Programming the nRF52840-DK

[AP040]

I am new to the NRF52840-DK. To burn the program into the kit, I have lots of tries to install nrfGo studio but it gives me the "no board detected readback protection" error. So, I installed nRF Connect v3.0.0 PC tool and add programmer app.

By using this app, I am able to load the program into the board.

Here, my concern is that when I am loading the pre-compiled .hex file given by Nodic, it has included three memory region- MBR or Application, SoftDevice, and Application.

Now, I have made little change in the code and compiled my project which is generated .hex file. When I tried to load this file, it has shown me only the Application region and When I am loading this by doing "Erase and Write" option in the tool it is not working.

There is one option in the tool for only "Write" but it is not enabled.

What should I do here? If we only want to load application image what we do here? Like we have the option in nRFgo studio for selection Application, Boot-loader, and SofDevice.

[Einar Thorsrud]

Hi,

I am new to the NRF52840-DK. To burn the program into the kit, I have lots of tries to install nrfGo studio but it gives me the "no board detected readback protection" error. So, I installed nRF Connect v3.0.0 PC tool and add programmer app.

nRFgo Studio is legacy software that does not support nRF52840. Going with nRF Connect Programmer is the most sense if you want a stand-alone GUI programming interface.

Here, my concern is that when I am loading the pre-compiled .hex file given by Nodic, it has included three memory region- MBR or Application, SoftDevice, and Application.

Now, I have made little change in the code and compiled my project which is generated .hex file. When I tried to load this file, it has shown me only the Application region and When I am loading this by doing "Erase and Write" option in the tool it is not working.

The .hex file generated by your toolchain when you build the application will always only contain the application only (or the bootloader only if you compiled the bootloader project). The reason the example .hex files contain both SoftDevice (including MBR) and application is that the SoftDevice .hex file and application hex files have been merged using the mergehex tool before being shipped. So in this case you have to program both the SoftDevice and application .hex. This can be done in several ways, for example by adding both hex files before programming using the nRF Connect Programmer app.

Now, I have made little change in the code and compiled my project which is generated .hex file. When I tried to load this file, it has shown me only the Application region and When I am loading this by doing "Erase and Write" option in the tool it is not working.

This is expected. The .hex file contains only the application, and the "Erase &write" option will erase all flash in the chip before programming the selected .hex file(s). Since you only have selected the application it is the only thing that will be programmed. This will not work since it depends on the SoftDevice.

There is one option in the tool for only "Write" but it is not enabled.

The "Write" button is enabled if you have read the device flash content and the current content does not overlap with the selected .hex file(s). If they overlap, the only option is to erase before writing.

What should I do here? If we only want to load application image what we do here? Like we have the option in nRFgo studio for selection Application, Boot-loader, and SofDevice.

Fron nRF Connect the only option is to add both the SoftDevice and the application .hex files (either at the same time or program them one after the other, since they do not overlap). Alternatively, you can merge the hex files, but that is just a waste of time in my opinion. A simpler approach is to use the IDE as awneil suggests, or just use nrfjprog on the command line together with the --sectorerase option. This will make the tool erase only the sectors that you are writing to, keeping the SoftDevice pages etc. untouched.

[awneil]

Einar Thorsrud said:

The .hex file generated by your toolchain when you build the application will always only contain the application only

Indeed.

However, when you use SES, it can be configured to also load the SoftDevice when you program the chip.

The is specified as an 'Additional Load File' in the Project configuration.

I think that all of Nordic's SES example projects do this where required ?

[Einar Thorsrud]

awneil said:

I think that all of Nordic's SES example projects do this where required ?

 Yes, that is correct.