Issue booting Orin Nano, help please

Autonomous Machines Jetson & Embedded Systems Jetson Orin Nano
1

I am struggling mightly to get my Orin Nano to boot.

Because the Orin Nano comes with old firmware, I needed to update it.

Based on my boot screen, I’ve determined that the device is running Jetson UEFI 3.0-32616947 (Fig. 1). The boot stalls out without the L4T launcher being located (again, Fig. 1). I initially did this with Jetpack 6.2 flashed to the SD.

IMG_1734
IMG_17341920×1440 124 KB

Following the instructions here, I then flashed the SD card with Jetpack 5.1.3.
However, I get the same boot screen for both 5 seconds and then the display and fan turn off. The instructions mention the possibility of there being no display signal, so I left it overnight attached to ethernet hoping it would update in the background as the instructions suggest. This did not work, the same thing happens when I reboot.

Following other advice, I have been trying serial debugging. I got a pack of Serial to USB converters with the PL2303 chipset. My main computer is a mac, running Sequioa 15.2.

Using minicom I am able to see the chip.
When I boot the Nano, however, I get a series of p’s and ?'s that flash by until it gets stuck and the fan dies again.

The BAUD rate of the Nano should be 115200 and I started there. I’ve tired adjusting the speed with no luck.

I considered the fact that the converters I ordered from Amazon are trash, but I’ve tried all three that I have and none work, included when I flip the order of the connectors on the RXD and TXD pins. That suggests to me the converter is not the issue.

I’ve tried reinstalling the PL2303 driver a couple of times to no effect.

Finally just tried debugging with Jetpack 6.1…more of the same.

Does anyone have insight into what might be going wrong or what I should try next?

Many thanks!

3

Hi,

Please unplug ethernet and using JP 5.1.3 image and check whether the issue exist.

Thanks

4

Yes, it still exists.

5

Ok, I finally made progress. I went back to using the display instead of the TTL cable. I was able to get into the Setup utility. In the boot manager I could see that the SD was not visable. I flashed 5.1.3 to a different SD card (32GB, incidentally) and was able to get going from there. Interestingly, flashing to and booting 6.2 from the original 128GB SD worked fine this time. I’d flashed and validated 5.1.3 to that card multiple times, so I really have no idea what might be going on. But this sort of thing is not my area of expertise; I’m just happy to be up and running.

6

OK I am stuck like you. I was using a 128G SD card I’ll try a different 32G card.

7

tried the 32g card still no luck.
I’ll see if any of the boot options work.
nope it just turns the fan off and the screen black.
looking for suggestions

8

I should have added that I fiddled with various settings in the boot manager. With 5.1.3 on the SD, I played around with changing the boot order and maybe some other settings that I can’t even remember at this point.
Also, I should note that the time it worked surprised me. I powered up and it did the thing with the fan turning off and the screen going black. Out of frustration, I turned to other work and then maybe 5 minutes later, the cursor showed up on the screen and the eventually the os loaded. Wishing you luck!

9

Thanks I’ll try the waiting game. I find this very tedious, I am used to things working much smoother in this area. Then again this is a new platform.

… Phil

10

jon … did you have the system in recovery mode ( jumpers), any network connected . I have a usb dongle and I have tried with the dongle and directly plugged into the b oard.
I’m about to get another linux system fired up to try to use that as a host.
thanks

11

looks like the technique of sitting and waiting and trying power downs and up eventually worked.
Suddenly I got an Updating progress bar and it looks good now.
I suspect some glitch or race condition in one of the early bootloaders.
i’m going to try to get to 6.2 now.

Thanks for the messages

12

Ah, I’m very happy for you! I must have powered up 50 times before finally getting it to work. That’d be funny if changing the boot settings wasn’t even the difference maker in the end.

NB for any future readers: I didn’t have a network connection at the time, nor was I in recovery mode.

13

Looks like I still have to install qspi to allow me to read the 6.2 sd card.
the system would boot off the 6.2 sd card if it is inserted into the sd card slot.

It will fire up the bootloader but not load if the 5.3 sd card is on a usb stick.
If I take out the 5.3 sd card , I still get the low level splash screen but no boot.
So I still have to transfer the image to the on board memory .

IMHO this process needs to be a bit more polished to not deter the new users.

14

the system would NOT boot off the 6.2 sd card if it is inserted into the sd card slot.