boundarydevices / imx_usb_loader

USB & UART loader for i.MX5/6/7/8 series

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mprt opened this issue · comments

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Hi,

In case anyone is wondering what the state of this tool is and what the differences regarding NXP's own UUU tool are:
https://boundarydevices.com/recovering-i-mx-platforms-using-uuu/

The Blog post is from 2020.
Here are the important parts in case the link breaks:

This blog post will introduce the Universal Update Utility (UUU) from NXP.

Introduction

For many years, Freescale provided MFGTools / sb_loader binaries in order to flash empty devices leveraging the USB recovery feature of the i.MX family.

However these tools were only meant for Windows Host. Therefore Boundary Devices decided, back in 2010, to develop its own Linux-based tool called imx-usb-loader.

This latter has been used by many for years, maintained by us with the help of the community.

But in 2018, NXP decided to unify their tools, creating a new one from scratch called UUU.

Let’s see the benefits of using that new tool and how it compares to ours.
UUU Advantages

First of all, UUU provides the same features as imx-usb-loader:

  • Loading bootloader / recovering devices over USB recovery (SDP) protocol
  • Loading any binary in RAM over USB for flashing purposes

But it also includes some new features:

  • Advanced scripting supported to flash any media
  • Fastboot protocol support in both U-Boot and OS (with imx-uuc)

Note that this blog post will focus on the recovery process part, flashing will be covered in another blog post.

We also see the following advantages in using it:

  • Tool maintained by NXP
    • Already supports next generation SoC
  • Tool works the same on Linux and Windows
    • MAC OS should work too, hasn’t been tested
  • Aligning our flashing procedure with NXP
    • Easier for customers
  • Still an open-source project
    • NXP accepts community contributions

What about imx-usb-loader?

As of this writing, Boundary Devices will no longer actively maintain imx-usb-loader.

We will now be focusing on using and contributing to UUU.

That being said, if the community still sees a need for imx-usb-loader, we will still accept pull-requests.