nRF5144 Boot Code Not Executing

[Daniel Blesener]

Hi, thank you for looking at my post.

I am using Keil V5.25.2.0 with a nRF51422. I am using the soft device "s310_nrf51422_1.0.0-2.alpha_softdevice." My memory regions for the boot and app are shown below. Memory regions for the soft devices are defined. The first image shows the boot loader mem regions, and the second shows the main application. 

The optimization of the compiler is at 0, so no code should be skipped.

Our application is working fine and has been in use for a while. The boot code seems to work fine for USB updates and for jumping to the main app.

I am working on OTA updates, to update the radio code itself. 

I have a programmed, production ready radio. When I program the boot code, the module still works fine. But when I program and stay in debugging mode, and I set a break point at the first line in the boot loader code with a debugger, it never reaches it. It is like the soft device is jumping the program counter to the application memory without the boot loaders help. The strange this, is that I can make some modifications in the boot they are noticed. But if I put a while(1){}; at the first line of the main loop in the boot loader, it will not matter. I still jump to the app, and never hit break points. When looking at the disassembly window, it is clear I did make it to the main application. 

I do not understand how or why this could be happening. 

Does anyone have any clues? Thanks for your support,

DB

[Daniel Blesener]

Also, a former employee here who wrote this code noted this when I wrote him:

"Vague memories of all this are coming back. If you are starting with a raw radio you may need to change a register value to ensure that the startup code within the soft device jumps to the correct code.   I don’t recall the exact memory map but the code resides in one space and by default the radio will jump there. The boot code resides elsewhere and a register within the radio needs to be set to get the soft device to jump to the boot code. There is a document with instructions on programming the radio in the factory and this step is included in that document. "

Is this true? Anyone know what he is referring to?

[Vidar Berg]

Hi,

I guess he was referring to the UICR.BOOTLOADERADDR register stored in non-volatile memory (flash). The UICR section is mapped to the 0x10001000 address range, and writes to this section is not supported in Keil's flash algorithm (ignored). Please try to program the bootloader .hex file with nrfjprog instead: http://infocenter.nordicsemi.com/topic/com.nordic.infocenter.sdk5.v11.0.0/bledfu_example_running.html?cp=4_0_10_4_3_1_1_0_1#bledfu_example_running_program

Some links to relevant documentation:

Startup sequence with Softdevice

nrfjprog