Can't Boot the Xavier NX following the 'Getting Started' Instructions

I had not used my Xavier NX in a while and wanted to get it going again. I followed the instructions on the ‘Getting Started’ tutorial page, and flashed a Jetpack 5.1 SD card. Trying to boot with the SD card, I get the large NVIDIA logo, and then prompted to select escape, F11, or enter. Any of the three options result in the same outcome. The system ends with the large NVIDIA logo still in place, and a dead shell prompt. I then went and tried to flash SD card with earlier versions of Jetpack, but now get the same result. Is there any way for me to flash an SD card at this point that will allow my Xavier NX to boot?
Thank you,
Paul McWhorter

Is this a dev kit? I’m guessing so since you are using an SD card, but fair warning, third party carrier boards with SD cards are not dev kits (they use an eMMC module, which is different than an SD card module).

Assuming it is a dev kit, then it probably means you must flash the module (the Jetson itself). Dev kits keep boot content on QSPI memory of the module, and this has to be compatible with the SD card software release. It might be your SD card is valid, but the QSPI content is not. This is especially true when JetPack 4.x was on the QSPI, and the SD card is from JetPack 5.x.

Regardless of other details, the first step would be to flash the Jetson anyway. JetPack 5.x will work with a host PC which is either Ubuntu 18.04 or 20.04 (the JetPack 4.x would work with a host PC version 16.04 or 18.04). JetPack/SDKM (the flash software running on the host PC) and L4T (what actually gets flashed, Ubuntu plus NVIDIA drivers) have their versions tied together, so you can get either the JetPack or L4T release you want, with instructions here:

Yes it is the official NVIDIA development kit. I followed your suggestion and installed SDK manager, and flashed it, and now it works. Thank you.

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