Introduction

This BSP provides a basis for development, deployment and execution of Linux based applications on the iMX7 System on Module (SOM).

Versioning

Software

Yocto Machine Configuration Table

This BSP release supports various configurations of the phyBOARD-Zeta i.MX7. You will need to know which Yocto machine configuration corresponds to your kit in order to build the appropriate BSP. By default, only the standard kit configurations are shown in the table. If you have a different kit, use the filters below to search by Kit Part Number or SOM. The U-Boot defconfig and kernel device tree file names are important when creating custom U-Boot and kernel images outside of Yocto development.

Linux Device Tree Summary

The following is an example describing the structure of the device tree for the standard phyBOARD-Zeta Kit (machine configuration imx7d-phyboard-zeta-004).

Please look at the dts file corresponding to your machine configuration for the included dtsi files.

Alternate dts files:

• imx7d-phyboard-zeta-004-m4.dtb: configure u-boot to use this DTS if running Linux on the Cortex-A7 while running FreeRTOS on the Cortex-M4
• imx7d-phyboard-zeta-004-mipi.dtb: configure u-boot to use this DTS if using the PEB-AV-06 MIPI module

Compatible Hardware

Supported Hardware Versions

Device tree changes are required to support earlier SOM and Carrier Board revisions. Visit the PHYTEC Support Portal to open a support ticket for help on how to make the device tree changes.

Compatible Expansion Boards and Accessories

Supported Raspberry Pi HATs (PEB-D-RPI Expansion Board)

PHYTEC supports a variety of Raspberry Pi HATs for use with the PEB-D-RPI Expansion Board. Other HATs may be hardware-compatible but have not yet been integrated and tested by PHYTEC. Demos and tests for supported HATs have been installed to the BSP file system, and are located in the /usr/share/phytec-rpihat-examples directory.

The following table lists supported Raspberry Pi HATs and the name of the subdirectory (relative to the phytec-rpihat-examples directory) that contains the demos for each HAT:

BSP Download

Prebuilt images of BSP-Yocto-FSL-iMX7-PD19.1.0 can be downloaded and extracted from the link below:

BSP-Yocto-FSL-iMX7-PD19.1.0

Documentation

• Quickstart: QuickStart
• BSP Development Guide: BSP Development Guide
• For testing the "Hello World" Greengrass example on an i.MX7 already running an image built with the -004 machine configuration: 
  • Page:
    i.MX7: AWS Greengrass Quick Start

• Additional documentation: 

  • Page:
    i.MX7: Flashing Images to NAND
  • Page:
    i.MX7: Creating a Bootable SD Card
  • Page:
    i.MX7: Boot Configurations
  • Page:
    i.MX7: Flashing Images to eMMC
  • Page:
    i.MX7: AWS Greengrass Quick Start
  • Page:
    i.MX7: Evaluating the PEB-D-RPI Expansion Board
  • Page:
    i.MX7: Raspberry Pi HAT Support with PEB-D-RPI Expansion Board

BSP Features

The following table lists the interfaces available from the phyCORE-iMX7 SOM. 

• Implemented - driver support exists in the kernel. 
• Tested  - the interface has been configured in the device tree and was tested by PHYTEC 

• Status in Device Tree - the corresponding device tree nodes are enabled in the device tree. See Linux Device Tree Summary for more information.

  

  The "Status in Device Tree" column is specifically for the standard phyBOARD-Zeta kit (machine configuration imx7d-phyboard-zeta-004).

  Please look at the dts file corresponding to your machine configuration for differences.

[1] Interface requires additional configuration, such as pinmuxing. It may be possible to change the software configuration to utilize this interface even if it is not being set in the board's default configuration. Please see NXP's i.MX7D Technical Reference Manual for more information on the various modes each pin can be muxed to.

New in this Release

PD19.1.0

• General
  
  • Support for AWS IoT Greengrass is now included in the standard kit (imx7d-phyboard-zeta-004)
  • Machine configurations have been reorganized
    • imx7d-phyboard-zeta-001: (standard Dual kit with PEB-EVAL-02 board) has been removed
    • imx7s-phyboard-zeta-002: (standard Solo kit with  PEB-EVAL-02 board) has been removed
      • The SOM from the kit (imx7s-pcm-061-0502100e) is now a nonstandard SOM with PEB-D-RPI support
    • PEB-EVAL-02 support in all nonstandard SOMs has been replaced with PEB-D-RPI support

• Yocto
  • Version: Ported to Yocto version 2.5 Sumo
  • Yocto Image: 
    • New imx7d-phyboard-zeta-004-mipi.dtb file is included in the boot partition of the -004 image (see "Linux Device Tree Summary")
    • Image now comes in .sdcard.bz2 format instead of .sdcard
  • Machine configuration file changes to reflect the changes listed in "General"

• Linux
  • Version: Migrated from Linux Kernel v4.9.11 to v4.14.78 
  • Merged imx7d_phyboard_zeta_greengrass_defconfig into imx7d_phyboard_zeta_defconfig, and thereby removed the former
  • DTS file changes made to reflect machine configuration changes listed in "General"

• U-Boot
  • Version: Migrated from v2017.03 to v2018.03
  • The default UART serial console was changed to be UART1 on the PEB-D-RPI module from UART5 on PBA-C-09 (carrier board)

Fixed in this Release

PD19.1.0

• N/A - see New in this Release for changes

Not Tested

• Booting via network
• Qt5 - NXP includes "fsl-image-qt5" Yocto Image in the BSP but it is meant for i.MX SoCs with hardware graphics, and is not supported by NXP or PHYTEC for the i.MX7D.

Known Issues

PHYTEC Known Issues

• IMX7SW-420: Using Java/Node.js with Greengrass:
  • The Node.js v6.10 package can't be found by Greengrass with its current package name. Link it to a file with the correct name:

    • ln -s /usr/bin/node /usr/bin/nodejs6.1

  • Java is experiencing runtime errors and will be fixed in a future release
• Ethernet:
  • iperf3 is included with the Sumo Yocto BSP. With UDP, this command reports much lower bandwidth than expected when compared with iperf command.

• eMMC:

  • IMX7SW-205: HS400 warnings/errors: configure eMMC to run at maximum 100MHz as a work around. See commit b8f6c1b7780 for more information
• Linux IMX Busfreq driver:
  • Driver disabled by default due to previous issues with impaired UART console functionality, which have since been resolved

  • For dynamic bus frequency scaling and improved power consumption, the busfreq driver can be enabled in the device tree by removing the "fsl,freq_scaling_disabled" property in imx7-phycore-som.dtsi. It can also be controlled in Linux sysfs: 

    echo 1 > /sys/bus/platform/drivers/imx_busfreq/soc\:busfreq/enable 

• NAND:
  • 256MB NAND is too small to flash fsl-image-validation-imx filesystem. Booting from NAND was tested with core-image-minimal Yocto image, which is included with release binaries.

NXP Known Issues

See i.MX Linux Release Notes from NXP in Linux 4.14.78_1.0.0 BSP Documentation

Technical Support

For further information or to report any problems, visit the PHYTEC Support Portal