Installing JetPack 4.6.4 on Waveshare Jetson Nano eMMC Board: What is the Most Reliable Method?

Robotics & Edge Computing Jetson Systems Jetson Nano
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Hello everyone,

I’m encountering significant difficulties trying to install JetPack 4.6.4 onto my Jetson Nano eMMC module (4GB) and am seeking the most reliable and proven installation path for this specific hardware combination.

My Current Hardware and Software Combination:

1. Device: Jetson Nano eMMC Module (4GB).

2. Carrier Board: Waveshare Jetson Nano Carrier Board.

3. Target JetPack Version: 4.6.4 (L4T 32.7.4).

4. Installation Environment: Docker Container on Ubuntu 18.04/20.04 (Attempting CLI/Manual methods via NVIDIA SDK Manager: 2.4.0.13234).

Problems Encountered (Leading to Manual Attempts):

• SDK Manager GUI: Even the JetPack 4.6.4 version is either unselectable for the Nano eMMC or exhibits major instability during the flashing steps in the SDK Manager GUI, frequently resulting in a “Skipped” status.

• Docker Manual Flashing Failure: Despite successfully downloading and manually extracting the necessary .tbz2 files using tar, the critical flash.sh file is not visible in the /Linux_for_Tegra directory. This prevents the manual flashing from initiating. (Example of the terminal error: ls: cannot access ‘flash.sh’: No such file or directory). I suspect this is due to a complex Docker file system bind/mount issue.

The Main Question:

What is the most reliable and trouble-free way to install JetPack 4.6.4 onto this unique combination (Waveshare Carrier Board + Jetson Nano eMMC Module)?

1. Does the Waveshare board require a specialized flashing command or a dedicated configuration file (.conf) that deviates from the standard setup?

2. Should I abandon the Docker environment entirely and attempt to flash directly from the Host machine (Ubuntu)?

3. What is the most compatible JetPack version (in the 4.x series) known to work reliably with the Waveshare eMMC carrier board?

If anyone has successful eMMC flashing experience with this specific Waveshare board and can recommend a proven method, I would be extremely grateful.

Thank you.

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You would need to use the Waveshare software (unless they state that NVIDIA flash software can be used).

The reason is that the carrier board can have a different electrical layout than the dev kit. Many pins have optional uses, and if any pin functions are used differently, then the device tree (which is firmware) is what tells Linux where to find that hardware. If you succeed with the wrong firmware, then it is possible large parts of it will work, and only altered parts fail; or it may be some attempt to access a wrong memory address within the kernel causes a crash.

Third party manufacturers will state something related to one of these:

  • That you can use NVIDIA’s flash software (in which case their carrier board has the same layout).
  • Provide a patch to the NVIDIA software (which is likely a patch of device tree).
  • Provide a rebranded flash software (which mostly does the same thing as NVIDIA’s flash software, but would include a different device tree and perhaps some feature support).
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