NRF_ERROR_STORAGE_FULL after an OTA DFU

[Vankata]

Hi

I am writing the firmware of a wearable device, based on nRF52832, which must support OTA DFU. I am using the peer_manager to manage paring and bonding, and the FDS library to access a relatively large amount of the free program flash (~120KB) as a non-volatile user storage space. Four parts – Bootloader, SoftDevice, Application, and the Settings table for the Booloader are merged into a single, combined HEX file for programing the device. During the development, I am testing on a nRF52DK Development Kit.

I see that the pm_manager uses the FDS and at least two pages are needed by the system. Also, having in mind the needed user flash data space I have specified FDS_VIRTUAL_PAGES to be equal to 33.

When the nRF52832 chip is programmed either from the IDE or by just drag-and-dropping the .HEX file to the virtual storage device of the nRF52DK board, the firmware runs fine. If I initiate OTA DFU and I reprogram the device with the same App-part of the firmware, the pm_init() in the initialisation phase returns an error – NRF_ERROR_STORAGE_FULL and the device restarts due to the subsequent APP_ERROR_CHECK line in the code.

I am aware of this post https://devzone.nordicsemi.com/f/nordic-q-a/61409/nrf_error_storage_full-after-dfu-update but it does not help me. In my case NRF_DFU_APP_DATA_AREA_SIZE is set to 12288, which should be sufficient for the FDS module to get initialised, shouldn't it? Erasing the flash pages, allocated to FDS followed by a NVIC_SystemReset() would be an option, but how can this be performed if the FDS is not initialised? 

Am I missing something? Why is that error generated? How can I get over this issue?

Regards,

Vankata

[ovrebekk]

Hi Vankata

The NRF_DFU_APP_DATA_AREA_SIZE define has to be set according to how much flash you have assigned to FDS. You mention that this is ~120kB, which is obviously a lot more than 12288. 

Are you able to update this and see if it works better?

This will greatly reduce the amount of flash available for the DFU operation, so you will most likely need to go for single banked DFU rather than dual bank. 

Best regards
Torbjørn