iMX Recovery Mode
Introduction
Make sure there is no SD card inserted in the carrier board in order to enter recovery mode properly.
On the SoMs equipped with i.MX SoCs, the shared USB Client/Host port can be used to load Toradex Easy Installer and download a new OS image.
Enter Recovery Mode
Select your computer on module from the tabs below:
Apalis iMX8
Connect the Module to your Development PC
Connect the Carrier Board USB OTG port to your Linux or Windows host machine
Apalis Evaluation Board
Connect X49 or X50 (USBO1_CL/USBO1)
Ixora Carrier Board
Connect to X9 on the underside of the Carrier Board. Be sure to remove JP2 in order to be able to use X9 in OTG Client mode. Be sure nothing is plugged into the lower connector of X8.
Enter recovery mode
Using hardware mechanism
There are 2 different methods to enter recovery mode using hardware mechanisms. While alternative 2 is more generic, it is usually a bit clumsier to execute.
Follow precautions for handling electrostatic sensitive devices (ESD)
Ixora
Make sure the board is turned off.
Connect the 2 pads as shown in the picture
You can use scissors, tweezers, a paper clip or whatever you have at hand to short circuit the pads. You should not make a permanent short-circuit by e.g. soldering the pads together.
- Power on the board and keep the pads connected for more than 6 seconds, only after that, remove the pads.
Other boards
Make sure the board is turned off.
Shorten the pads on the picture.
You can use scissors, tweezers, a paper clip or whatever you have at hand to short circuit the pads. You should not make a permanent short-circuit by e.g. soldering the pads together.
- Power on the board and keep the short circuit for more than 6 seconds, only after that, remove the short circuit.
The short circuit should be held only while the board is turning on
It was reported that on some rare cases with specific combinations of HW, a proper power-cycle (turn the board off and on again) would require that you remove the USB cables due to backfeeding, or even remove the SoM from the carrier board and shorten all its pins. If you cannot enter recovery mode for the second try in a row, consider disconnecting and reconnecting all cables.
Apalis iMX6
Connect the Module to your Development PC
Connect the Carrier Board USB OTG port to your Linux or Windows host machine
Apalis Evaluation Board
Connect X49 or X50 (USBO1_CL/USBO1)
Ixora Carrier Board
Connect to X9 on the underside of the Carrier Board. Be sure to remove JP2 in order to be able to use X9 in OTG Client mode. Be sure nothing is plugged into the lower connector of X8.
Enter recovery mode
Using hardware mechanism
There are 3 different methods to enter recovery mode using hardware mechanisms. While alternative 3 is more generic, it is usually a bit clumsier to execute.
Follow precautions for handling electrostatic sensitive devices (ESD)
Apalis Evaluation Board with Mezzanine
Make sure the board is turned off.
Press and hold the Recovery Mode button (SW2)
- Power on the board while keep pressing the Recovery Mode button for additional 6 seconds.
Ixora
Make sure the board is turned off.
Connect the 2 pads as shown in the picture
You can use scissors, tweezers, a paper clip or whatever you have at hand to short circuit the pads. You should not make a permanent short-circuit by e.g. soldering the pads together.
- Power on the board and keep the pads connected for more than 6 seconds, only after that, remove the pads.
Other Boards
Make sure the board is turned off.
Shorten the pads on the picture.
You can use scissors, tweezers, a paper clip or whatever you have at hand to short circuit the pads. You should not make a permanent short-circuit by e.g. soldering the pads together.
- Power on the board and keep the short circuit for more than 6 seconds, only after that, remove the short circuit.
The short circuit should be held only while the board is turning on
It was reported that on some rare cases with specific combinations of HW, a proper power-cycle (turn the board off and on again) would require that you remove the USB cables due to backfeeding, or even remove the SoM from the carrier board and shorten all its pins. If you cannot enter recovery mode for the second try in a row, consider disconnecting and reconnecting all cables.
Using a command in the bootloader
Connect the serial port UART1 of the carrier board with your host computer.
Apalis Evaluation Board
Depending on JP10/12 connect the serial debug console to the lower X28 using a null modem RS-232 cable or X29 using a regular USB cable.
Ixora Carrier Board
Connect the serial debug console to X22 using a null modem RS-232 cable and a 10 pin IDC to 9 pin D-sub male connector (DTK or Intel standard).
Open a terminal on your host computer (115200 baud, 8 data bits, no parity, one stop, no hardware/software flow control).
Power cycle the board and immediately press [space] on the terminal
If you are using U-Boot you should see the U-Boot banner and the prompt
Apalis iMX6 #, in this case, type on the U-Boot command line:
> bmode usb
- If you are using Eboot you should see a menu, in this case, type 'X' to enter the bootloader console, then on the Eboot command line:
> bootfrom USB
> reboot
Colibri iMX8X
Connect the Module to your Development PC
Connect the Carrier Board USB OTG port to your Linux or Windows host machine
Colibri Evaluation Board
Connect X29 or X30 (USB_CL/USB_OTG)
Iris Carrier Board
Connect X12 micro USB (close to the Ethernet connector)
Aster Carrier Board
Connect a (second) micro USB on X10. Be sure that nothing is plugged at the lower connector of X9.
Make sure that no SD card is in the SD card slot
Enter recovery mode
- Using hardware mechanism
There are 3 different methods to enter recovery mode using hardware mechanisms. While alternative 3 is more generic, it is usually a bit clumsier to execute.
Follow precautions for handling electrostatic sensitive devices (ESD)
Iris Carrier Board
Make sure the board is turned off.
Connect the 2 pads (Pins 1 and 2 from JP1) as shown in the picture
You can use scissors, tweezers, a paper clip or whatever you have at hand to short circuit the pads. You should not make a permanent short-circuit by e.g. soldering the pads together.
- Power on the board and keep the short circuit for more than 6 seconds, only after that, remove the short circuit.
The short circuit should be held only while the board is turning on
Colibri Evaluation Board
- Make sure the board is turned off.
- Press and hold the Recovery Mode button (SW9)
- Power on the board while keep pressing the Recovery Mode button for additional 6 seconds.
Aster Carrier Board and Other Carrier Boards
Make sure the board is turned off.
Shorten the pads on the picture.
You can use scissors, tweezers, a paper clip or whatever you have at hand to short circuit the pads. You should not make a permanent short-circuit by e.g. soldering the pads together.
- Power on the board and keep the short circuit for more than 6 seconds, only after that, remove the short circuit.
The short circuit should be held only while the board is turning on
It was reported that on some rare cases with specific combinations of HW, a proper power-cycle (turn the board off and on again) would require that you remove the USB cables due to backfeeding, or even remove the SoM from the carrier board and shorten all its pins. If you cannot enter recovery mode for the second try in a row, consider disconnecting and reconnecting all cables.
Colibri iMX6
Connect the Module to your Development PC
Connect the Carrier Board USB OTG port to your Linux or Windows host machine
Colibri Evaluation Board
Connect X29 or X30 (USB_CL/USB_OTG)
Iris Carrier Board
Connect X12 micro USB (close to the Ethernet connector)
Aster Carrier Board
Connect a (second) micro USB on X10. Be sure that nothing is plugged at the lower connector of X9.
Make sure that no SD card is in the SD card slot
Enter recovery mode
- Using hardware mechanism
Follow precautions for handling electrostatic sensitive devices (ESD)
Make sure the board is turned off.
Shorten the pads on the picture.
You can use scissors, tweezers, a paper clip or whatever you have at hand to short circuit the pads. You should not make a permanent short-circuit by e.g. soldering the pads together.
- Power on the board and keep the short circuit for more than 6 seconds, only after that, remove the short circuit.
The short circuit should be held only while the board is turning on
It was reported that on some rare cases with specific combinations of HW, a proper power-cycle (turn the board off and on again) would require that you remove the USB cables due to backfeeding, or even remove the SoM from the carrier board and shorten all its pins. If you cannot enter recovery mode for the second try in a row, consider disconnecting and reconnecting all cables.
Using a command in the bootloader
Connect the serial port UART_A of the carrier board with your host computer.
Colibri Evaluation Board
Depending on JP17/19 (and JP20/JP21 if you use a Carrier Board with V3.2 and later) connect the serial debug console to the bottom X25 using a null modem RS-232 cable or X27 using a regular USB cable.
Iris Carrier Board
Connect the serial debug console to X13 using a null modem RS-232 cable and a 10 pin IDC to 9 pin D-sub male connector (DTK or Intel standard).
Open a terminal on your host computer (115200 baud, 8 data bits, no parity, one stop, no hardware/software flow control).
Power cycle the board and immediately press [space] on the terminal
If you are using U-Boot you should see the U-Boot banner and the prompt
Colibri iMX6 #, in this case, type on the U-Boot command line:
> bmode usb
- If you are using Eboot you should see a menu, in this case, type 'X' to enter the bootloader console, then on the Eboot command line:
> bootfrom USB
> reboot
Colibri iMX7
Colibri iMX7 Solo/Dual 256/512MB V1.1A and older are not supported by Toradex Easy Installer.
Colibri iMX7 Dual 1GB V1.1A and newer are using an eMMC flash and are supported by Toradex Easy Installer 1.2, 1.3 and 1.6 or newer.
Toradex Easy Installer 1.4 and 1.5 did now work reliably with these modules.
Connect the Module to your Development PC
Connect the Carrier Board USB OTG port to your Linux or Windows host machine
Colibri Evaluation Board
Connect X29 or X30 (USB_CL/USB_OTG)
Iris Carrier Board
Connect X12 micro USB (close to the Ethernet connector)
Aster Carrier Board
Connect a (second) micro USB on X10. Be sure that nothing is plugged at the lower connector of X9.
Make sure that no SD card is in the SD card slot
Enter recovery mode
There are 3 different methods to enter recovery mode using hardware mechanisms. While alternative 3 is more generic, it is usually a bit clumsier to execute.
Follow precautions for handling electrostatic sensitive devices (ESD)
Iris Carrier Board
Make sure the board is turned off.
Connect the 2 pads (Pins 1 and 2 from JP1) as shown in the picture
You can use scissors, tweezers, a paper clip or whatever you have at hand to short circuit the pads. You should not make a permanent short-circuit by e.g. soldering the pads together.
- Power on the board and keep the pads connected for more than 6 seconds, only after that, remove the pads.
The short circuit should be held only while the board is turning on
Colibri Evaluation Board
- Make sure the board is turned off.
- Press and hold the Recovery Mode button (SW9)
- Power on the board while keep pressing the Recovery Mode button for additional 6 seconds.
Aster Carrier Board and Other Carrier Boards
- Make sure the board is turned off.
- Shorten the pads on the picture.
You can use scissors, tweezers, a paper clip or whatever you have at hand to short circuit the pads. You should not make a permanent short-circuit by e.g. soldering the pads together.
- Power on the board and keep the short circuit for more than 6 seconds, only after that, remove the short circuit.
The short circuit should be held only while the board is turning on
It was reported that on some rare cases with specific combinations of HW, a proper power-cycle (turn the board off and on again) would require that you remove the USB cables due to backfeeding, or even remove the SoM from the carrier board and shorten all its pins. If you cannot enter recovery mode for the second try in a row, consider disconnecting and reconnecting all cables.
Colibri iMX6ULL
Colibri iMX6ULL 512MB Wi-Fi/Bluetooth are only supported by Toradex Easy Installer 1.3 and newer.
Connect the Module to your Development PC
Connect the Carrier Board USB OTG port to your Linux or Windows host machine
Colibri Evaluation Board
Connect X29 or X30 (USB_CL/USB_OTG)
Iris Carrier Board
Connect X12 micro USB (close to the Ethernet connector)
Aster Carrier Board
Connect a (second) micro USB on X10. Be sure that nothing is plugged at the lower connector of X9.
Make sure that no SD card is in the SD card slot
Enter recovery mode
Using hardware mechanism
There are 3 different methods to enter recovery mode using hardware mechanisms. While alternative 3 is more generic, it is usually a bit clumsier to execute.
Follow precautions for handling electrostatic sensitive devices (ESD)
Iris Carrier Board
Make sure the board is turned off.
Connect the 2 pads (Pins 1 and 2 from JP1) as shown in the picture
You can use scissors, tweezers, a paper clip or whatever you have at hand to short circuit the pads. You should not make a permanent short-circuit by e.g. soldering the pads together.
- Power on the board and keep the pads connected for more than 6 seconds, only after that, remove the pads.
The short circuit should be held only while the board is turning on
Colibri Evaluation Board
- Make sure the board is turned off.
- Press and hold the Recovery Mode button (SW9)
- Power on the board while keep pressing the Recovery Mode button for additional 6 seconds.
Aster Carrier Board and Other Carrier Boards
- Make sure the board is turned off.
- Shorten the pads on the picture.
You can use scissors, tweezers, a paper clip or whatever you have at hand to short circuit the pads. You should not make a permanent short-circuit by e.g. soldering the pads together.
- Power on the board and keep the short circuit for more than 6 seconds, only after that, remove the short circuit.
The short circuit should be held only while the board is turning on
It was reported that on some rare cases with specific combinations of HW, a proper power-cycle (turn the board off and on again) would require that you remove the USB cables due to backfeeding, or even remove the SoM from the carrier board and shorten all its pins. If you cannot enter recovery mode for the second try in a row, consider disconnecting and reconnecting all cables.
Using a command in the bootloader
Connect the serial port UART_A of the carrier board with your host computer.
Colibri Evaluation Board
Depending on JP17/19 (and JP20/JP21 if you use a Carrier Board with V3.2 and later) connect the serial debug console to the bottom X25 using a null modem RS-232 cable or X27 using a regular USB cable.
Iris Carrier Board
Connect the serial debug console to X13 using a null modem RS-232 cable and a 10 pin IDC to 9 pin D-sub male connector (DTK or Intel standard).
Open a terminal on your host computer (115200 baud, 8 data bits, no parity, one stop, no hardware/software flow control).
Power cycle the board and immediately press [space] on the terminal
If you are using U-Boot you should see the U-Boot banner and the prompt
Colibri iMX6ULL #, in this case, type on the U-Boot command line:
> bmode usb
Verdin SoM Family
The Verdin Family Specification defines an always compatible recovery mode pin on the edge connector of the SoM. The method for entering recovery mode on all Verdin SoMs is the same.
Connect the Module to your Development PC
Connect the Carrier Board USB OTG port to your Linux or Windows host machine
Verdin Development Board
Connect X34 USB OTG interface, using a USB Type-C cable.
Dahlia Carrier Board
Connect X3 USB OTG interface, using a USB Type-C cable.
Enter recovery mode
- Using hardware mechanism
For the Verdin Computer on Modules, there is just one way to enter Recovery Mode, which is by the dedicated recovery pin (SODIMM pin 246), which needs to be pulled down with ≤1kΩ during the initial power on (cold boot) of the module.
Toradex carrier boards for Verdin come with a dedicated button to manipulate the Recovery Mode mechanism, which is described in detail below for each available model.
Follow precautions for handling electrostatic sensitive devices (ESD)
Dahlia
Make sure the board is turned off. Make sure that the JP3 jumper is opened.
Press and hold the Recovery Mode Button (SW5)
- Power on the board, pressing the ON/OFF Button (SW3) while keep pressing the Recovery Mode button for additional 10 seconds. Only after that, release the Recovery Mode Button (SW5)
Verdin Development Board
Make sure the board is turned off.
Press and Hold the Recovery Mode Button (SW3)
- Power on the board, pressing the ON/OFF Button (SW2) while keep pressing the Recovery Mode button for additional 10 seconds. Only after that, release the Recovery Mode Button (SW3)
Other Boards
Custom-made carrier boards for Verdin SoMs shall expose in its design access to the SODIMM Pin 246 present in the module (showed below, from Dahlia datasheet - 6. Recovery Mode), in a way that, if necessary, this signal can be pulled down with ≤1kΩ during the initial power on (cold boot) of the module.
With that, a process similar to the ones presented previously can be followed:
Make sure the board is turned off.
Pull down SODIMM Pin 246 with ≤1kΩ
Power on the board and keep the pull-down at SODIMM Pin 246 with ≤1kΩ for more than 10. seconds. Only after that, remove the pull-down at SODIMM Pin 246.
There are no available pads on the Verdin SoMs to enter Recovery Mode. SODIMM Pin 246 is the only supported method, so your design may take this into consideration!
It was reported that on some rare cases with specific combinations of HW, a proper power-cycle (turn the board off and on again) would require that you remove the USB cables due to backfeeding, or even remove the SoM from the carrier board and shorten all its pins. If you cannot enter recovery mode for the second try in a row, consider disconnecting and reconnecting all cables.
To check if your Computer on Module has entered recovery mode correctly, you can compare the output of lsusb on your computer before and after entering recovery mode. A new entry will be present if the procedure has been successful.
Flash an Image
After you have entered recovery mode:
- Load Toradex Easy Installer on the computer on module.
- Flash an image to the computer on module.
Legacy
There is another way to flash images to the module: the Legacy flashing method. Check out the articles listed on the See Also section.
Legacy flashing method does not imply that the embedded Linux image is legacy. There are pre-built Toradex images that are provided in both legacy and Toradex Easy Installer formats. Consult the image releases for a list of images in both formats.