NCS DFU Supported External Flash Devices

Question

OS: Windows 
 NCS: 2.2.0 
 We have discovered that we do not have enough internal flash space to support BLE DFU and need to add an external flash to our nRF52833-based design. The nRF52840 DK board has an external flash ( MX25R64) and BLE DFU is shown to work with the bus configured as SPI or QSPI. 
 https://devzone.nordicsemi.com/f/nordic-q-a/82430/ncs-external-flash-ota-change-qspi-to-spi/345238 Our board is very small, so the MX25R64 is simply too physically large, so we are looking at the Gigadevices GD25WD40E/20E. It is tiny at 1.2x1.2mm and supports SPI bus. https://www.mouser.com/datasheet/2/870/gd25wd40e_gd25wd20e_datasheet_rev1_1_20221019-3081635.pdf 
 We have no way of verifying this device without doing another version of the board. That is a big risk. 1. Is there a specific memory layout of the flash for NCS DFU to work? For example, the Gigadevices part's memory layout looks like: 
 2. Is there a specific list of SPI/QSPI flash devices that work with NCS DFU?

Kenneth · Accepted Answer

I think getting a breakout board as suggested is a good option to debug/verify this works. The breakout board can be done with a different package type. 
 That said, I do believe you should be able to make this work. The spi_nor driver is pretty generic. 
 In terms of how to switch between internal flash, spi flash and qspi flash you can find the driver test for the flash module useful: https://github.com/nrfconnect/sdk-zephyr/tree/main/tests/drivers/flash 
 In your case that want to use spi you can find these two files relevant: boards/nrf52840dk_flash_spi.conf boards/nrf52840dk_mx25r_high_perf.overlay 
 By modifying the .overlay file you should hopefully relatively quickly find configuration that works. 
 Edit, here are the properties that can be set: https://github.com/nrfconnect/sdk-zephyr/blob/main/dts/bindings/mtd/jedec%2Cspi-nor.yaml https://github.com/nrfconnect/sdk-zephyr/blob/main/dts/bindings/mtd/jedec%2Cspi-nor-common.yaml 
 "Properties supporting Zephyr spi-nor flash driver (over the Zephyr SPI API) control of serial flash memories using the standard M25P80-based command set." 
 Kenneth

Bryan · Answer

The missing items were: In child_image/mcuboot/boards/o1-agg-nrf52833.conf CONFIG_SPI_NOR_FLASH_LAYOUT_PAGE_SIZE=4096 CONFIG_SPI_NRFX_RAM_BUFFER_SIZE=32 CONFIG_LOG=y CONFIG_LOG_MODE_MINIMAL=y CONFIG_PM_OVERRIDE_EXTERNAL_DRIVER_CHECK=y In prj.conf CONFIG_SPI_NOR_FLASH_LAYOUT_PAGE_SIZE=4096 CONFIG_SPI_NRFX_RAM_BUFFER_SIZE=32 CONFIG_PM_OVERRIDE_EXTERNAL_DRIVER_CHECK=y Explicitly setting the flash layout page size fixed it. 
 PS C:\Virtuix
ordic\myapps\hello_world_dfu_833DK_ext_flash\build> west build -t partition_manager_report -- west build: running target partition_manager_report [1/1] cmd.exe /C "cd /D C:\Virtuix
ordic\myapps\hello_world_.../myapps/hello_world_dfu_833DK_ext_flash/build/partitions.yml" external_flash (0x100000 - 1024kB): +-------------------------------------------+ | 0x0: mcuboot_secondary (0x71000 - 452kB) | | 0x71000: external_flash (0x8f000 - 572kB) | +-------------------------------------------+ 
 flash_primary (0x80000 - 512kB): +-------------------------------------------------+ | 0x0: mcuboot (0xf000 - 60kB) | +---0xf000: mcuboot_primary (0x71000 - 452kB)-----+ | 0xf000: mcuboot_pad (0x200 - 512B) | +---0xf200: mcuboot_primary_app (0x70e00 - 451kB)-+ | 0xf200: app (0x70e00 - 451kB) | +-------------------------------------------------+ 
 sram_primary (0x20000 - 128kB): +--------------------------------------------+ | 0x20000000: sram_primary (0x20000 - 128kB) | +--------------------------------------------+ 
 PS C:\Virtuix
ordic\myapps\hello_world_dfu_833DK_ext_flash\build> Kenneth - Thanks for all the help! Nordic's next dev academy should be DFU! I have attached the working project. 8551.hello_world_dfu_833DK_ext_flash.zip

NCS DFU Supported External Flash Devices

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