BOTH STANDARD AND HG KUROBOXES, THERE HAS BEEN AT LEAST ONE KUROBOX BRICKED. THINK LONG AND HARD BEFORE PERFORMING THIS MODIFICATION. A BRICKED KUROBOX REQUIRES JTAG ACCESS TO REPAIR AND IS NOT COVERED UNDER THE KUROBOX WARRANTY

Introduction

The U-Boot project for the Kurobox is something for which the community has been waiting a long time! Nijino was the first person to provide a patch to adapt U-Boot to the Kurobox architecture and specifications! U-Boot will allow you to boot any kernel directly from the hard drive without first booting the 2.4.17 kernel stored in the Kurobox's flash memory.

Known functions and limitations

Functions :

• Boot a kernel image from the hard drive in uImage format
• Force Emergency Mode (EM) by pressing the the red button at the rear of the Kurobox right after the POWER LED stops blinking. (Note: EM can take around 2 minutes to start, so don't worry if you can't ping your Kurobox immediately)

Limitations :

• This version of U-Boot comes with no support for ethernet, so for now booting from or connecting to U-Boot over LAN is impossible. According to the author of this patch, nijino, ethernet driver implementation will not be easy, so we may never see this function in our Kuroboxes!

Building a Linux kernel in U-Boot format

To be able to build a kernel in uImage format, you will need the mkimage tool that is built when compiling U-Boot. Alternatively, you can download a precompiled version of this tool:

# wget http://www.kurobox.com/sylver/u-boot/mkimage
# chmod 0755 mkimage
# mv mkimage /usr/bin/

Now compile the kernel as normal:

# export ARCH=ppc

next do either

# make menuconfig

or

# make oldconfig

Create a U-Boot compatible uImage:

# make uImage

This will create a uImage file in arch/ppc/boot/images/uImage. Move the image into the /boot/ directory (this is the default location that U-Boot searches for a kernel image) and then compile the modules and install them.

# cp arch/ppc/boot/images/uImage /boot/
# make modules
# sudo make modules_install

To assist with this section, Sylver has prebuilt some uImage format kernels and modules:

• Kernel 2.6.17.1 for standard Kurobox
• Kernel 2.6.17.1 for Kurobox HG

Make sure you download the appropriate kernel and modules for the Kurobox you have, and then tar zxvf it in the root directory /.

Flash U-Boot on your Kurobox

WARNING! There is a possibility that you could brick your NAS with these instructions. Please make sure that you read the entire page carefully. The Kurobox and Kurobox HG use a different U-Boot flash image. If the wrong image is written to the flash memory, your Kurobox will be bricked and will require a JTAG cable and software to repair.

Sylver has built both the Standard and HG version of the patched U-Boot (1.1.4) using gcc version 4.1.2 20060613 (prerelease) (Debian 4.1.1-5). These flash images are configured to load the kernel image from /boot/uImage on hda1.

Standard Kurobox

WARNING! This section is for the Standard Kurobox. For Kurobox HG, goto the Kurobox HG Instructions

Kernel 2.4.x for standard Kurobox only

Boot your 2.4.x kernel as usual and download, untar, and check the checksum of the U-Boot image for standard Kurobox:

# wget http://www.kurobox.com/sylver/u-boot/u-boot-1.1.4-kurobox.tar.gz
# tar zxvf u-boot-1.1.4-kurobox.tar.gz
# cksum u-boot.bin
1870540566 164676 u-boot.bin

If all is ok, flash the boot !

# dd if=u-boot.bin of=/dev/fl2 bs=1k

Make sure the boot is ok in flash :

# cmp u-boot.bin /dev/fl2
cmp: EOF on u-boot.bin

Make sure you have a valid /boot/uImage in hda1 and reboot ;)

# reboot

If it doesn't work :

• Your Kurobox is now a brick, only JTAG will allow to restore it
• The kernel in /boot/uImage is incorrect, try forcing Emergency Mode (EM) by using the red button on the back of your Kurobox.

Kernel 2.6.x for standard Kurobox only

WARNING! Process is harder when using a 2.6.x kernel ! If you're not sure, boot to a 2.4.x kernel and follow the 2.4 kernel instructions !

Boot your 2.6.x kernel as usual and download, untar, and check the checksum the U-Boot image for standard Kurobox:

# wget http://www.kurobox.com/sylver/u-boot/u-boot-1.1.4-kurobox.tar.gz
# tar zxvf u-boot-1.1.4-kurobox.tar.gz
# cksum u-boot.bin
1870540566 164676 u-boot.bin

If all is ok, check your flash mapping : it should be

# cat /proc/mtd
dev:    size   erasesize  name
mtd0: 00300000 00010000 "mtd_firmimg"
mtd1: 00070000 00010000 "mtd_bootcode"
mtd2: 00010000 00010000 "mtd_status"
mtd3: 00080000 00010000 "mtd_conf"
mtd4: 00400000 00010000 "mtd_allflash"
mtd5: 000f0000 00010000 "mtd_data"

or

# cat /proc/mtd
dev:    size   erasesize  name
mtd0: 00400000 00010000 "mtd_allflash"
mtd1: 00300000 00010000 "mtd_firmimg"
mtd2: 00070000 00010000 "mtd_bootcode"
mtd3: 00010000 00010000 "mtd_status"
mtd4: 00080000 00010000 "mtd_conf"

The right place to flash is mtd_bootcode, so you'll have to flash the u-boot.bin to /dev/mtdblock1 or to /dev/mtdblock2! So depending of the result of the previous command, do a

# dd if=u-boot.bin of=/dev/mtdblock1 bs=1k

or a

# dd if=u-boot.bin of=/dev/mtdblock2 bs=1k

Make sure the boot is ok in flash :

# cmp u-boot.bin /dev/mtd1
cmp: EOF on u-boot.bin

or

# cmp u-boot.bin /dev/mtd2
cmp: EOF on u-boot.bin

Make sure you have a valid /boot/uImage in hda1 and reboot ;)

# reboot

If it doesn't work :

• Your Kurobox is now a brick, only JTAG will allow to restore it
• The kernel in /boot/uImage is incorrect, try forcing Emergency Mode (EM) by using the red button on the back of your Kurobox.

Kurobox HG

WARNING! This section is for the Kurobox HG. For Standard Kurobox, goto the Standard Kurobox Instructions

Kernel 2.4.x for Kurobox HG only

Boot your 2.4.x kernel as usual and download, untar, and check the checksum of the U-Boot image for Kurobox HG :

# wget http://www.kurobox.com/sylver/u-boot/u-boot-1.1.4-kuroboxhg.tar.gz
# tar zxvf u-boot-1.1.4-kuroboxhg.tar.gz
# cksum u-boot.bin
2604640296 164676 u-boot.bin

If all is ok, flash the boot !

# dd if=u-boot.bin of=/dev/fl2 bs=1k

Make sure the boot is ok in flash :

# cmp u-boot.bin /dev/fl2
cmp: EOF on u-boot.bin

Make sure you have a valid /boot/uImage in hda1 and reboot ;)

# reboot

If it doesn't work :

• Your Kurobox is now a brick, only JTAG will allow to restore it
• The kernel in /boot/uImage is incorrect, try forcing Emergency Mode (EM) by using the red button on the back of your Kurobox.

Kernel 2.6.x for Kurobox HG only

WARNING! Process is harder when using a 2.6.x kernel ! If you're not sure, boot to a 2.4.x kernel and follow the 2.4 kernel instructions !

Boot your 2.6.x kernel as usual and download, untar, and check the checksum the U-Boot image for Kurobox HG :

# wget http://www.kurobox.com/sylver/u-boot/u-boot-1.1.4-kuroboxhg.tar.gz
# tar zxvf u-boot-1.1.4-kuroboxhg.tar.gz
# cksum u-boot.bin
2604640296 164676 u-boot.bin

If all is ok, check your flash mapping : it should be

# cat /proc/mtd
dev:    size   erasesize  name
mtd0: 00300000 00010000 "mtd_firmimg"
mtd1: 00070000 00010000 "mtd_bootcode"
mtd2: 00010000 00010000 "mtd_status"
mtd3: 00080000 00010000 "mtd_conf"
mtd4: 00400000 00010000 "mtd_allflash"
mtd5: 000f0000 00010000 "mtd_data"

or

# cat /proc/mtd
dev:    size   erasesize  name
mtd0: 00400000 00010000 "mtd_allflash"
mtd1: 00300000 00010000 "mtd_firmimg"
mtd2: 00070000 00010000 "mtd_bootcode"
mtd3: 00010000 00010000 "mtd_status"
mtd4: 00080000 00010000 "mtd_conf"

The right place to flash is mtd_bootcode, so you'll have to flash the u-boot.bin to /dev/mtdblock1 or to /dev/mtdblock2! So depending of the result of the previous command, do a

# dd if=u-boot.bin of=/dev/mtdblock1 bs=1k

or a

# dd if=u-boot.bin of=/dev/mtdblock2 bs=1k

Make sure the boot is ok in flash :

# cmp u-boot.bin /dev/mtd1
cmp: EOF on u-boot.bin

or

# cmp u-boot.bin /dev/mtd2
cmp: EOF on u-boot.bin

Make sure you have a valid /boot/uImage in hda1 and reboot ;)

# reboot

If it doesn't work :

• Your Kurobox is now a brick, only JTAG will allow to restore it
• The kernel in /boot/uImage is incorrect, try forcing Emergency Mode (EM) by using the red button on the back of your Kurobox.

Building your own U-Boot binary

There are some problems while trying to compile U-Boot 1.1.4 with make v3.81. Please install make v3.80 before trying to compile U-Boot.

Get nijino's patch:

# wget http://homepage2.nifty.com/nijino/library/u-boot-1.1.4_kurobox-20060707.patch.bz2

Get U-Boot 1.1.4 source code from a mirror and apply the patch

# wget http://surfnet.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/u-boot/u-boot-1.1.4.tar.bz2
# tar xjf u-boot-1.1.4.tar.bz2 && cd u-boot-1.1.4
# bzip2 -dc ../u-boot-1.1.4_kurobox-20060707.patch.bz2 | patch -Np1

Configure U-Boot for your target :

• Kurobox

# make KUROBOX_config

• Kurobox HG

# make KUROBOX_HG_config

Build U-Boot

# make

Copy mkimage to /usr/bin (needed to build kernel images for U-Boot

# cp tools/mkimage /usr/bin/mkimage
# chmod 0755 /usr/bin/mkimage

You now have your own u-boot.bin file. Just follow this article to write this into your Kurobox's flash memory.

nijino has also written a tool to check if a built u-boot.bin is built for the correct Kurobox version.

# wget http://homepage2.nifty.com/nijino/kurobox/uboot_check.c
# gcc -o uboot_check uboot_check.c
# ./uboot_check

The output will tell you if your u-boot.bin matches your Kurobox version.

References

• Nijino's page with his patch and instructions (in Japanese)