USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Simonr — Tue, 30 May 2023 09:19:03 GMT

Hi again

Thank you for the update. Not able to see any obvious errors from your main file either, but I have a few more clarifications to make.

You haven't ran this project on a Development Kit at all, correct?

Since you have two slaves on the same bus, that might add some capacitance on the lines, so if the frequency you run on is too high, that might cause trouble. What frequency are you running the SPI on? You can try lowering it to 250 kHz for example to see if that helps at all.

Any chance you have an oscilloscope? If so, it would be helpful to see a scope plot of the SPI lines to see if everything makes sense logically.

We can also do a schematic/PCB layout review of your HW if you'd like to make sure that everything looks to be set up correctly. You can either make a new private case where you upload schematic and .gerber files, or we can make this one private so you can share the files here. Let me know if that's the case and I'll set this case to private.

Best regards,

Simon

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Ash-tink — Fri, 26 May 2023 04:26:17 GMT

Hi Simon,

I have already used this function in my code. Please take a look at this file. I have used the format function "f_mkfsI()" inside the "fatfs_init()" function.

devzone.nordicsemi.com/.../34257143.main.c

Thanks.

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Simonr — Tue, 23 May 2023 13:13:13 GMT

The file system will need to be formatted in order for the device to be able to mount the file system and operate correctly. If it's not already formatted you can use the f_mkfsI() function to format your drive. That function is documented here: http://elm-chan.org/fsw/ff/doc/mkfs.html

Best regards,

Simon

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Ash-tink — Tue, 16 May 2023 11:13:46 GMT

Hi,

The device is connected to the computer using USB port. We are not manipulating the file system when the USB is connected. All we are trying to do is to open the USB drive which is detected on the laptop. But the computer asks us to format the drive. The logs were captured on the RTT terminal.

Thanks & Regards,

Snehal

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Simonr — Mon, 15 May 2023 11:55:57 GMT

Hmm, okay. From the USB MSC example project, the testing "steps" are working as intended for the first 5 or so steps, correct? So your device is connected to the computer using UART and a COM port? Then how do you switch to use the nRF USB peripheral to let the host computer format and open the disk instances? Manipulating the file system will not be possible while the USB is connected, and vice versa.

Best regards,

Simon

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Ash-tink — Wed, 10 May 2023 09:10:31 GMT

Hi Simon,

The pins which we have used are as follows:-

P0.21	SPI_SS_USB
P0.22	SPI_SS
P0.23	SPI_MOSI
P0.24	SPI_MISO
P0.25	SPI_CLK
P0.26	SPI_WP
P0.27	SPI_HOLD
P0.15	SPI_SS_FLSH

In my firmware P0.21 is not configured as we are currently working only on Flash chip.

Thanks.

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Simonr — Wed, 10 May 2023 07:42:53 GMT

Hmm, okay. Can you share what pins you're using for the CS,MISO,MOSI,SCK,WP and HOLD pins in your project? I'm running out of ideas as to what the issue could be I'm afraid.

Best regards,

Simon

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Ash-tink — Tue, 09 May 2023 04:43:26 GMT

Hi Simonr,

Yes I have converted the drivers from QSPI to SPI. I am not using the QSPI drivers. For connection we are using CS,MISO,MOSI,SCK,WP and HOLD pins for connection.

In the hardware we have 2 IC on SPI interface. one is Flash chip and other is MAX3421e. We are controlling both the IC using the chip select pin. Currently in my firmware I have configured only 1 SPI and controlling it via CS pin.

Regards,

Snehal

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Simonr — Mon, 08 May 2023 12:58:47 GMT

I notice that the AT25 does not support QSPI, which is what the USB MSC example is using by default. Have you made changes to the example in order to use normal SPI and not QSPI? If you're trying to enable quad mode on a flash device that doesn't support it that explains why you're not able to mount correctly. Is your flash device connected with one or two data lines in HW on your end?

Best regards,

Simon

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Ash-tink — Fri, 05 May 2023 07:58:48 GMT

Hi Simonr,

The nRF52840 SoC is operated by 3V. We are using AT25DF041B-MAHN-T as external flash drive. The flash drive will support from 1.6V -3.6V range. You can find the details of this flash chip in the below mentioned link.

https://www.digikey.in/en/products/detail/renesas-electronics-operations-services-limited/AT25DF041B-MAHN-T/6827489

Please let me know if this helps or you will still need to check the schematic files.

Thanks.

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Simonr — Thu, 04 May 2023 06:57:11 GMT

Sorry, not the formatting, the Mount failed because the file system can't be found for some reason. What voltage is your custom board running on, and what voltages does the external flash device support? There might be a discrepancy here causing these issues. If you'd like we can do a HW review of your design to make sure that everything looks okay on your custom board as well. If you'd like to, let me know and I'll set this case to private mode so its contents will only be visible to yourself and Nordic engineers as I assume you don't want to share HW files publicly. Then you can upload schematics as a .pdf and layout files as gerber files for us to review.

Best regards,

Simon

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Ash-tink — Tue, 02 May 2023 13:07:30 GMT

On the development kit I have tried testing using the sdk sample code and it works fine with the flash chip on dev kit. I am not sure why it is not working on my custom board. I am accessing the drive only through 1 user.

You said "The formatting still seems to fail for some reason, which could be the workbuffer being incorrect." Where did you see that?? In the logs it does format and creates a new file again.

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Simonr — Tue, 02 May 2023 12:17:27 GMT

The .size should indeed be 524288. I think the workbuffer size and block size should be set in the external flash data sheet. The formatting still seems to fail for some reason, which could be the workbuffer being incorrect. But can you try recreating this on an nRF52840 DK if you have one available?

Worth noting that the MSC example project does not support multiple users accessing the flash device at the same time, this is a limitation in the specification if you're trying to do that.

Best regards,

Simon

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Ash-tink — Tue, 02 May 2023 06:55:38 GMT

I have also added some logs in the usb msc drivers to check for any errors. I have attached the log file here. Can you please help me debugging it?

devzone.nordicsemi.com/.../RTT_2D00_DEBUG1.log

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Ash-tink — Tue, 02 May 2023 06:29:03 GMT

Thanks for your reply. So that means the .size will be set to 524288. Now for setting MSC_WORKBUFFER_SIZE, how can we determine the size of a single block?

If we set the config as follows:-

NRF_BLOCK_DEV_SPI_DEFINE(
m_block_dev_spi,
NRF_BLOCK_DEV_SPI_CONFIG(
512,
NRF_BLOCK_DEV_SPI_FLAG_CACHE_WRITEBACK,
NRF_DRV_SPI_DEFAULT_CONFIG
),
NFR_BLOCK_DEV_INFO_CONFIG("Nordic", "SPI", "1.00")
);

then the block size will be 512??

So MSC_WORKBUFFER_SIZE should be set to 1024 right?

But even after doing these settings I am still not able to access drive through laptop.

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Simonr — Thu, 20 Apr 2023 09:09:58 GMT

Hi Snehal

The .size set by default is for a 64Mbit flash (8 MByte). 1024*1024 = 1 MB, so you can multipy that with how many MB the used flash device is. Since 4Mbit is the same as 0.5 MB, the .size should be set to 0.5 * 1024 *1024, or 512 * 1024 simplified. MSC_WORKBUFFER_SIZE is the buffer that gets actual payload from the USB. This buffer is subdivided into 2 smaller buffers and they should have the size of a single block.

Best regards,

Simon

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Ash-tink — Wed, 19 Apr 2023 03:55:27 GMT

Sorry my SDK is 17.0.2 only. I misread it . what should be the configuration of the flash chip inside this function if my flash is 4Mbit?

The below config is taken from example code.

static const nrf_serial_flash_params_t m_sflash_params[] = {
{ /*MXIC MX25R6435F*/
.read_id = { 0xEF,0x60,0x17 },
.capabilities = 0x00,
.size = 8 * 1024 * 1024,
.erase_size = 2 * 1024,
.program_size = 256,
}
};

And what should be the Block size,MSC_WORKBUFFER_SIZE & format size for 4Mbit flash?

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Simonr — Tue, 18 Apr 2023 06:53:55 GMT

There could be unreported errors, depending on whether you log the callback of each function or not, but it's important here that nRF5 SDK v17.0.0 is not recommended for development. There were some issues with this release, and it's strongly recommended to switch to v17.0.2 or v17.1.0 (stated in the release notes here).

Best regards,

Simon

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Ash-tink — Tue, 18 Apr 2023 03:02:55 GMT

I am using sdk 17.0.0. The main issue is I am not able to see any errors while mounting the File system. Is it possible that the file system mounting does not show any errors but still has some configuration errors??

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Simonr — Mon, 17 Apr 2023 10:52:16 GMT

What SDK and SDK version have you used for development? Are you able to recreate this on a Development Kit? If so we can narrow it down to SW instead of HW at least.

Best regards,

Simon

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Ash-tink — Fri, 14 Apr 2023 09:18:27 GMT

I connect the board using USB C cable. The USB cable is attached to the laptop.

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Simonr — Fri, 14 Apr 2023 06:44:50 GMT

Okay, can you then show me how you connect the custom board to your laptop when you're not able to access the drive?

Best regards,

Simon

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Ash-tink — Thu, 13 Apr 2023 13:31:58 GMT

This is not development kit. It is our custom board but we are using NRF52840 in our board. I don't see any errors while unmounting the device. When I plug in the device, the USB MSC starts, file system is mounted. No errors are seen in the logs.

RE: USB MSC code, windows not able to access drive.

Simonr — Thu, 13 Apr 2023 12:52:06 GMT

[quote user=""]When I plug in the device into my laptop[/quote]

What device is this exactly, is it the nRF52840 DK or an external board of some kind?

What did you do before this, did you just unplug the DK and plug the USB cable into the other USB port on the DK? You need to make sure that the file system is unmounted correctly so it doesn't have to format again when reconnected after a poweroff.

Best regards,

Simon