Linux + u-boot port to MT6235

historical

Hi All!

That's true, I managed to run U-Boot on MT6235, but linux kernel is
not fully functional yet (it's fresh stuff as I managed to ran it on
Tuesday and then I was off to conference).
For MT6235 development I chose Sciphone G2, which is pretty cheap.
After some time I managed to download code to SRAM (just 64KB) using
MTK's FlashTool.
MTK FlashTool communicates over UART directly with MT6235 bootloader
and sends its own chunk of code (about 58KB) which is executed in SRAM
and communicates with FlashTool.
I found on pudn.com some pack to customize code loaded by FlashTool,
thanks to which I could download my own code to SRAM (without JTAG).
The problem was that it had to be linked with some security libraries
which occupied about 56KB and not much memory left for my own code.
Then I decided to try find JTAG pins to get all control on MT6235.
That took me sometime, but finally I succeeded.
The other bigger issue was initializing DRAM controller to be able to
download bigger code (linux kernel + uboot) to external RAM. In
sciphone there is problem that all interesting chips are under metal
shield which is pretty havily soldered. In this case I couldn't read
what kind of RAM memory is mounted without destroying the board (I
don't have such soldering machine which could unsolder so big metal
shield). Thanks to JTAG I could attach to target and then dump DRAM
controller registers from processor running MTK's software, but
setting these values after processor start and configuration of PLL
didn't work.
I decided to disassemble bootloader which could show me how DRAM
controller is initialized and how code fron NAND is loaded (to be able
to flash U-Boot and kernel to NAND so MT6235 will start my code
automatically and I will not have to use JTAG). Currently I have
knowledge how internal MT6235 bootloader is loading code from memory
during startup and I also extracted procedure of DRAM controller
initialization. Thanks to that I'm able to run U-Boot from the very
begining of processor startup.
The problem is that I have just one piece of Sciphone G2 and I don't
want to flash it yet to not break existing code in it. Thanks to
running device I'm able to attach with JTAG and check how peripherals
are configured (i.e. LCD, MMC, etc.). I have backup of flash, but I'm
not 100% sure if I will flash it back, phone will startup. That's why
I bought second piece of Sciphone G2 and should receive it today or on
Tuesday (this Monday is holiday in Poland). In this case I'll flash
U-Boot to NAND and try to make it working. Then we could load the rest
of code from U-Boot (to RAM or NAND over serial).
You can see how my setup looks on attached picture.
The good thing about it is that the same bootloader is used in MT622x,
so it should be fairly easy to do the same on phones based on that
SoCs (but unfortuantely it's just ARM7).
If it comes to code, of course I can share it on "git.osmocom.org".
Currently it's just basic port of U-Boot and not much for linux
kernel, but I'm working on this now so I'll push it when it'll be
ready.

Currently I'm working on driver for NAND memory for U-Boot, so we
could flash linux kernel. When that will be ready I'll push the code.
Then I'll switch to linux kernel and when it'll be functional I also
push the code. At this stage you will not need to have JTAG and you
could load the code over serial in U-Boot.

If it comes to GSM I didn't work with it before. I actualy worked 6
months in L2/3 team for LTE (on RRC) but it's different story.
That could be really outstanding thing if we could run first phone
ever with whole code open (from BB up to APP).

BR,
Marcin
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