Base Firmware files and installation

This sections shows how to install all base firmware components for the HiKey960. Once finished with these instructions, please continue to the HiKey960 documentation landing page to flash an operating system.

• Step 1: Material and Preperations
• Step 2: Dependencies
• Step 3: Enter recovery/forced-download mode on HiKey960
• Step 4: Flash Base Firmware
• Step 5: Explore other modes, proceed to OS installation
• Troubleshooting

Step 1: Materials and Preperations

Materials

• HiKey960
• USB Type-A (Host machine) to USB Type-C (96Boards) cable
• 96Boards compliant power supply

Preperations

There are two versions of HiKey960: v1 and v2. One important difference you should know is: v1 is using Jumper (J2001), while v2 is using DIP switch (SW2201). Both are located in the bottom side of board.

**Both version of switches are located on the bottom of the board.

• To boot into fastboot mode everytime set switch 1 & 3 to ON state and switch 2 to OFF state.
• To boot into fastboot mode at every alternate rebooot set switch 1 to ON and switch 2 & 3 to OFF state.
• To boot into recovery mode set switch 1 & 2 to ON state and switch 3 to OFF state

Step 2: Dependencies

Host Linux Machine

• Remove modemmanager. At least in Ubuntu 14.04 and 16.04 verions, we found a conflicting issue if modemmanager is installed and active. Modemmanager monitors ttyUSBx's incoming data, when it reads some given pattern, it will send some bytes back into the tty as response. And those bytes sent by modemmanager can make board side recovery flashing tool confuse and fail. Solution is to uninstall this service. If you have a doubt whether you are safe to remove it or not, double confirm here: ModemManager homepage.

$ sudo dpkg -s modemmanager
$ sudo apt-get remove modemmanager

• Android SDK “Platform-Tools” for Linux can be downloaded here
• Use terminal to clone this repository into desired folder and cd into tools-images-hikey960

$ git clone https://github.com/96boards-hikey/tools-images-hikey960
$ cd tools-images-hikey960

Step 3: Enter recovery/forced-download mode on HiKey960:

• Remove power from the board
• Change Jumper/DIP switch settings, to enter recovery/forced-download mode:

• Apply power to the board using 96Boards compliant power supply
• Insert USB Type-C cable (OTG port) to the board, and connect the other end to your Linux PC
• Check whether there is a device node "/dev/ttyUSBx". If there is, it means your PC has detected the target board; If there is not, try to repeat previous steps.

Step 4: Flash base firmware

Once again using the terminal on your host machine, execute the following command. Be sure to replace /dev/ttyUSBx with the USB value detected by your machine.

$ sudo ./recovery-flash.sh /dev/ttyUSBx

After it completes, the base firmware will be flashed to the device, this does not mean OS.

The board will then be in fastboot mode.

Step 5: Explore other modes, proceed to OS installation

• Remove power from the board
• Proceed to OS "Installation" through the HiKey960 documentation landing page

Troubleshooting

• If recovery script "./recovery-flash.sh /dev/ttyUSBx" fail to run to completion and you see "< waiting for any device >" in a loop, then try uninstalling modemmanager from your host machine. The script will work after that. Don't forget to install modemmanager back after recovery.
• If you run into trouble, see the README-technical.md file in this directory.