nrf_wifi fails : memory allocation failure at boot and crash at config

Question

Using an nrf5340 with nrf7002 wifi, connected via SPI4. Using a shared (chip) antenna, and the COEX signals (pretty much exactly as per the dev board schema).

DTS snippets:

// Wifi nrf7002 : SPI4 using SCK P0.08, MOSI P0.09, MISO P0.10, CS P0.11

// BUCKEN P0.12, IRQ P0.23, COEX_GRANT P0.24, COEX_REQ P0.28, STATUS0 P0.30, STATUS1 P0.29, NRF7002_IOVDD_EN ioexp0/GPB0

nrf_radio_coex: nrf7001-coex {

status = "okay";

compatible = "nordic,nrf700x-coex";

req-gpios = <&gpio0 28 GPIO_ACTIVE_HIGH>;

status0-gpios = <&gpio0 30 GPIO_ACTIVE_HIGH>;

grant-gpios = <&gpio0 24 (GPIO_PULL_DOWN | GPIO_ACTIVE_LOW)>;

swctrl1-gpios = <&gpio0 29 GPIO_ACTIVE_HIGH>;

// btrf-switch-gpios = <&gpio1 10 GPIO_ACTIVE_HIGH>; No, controlled by nrf7002 directly???

};

nordic_wlan0: nordic_wlan0 {

compatible = "nordic,wlan0";

status = "okay";

};

&spi4 { // Wifi nrf7002

status = "okay";

compatible = "nordic,nrf-spim";

pinctrl-0 = <&spi4_default>;

pinctrl-1 = <&spi4_sleep>;

cs-gpios = <&gpio0 11 GPIO_ACTIVE_LOW>; /* P0.11 */

pinctrl-names = "default", "sleep";

nrf700x: nrf7002@0 {

status = "okay";

compatible = "nordic,nrf700x-spi";

reg = <0>;

spi-max-frequency = <33000000>;

// sck-frequency = <24000000>;

/* Wi-Fi Pins used */

iovdd-ctrl-gpios = <&ioexp0 8 GPIO_ACTIVE_HIGH>; // GPB00

bucken-gpios = <&gpio0 12 GPIO_ACTIVE_HIGH>;

host-irq-gpios = <&gpio0 23 GPIO_ACTIVE_HIGH>;

};

I have configured prj.conf to have the wifi STA 'iot' operation, as per the docs:

# WIFI config
CONFIG_WIFI=y
CONFIG_WIFI_NRF700X=y

# WPA supplicant
CONFIG_WPA_SUPP=y
CONFIG_NRF700X_AP_MODE=n
CONFIG_NRF700X_P2P_MODE=n

# Networking layers
CONFIG_NETWORKING=y
CONFIG_NET_SOCKETS=y
CONFIG_NET_LOG=y
CONFIG_NET_IPV4=y
CONFIG_NET_UDP=y
CONFIG_NET_TCP=y
CONFIG_NET_DHCPV4=y

CONFIG_NET_IF_UNICAST_IPV4_ADDR_COUNT=2
CONFIG_NET_MAX_CONTEXTS=1
CONFIG_NET_CONTEXT_SYNC_RECV=y

CONFIG_NET_L2_ETHERNET=y

CONFIG_NET_CONFIG_SETTINGS=y
CONFIG_NET_CONFIG_INIT_TIMEOUT=0

CONFIG_NET_SOCKETS_POLL_MAX=1

# Memory usage
CONFIG_NET_TX_STACK_SIZE=4096
CONFIG_NET_RX_STACK_SIZE=4096

# Optimized networking settings for memory usage (STA MODE IOT DEVICES profile)
# https://docs.nordicsemi.com/bundle/ncs-latest/page/nrf/protocols/wifi/stack_configuration.html
CONFIG_NRF700X_MAX_TX_TOKENS=5
CONFIG_NRF700X_MAX_TX_AGGREGATION=1
CONFIG_NRF700X_RX_NUM_BUFS=6

CONFIG_NET_TC_TX_COUNT=1
CONFIG_NET_PKT_RX_COUNT=6
CONFIG_NET_PKT_TX_COUNT=6

CONFIG_NET_BUF_RX_COUNT=6
CONFIG_NET_BUF_TX_COUNT=12
# can take BUF_DATAT_SIZE down to 500
CONFIG_NET_BUF_DATA_SIZE=800

However, at boot time I see these logs:

[00:00:00.015,686] <inf> wifi_nrf_bus: SPIM spi@a000: freq = 33 MHz
[00:00:00.022,369] <inf> wifi_nrf_bus: SPIM spi@a000: latency = 1
[00:00:01.074,981] <err> wifi_nrf: hal_fw_patch_load: Failed to allocate memory for patch UMAC-bin: chunk 1/6, size: 8192
[00:00:01.086,639] <err> wifi_nrf: nrf_wifi_fmac_fw_load: UMAC patch load failed

[00:00:01.094,818] <err> wifi_nrf: nrf_wifi_fw_load: nrf_wifi_fmac_fw_load failed
[00:00:01.103,027] <err> wifi_nrf: nrf_wifi_fmac_dev_add_zep: nrf_wifi_fw_load failed
[00:00:01.113,891] <err> wifi_nrf: nrf_wifi_if_start_zep: nrf_wifi_fmac_dev_add_zep failed

Note I also have configured malloc to use the system heap, and for it to occupy all remaining RAM:

CONFIG_COMMON_LIBC_MALLOC=y

CONFIG_COMMON_LIBC_MALLOC_ARENA_SIZE=-1

The heap size at boot time is 233576 bytes so no reason for a malloc to fail?

Then when I attempt to initialise the wifi I get this crash

[00:00:13.322,784] <err> os: ***** USAGE FAULT *****
[00:00:13.328,399] <err> os: Unaligned memory access
[00:00:13.334,197] <err> os: r0/a1: 0xa07eeaff r1/a2: 0x00000068 r2/a3: 0x0000005c
[00:00:13.342,834] <err> os: r3/a4: 0x20047130 r12/ip: 0x00000000 r14/lr: 0x00063dc9
[00:00:13.351,440] <err> os: xpsr: 0x61000000
[00:00:13.356,628] <err> os: Faulting instruction address (r15/pc): 0x0009bafe
[00:00:13.364,501] <err> os: >>> ZEPHYR FATAL ERROR 31: Unknown error on CPU 0
[00:00:13.372,375] <err> os: Current thread: 0x20007340 (sysworkq)
[00:00:13.379,180] <err> os: Halting system

in nrf_wifi_osal_mem_zalloc() according to zephyr.map.

This is called somewherr from nrf_wifi_coex_config_non_pta():

/* Configure Coexistence Hardware */

log_info("netwifi: Configuring non-PTA registers. seperate antennas:%s is_sr_protocol_ble: %s",separate_antennas?"YES":"NO", is_sr_protocol_ble?"YES":"NO");

ret = nrf_wifi_coex_config_non_pta(separate_antennas, is_sr_protocol_ble);

if (ret != 0) {

log_warn("netwifi: Configuring non-PTA registers of CoexHardware FAIL");

return false;

}

Note the wifi sample projects (wifi_radio_test, wifi_shell)all run just FINE (with no error logs at boot) so the hardware is apparently good, but I haven't managed to get from them to my full app without this problem occuring...

Any ideas?

nrf_wifi fails : memory allocation failure at boot and crash at config

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