Troubles with flashing Jetson TX2

Robotics & Edge Computing Jetson & Embedded Systems Jetson TX2
1

Hello everyone, I have been trying for three days now to flash my Jetson TX2 from a host PC with absolutely no luck. I am looking for any advice as to what I could do to fix either of the situations I am trying.

My host PC is a laptop running Ubuntu 18.04. I know this version is not officially supported but it seems from the forums many have gotten it to work with their host system. Below I will detail the two methods I have tried so far:

Method 1: Flashing from 18.04 Host

  • Download Jetpack 3.3 from the Nvidia Developers site
  • Navigate to desired JetPack directory
  • chmod +x /JetPack-L4T-3.3-linux-x64_b39.run --confirm
  • Run the commands listed in the solution here: https://devtalk.nvidia.com/default/topic/1033194/jetson-tx2/installing-jetpack-3-2-on-ubuntu-18-04/post/5259553/#5259553
  • Run the jetpack Installer

    • At this point, the installation runs until it gets to installing OpenCV then I am met with the errors that this user experiences: https://devtalk.nvidia.com/default/topic/1031386/jetson-tx2/error-installing-opencv-in-jetpack-3-2-on-host-ubuntu-16-04-pc-/. I go through the solution listed there as well. I have absolutely purged every file and directory with the name “OpenCV” in it from my system and yet I am still met with dependency issues and can not proceed. I do not understand why I can not install Opencv if I have no current installation?

    Method 2: Flashing from 14.04 VM

  • I know VM's are also not officially supported but it seems like people have had success
  • Set up VirtualBox with 14.04 allowing for USB access of Nvidia Device
  • Attempt to flash firmware either using JetPack or Command Line
  • In both situations the flash process gets stuck at "Boot Rom Not Loading"

    • Any help at all is appreciated. I can not for the life of me figure out why the solution for 18.04 that others report working are not.

    2

    Hi Jadin.Tredup,

    Our suggestion is to use Ubuntu 16.04, also the VM is not supported, may other developers could share their experience to help you.

    Cheers

    3

    Hi Kayccc,

    I have read somewhere that it is possible to flash the Jetson via SD card but I haven’t been able to find clear documentation on it. Do you happen to know if any is available?

    4

    “flashing” from an SD card isn’t possible. On the other hand, if the system is sufficiently intact to boot from a rescue SD card, and if the SD card contains everything needed, then “dd” can fake flash. There are a lot of “gotchas” doing that. One of the “gotchas” is that there are many more partitions than just the rootfs, and that those have to be the same version of L4T as the rootfs was designed for. If you are upgrading to a newer release this implies you’d probably need get those partitions from another TX2 with the newer version.