Is SPI image sensor still supported in Jetpack 6.2?

Robotics & Edge Computing Jetson & Embedded Systems Jetson Orin NX
1

Good morning,
we are going to migrate our image processing design with 1 x IMX290 ( I2C controlled, version 2 camera driver ) and 2 x IMX174 sensors ( SPI controlled, version 1 camera driver ) sensor from Jetpack 5.1.2 - Xavier NX to Jetpack 6.2 Orin NX.
In Sensor Software Driver Programming — Jetson Linux<br/>Developer Guide 34.1 documentation it is mentioned that:

V4L2 version 1.0: The version used in past releases. Some version 1.0 features are not available in later releases

As we are successful in controlling the I2C based image-sensor ( IMX290 , v4l2 version 2 driver ) but unsuccessful in controlling the SPI based image-sensors (IMX174 ) under Jetpack 6.2 ( Orin-NX ) and as there is no camera driver example for SPI ( $JETSON_KERNEL_SOURCE/kernel/nvidia/drivers/media/spi/imx204.c in earlier relases ) in Jetpack-6.2 :

Does Jetpack 6.2 support SPI-controlled image sensors ?

What we tried so far for Orin NX under JetPack 6.2 ( with hardware running well with JetPack 5.1.2 , Xavier NX) :

  1. Compiled a version 1 driver for IMX174 imager as load module . Can be installed and looks fine. But results in errors when raw-images are taken using v4l2-ctl. ( All data is binary zero, no framesync-errors, etc. )
  2. Wrote a version 2 sensor driver for imx174 and made some very little patches to tegracam_core.c, tegracam_v4l2.c to change the control interface from I2C to SPI. This ends in ambiguous system crashes when probing the sensor.

Best regards
Andy

3

Suppose v1/v2 doesn’t matter with the problem.
What’s the trace log for the v1 driver?

4

JP61_SpiDriver_Version1_20250306_Compliance.txt (4.2 KB)
JP61_SpiDriver_Version1_20250306_MediaCtrl.txt (2.8 KB)
JP61_SpiDriver_Version1_20250306_TraceLog.txt (5.1 KB)
Here is the trace log and the output of the compliance test and the media0 ctrl. We made the trace-log with imx174@spi0.1 (/dev/video2)

5

Looks like didn’t receive any validate data.
You may need to probe the MIPI signal to confirm.

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We believe, we found the problem:

SPI controlled IMX174 is working well with our version1 driver with 2 lanes at CSI0_D0/D1/CLK_P/N .

The second sensor at CSI2_D0/D1/CLK_P/N is probably not working, because there might be a problem with our Jetson-Orin-NX module at pin 24 (CSI_2_D0_P). Our FPGA is unable to drive a high level at this pin. When we measure the resistance into this pin against ground the value is 66 ohms. All other CSI-pins ( clk and data ) of the Orin NX modules have values of about 8 kohms. So we might have got a defective module.
By the way: When we measure into the CSI pins of a Xavier-NX module the values are much higher ( 2.5 … 3.5 MOhms )

9

@Andreas.Jock
66 Ohms impedance seems abnormal. Could be issue on FPGA side or the module side. Could try replacing the module if have a spare one. I2C or SPI support is a SW topic.