Rockusb

Introduce

Rockusb is a vendor specific USB class from Rockchip, which is for firmware dowmload for Rockchip SoCs.

 

Get into Rockusb

There are a few cases for Rockchip SoCs to get into Rockusb.

• maskrom mode, no firmware found on chip, target run maskrom rockusb driver;
• usbplug mode, 
• miniLoader rockusb mode, target run miniloader rockusb driver.
• uboot rockusb mode.

 

Maskrom mode

If there is no bootable firmware found on board, the SoC will run Rockusb driver automatically, we call it Bootrom mode or Maskrom mode.

If firmware is at somewhere of the board, in order to get into this mode, we can do something to prevent cpu read the firmware successful:

• for SD-card, unplug the SD-card;
• for eMMC, short the eMMC clock to GND;
• for NAND, short the data line or clock line;
• for SPI, short the spi signal to GND;
• By "reboot bootrom" command in U-Boot and Kernel, WIP.
• erase bootable region with non-bootable data in eMMC or other media devices

In Maskrom mode, the DRAM is not available, so the download size is limit by the internal memory size.

Use db command in rkdeveloptool, system will init the DRAM and run into usbplug(with rockusb driver) mode which have no size limitation in download size.

Usbplug mode

The usbplug is a firmware used for USB download with rkdeveloptool db command, with rockusb driver inside, the DRAM already initialized in this mode.

Miniloader Rockusb mode

Rockchip legacy image(with U-Boot 2014.10) using miniloader as default USB firmware upgrade path, enter this mode with:

- Press 'recovery' or 'volumn +' key pressed when power up;

-  there is no next stage firmware found.

  For example, erase bootable data in U-Boot:

mmc erase 0x4000 0x2000

-  run "reboot loader" command in kernel.

NOTE: In this miniloader rockusb, the offset for rkdeveloptool is not the physical address,

the physical offset 0~0x2000 is no able to write by wl command;

The physical address of  offset in wl command is the offset plus 0x2000, eg:

"rkdeveloptool wl 0x2000 uboot.img" will write uboot.img to emmc 0x4000 address.

U-Boot Rockusb mode

enter this mode with:

- Press 'recovery' or 'volumn +' key pressed when power up;

- Run "reboot loader" command in kernel;

- Start with cmd in U-Boot shell

rockusb 0 mmc 0

 

USB VID/PID for rockusb

Rockchip Vendor ID is 0x2207, and the product ID for different SoCs are different.

Rockusb product ID:

• RK3288: 0x320a
• RK3328: 0x320c
• RK3399: 0x330c

Please use lsusb command in Linux PC to check if there is a Rockusb device connect.

 

Firmware download

rkdeveloptool is the tool to do the firmware upgrade for Rockchip SoCs which is using Rockusb protocol via USB.

Please follow the steps for boot from eMMC for how to use the tool.