BeagleBoardFAQ

This page collects frequently asked questions (FAQ) about TI's ARM based OMAP3 Beagle Board. See "official" BeagleBoard FAQ and eLinux BeagleBoard wiki page, too.

=Board revisions=

Q: What is the difference between BeagleBoard revision B4 and B5?

A: Revision B5 removes capacitor C70 to fix errata #7.

=BeagleBoard alternative distributors=

Q: Are there any alternative distributors to order BeagleBoard from?

A: No, unfortunately not. You have to order from DigiKey.

However, for India there is an exception: The Beagle Board is available for Rs 9,999 /- from Cranes Software. Use [mailto:beaglesales.india@cranessoftware.com beaglesales.india@cranessoftware.com] for contact.

=DigiKey out of stock=

Q: I like to order a BeagleBoard from DigiKey. But they seem to be out of stock?

A: DigiKey is having IT issues in that they can't handle partial shipments against an order, it does not show up in their system. Currently, they are receiving > 200 boards a week from the contract manufacturer. Typically they will only show a QTY of 1 for EVMs and it is not an indication of total quantity they have.

=Shipped hardware=

Q: I like to buy a BeagleBoard from DigiKey, what hardware is included?

A: Only the board itself. To make board as cheap as possible, for most peripherals you need additional adapters.

=Shipped software=

Q: I like to buy a BeagleBoard from DigiKey, what software is included?

A: 2nd stage loader (X-Loader) and bootloader U-Boot in diagnostic version is flashed to Beagle's NAND flash. No further operating system, e.g. Linux, is included.

=Peripherals needed=

Q: As shipped BeagleBoard doesn't contain any peripherals and adapters, what else will I need?

A: There are some adapters necessary to bring up and some are nice to have for diagnosis etc.:


 * IDC10 to DB9M serial adapter (necessary)
 * Serial null modem cable (optional, depends on your serial adapter and your serial PC port)
 * USB serial adapter (optional, depends if your PC has still DB9M serial connector)
 * SD card >= 256MB (necessary, at least for some fun with demos)
 * USB-A to mini USB cable to power BeagleBoard (necessary, or optional if you have additional 5V power supply, see below)
 * 5V, >= 500mA, 2,1mm/5,5mm plug, stabilized power supply (optional)
 * HDMI to DVI-D cable (optional)
 * USB Standard-A to Mini-A Adapter (optional, for USB usage external 5V power supply is necessary)
 * Self power USB hub (optional, and some USB peripherals like keyboard and mouse)

=New board, and now=

Q: Hurray, I got my board. And now?

A: See out of the box page.

=Serial connection #1=

Q: If I power my new board, after some seconds USR1 and USR2 LEDs are switching on, but I can't get anything in terminal program (minicom, kermit, hyperterm etc,).

A: Review wiring of your IDC10 to DB9M serial adapter, try with and without NullModem cable, try to use DB9 serial port of your PC or USB serial adapter. Try all combinations.

BeagleBoard only implements RS-232 signals RX, TX, and GND. These are pins 2, 3, and 5 of BeagleBoard 5x2 header P9 and also the DB9 connector on the serial adapter. To see if there is any activity at all on the serial port, use an RS-232 LED monitor or break-out box or a digital oscilloscope to see if there is a bit stream on TX.

=Serial connection #2=

Q: I tried everything from serial connection #1 above but still nothing. It seems that I sometimes get some random characters, though.

A: If there is a bit stream, check that you have configured your terminal program to:


 * BAUD RATE: 115200
 * DATA: 8 bit
 * PARITY: none
 * STOP: 1bit
 * FLOW CONTROL: none

This will work with most PCs. However, your PC may want to see DSR before it transmits to BeagleBoard and needs to have DTR (pin 4) wrapped back to DSR (pin 6).

=Serial connection #3=

Q: Hurray, I got my new board, I'm quite sure that my serial connection is correct using the above two FAQs. Unfortunately, I get (boot) output, but can't type anything at U-Boot prompt.

A: Try test proposed from John: Here's a useful experiment: disconnect BeagleBoard and jumper TX (DB9 pin 3) to RX (pin 2) at the end of your serial cable. See if your jumper echoes to your terminal emulator. If not, try jumpering DTR (pin 4) to DSR (pin 6) and repeat test. You can also jumper RTS (pin7) to CTS (pin 8) if you don't trust your software to have turned off flow control.

=Serial connection #4=

Q: I tried all three serial FAQs above, and I'm really really sure that anything is fine with my local serial configuration. But I still can't type anything at U-Boot prompt.

A: If you get TX data from the BeagleBoard OK but do not get RX data from your terminal program to BeagleBoard, check P9 pin 2 with a digital 'scope or an LED with 1K series resistor to see if there is any activity there. If there is data and you are really, really sure that everything is correct with your serial connection, then most probably your board suffers from errata #8. Then it's time for the Beagle Hospital. Sorry, you have to replace/repair it using RMA process.

ATTENTION: One user reports that his board showed all symptoms of errata #8 but only when DC powered; when USB powered serial input was fine. It turned out that pin 5 (ground) was miswired.

=Graphics accelerator=

Q: OMAP3530 used on BeagleBoard contains a graphics accelerator (SGX) based on the SGX core from Imagination Technologies. Are Linux drivers available for this? If not, when will they be available? Will they be OpenSource?

A: See Graphics accelerator section at BeagleBoard wiki page.

=USB 2.0 EHCI HS connector=

Q: On my board, USB 2.0 EHCI HS connector (#8) isn't soldered? Why? How can I use USB?

A: At revision A and B boards, USB 2.0 EHCI HS is broken due to HW errata #5. Therefore revision B boards don't have this connector soldered. This will be fixed with revision C boards (expected ~November 2008). You can use full USB functionality using OTG port with something like mini A to USB A adapter and self powered USB hub instead.

=USB OTG connection=

Q: As USB 2.0 EHCI connector doesn't work on BeagleBoards rev A and rev B, I like to use OTG port in host mode. I use a mini to USB A cable but if I connect something, nothing happens?

A: Make sure that
 * your cable is plugged in while kernel boot. At the moment, Linux only detects OTG port in host mode if cable is connected at boot time
 * you use a self powered hub to attach devices. BeagleBoard only support devices <= 100mA, so if you have USB issues try a self powered hub.
 * your mini USB plug is mini-A. Mini-B will not work. See types of USB connectors. Mini-B can be plugged to Beagle, but they don't have ID pin wired to GND. Only mini-A cables connect ID pin to GND. So mini-A with ID pin to GND is necessary.

=X-Loader and U-Boot version=

Q: I use X-Loader and U-Boot shipped with BeagleBoard. These are the versions from code.google.com. Unfortunately, sometimes I have issue xxx with these. Is this known? How to fix this?

A: The X-Loader and U-Boot version at code.google.com are the official TI versions available there for reference. They are known to have some issues. Try the community versions of X-Loader and U-Boot instead.

=Expansion connector #1=

Q: I got my new BeagleBoard Rev. xx board. But expansion connector (#5) isn't soldered. Is this wrong?

A: No, this is correct. All boards are shipped without mounted expansion connector.

=Expansion connector #2=

Q: Which signals are available at expansion connector?

A: See BeagleBoard HW Reference Manual Table 18. Depending on the pin mux you have:


 * MMC2
 * McBSP1
 * McBSP3
 * I2C2
 * McSPI3
 * McSPI4
 * UART2
 * GPIO

=Expansion connector #3=

Q: Should I mount expansion connector at top or bottom side?

A: Do as you like and as it fits your application. This is the reason why it isn't soldered by default

=Expansion connector #4=

Q: How much current can the Beagle supply to peripherals?

A: You are limited to 100mA @ 1.8V. This is referenced in the BeagleBoard HW Reference Manual in section 5.20.

=Sound at git kernel=

Q: I use OMAP git kernel, e.g. by Koen's demo images or I compiled it my own. Using audio or mplayer with audio output kernel crashes with something like

Unable to handle kernel NULL pointer dereference at virtual address 00000000

A: Unfortunately, ALSA sound output with current OMAP git kernel is broken. It is supposed that Beagle ASoC driver is fine, but something in ALSA together with the driver results in above error. So you can't use audio with recent git kernel, used within Koen's demo images, too. Use mplayer with -nosound option or use omapfbplay.

=NEON performance=

Q: There is some rumor that NEON performance is bad due to a OMAP3 hardware bug?

A: The hardware bug will be fixed with OMAP3 silicon revision ES3.0 (not available yet, available with Beagle revision C boards?). There is a software workaround used at BeagleBoard, e.g. with Koen's demo images. The performance impact isn't clear, yet. But the remaining performance is sufficient to play 720p video using omapfbplay at BeagleBoard :-)

=Demo videos=

Q: I'm using Koen's demo image. Which (demo) videos can I use to test (720p) video playback with mplayer or omapfbplay?

Q: Try 720p .avi versions of


 * Big Buck Bunny
 * Elephants Dream

Don't forget to disable sound, though.

Note: Don't forget to extend your kernel's bootargs in U-Boot by

video=omapfb:vram:2M,vram:4M

=Windows/Cygwin #1=

Q: I'd like to do some Linux development for BeagleBoard. But because of ... I can't use Linux as OS on my development PC. I only have a Windows PC.

A: Really consider switching to Linux at your development PC for doing BeagleBoard Linux development. Yes, you can use Cygwin (see below), but most probably this will result in some issues here and there you won't have if you develop under Linux, too. If you can't switch to Linux PC, consider running Linux in a virtual machine under Windows (VMWare etc.).

=Windows/Cygwin #2=

Q: Can I used Windows/Cygwin as a development platform?

A: While most Beaglers use a Linux development platform, it is possible to use Windows. Cygwin is a nice environment, since it gives you Linux commands but runs as a Windows application.

CodeSourcery has a G++ Lite toolchain that runs under Windows. For most Beagle applications the best version is ARM GNU/Linux 2007g3-51. When working with Cygwin, you need to set CYGPATH to the Cygwin "cygpath" program which converts Unix path names to Windows path names. Here is a typical CYGPATH assignment you might put in .bash_profile:

export CYGPATH=c:\\cygwin\\bin\\cygpath

Note: The Sourcery document says

export CYGPATH=c:/cygwin/bin/cygpath

but it seems necessary to change '/' to '\', with '\\' needed to escape the '\' character.

One thing that is more or less impossible to do under Windows is to copy (or better yet, untar) a root file system to an ext2 or ext3 partition of an MMC/SD card. One way to do this is to boot a version of Linux from CD ROM without installing it on the Windows machine. It's slow, but it's a safe way to run Linux. Kubuntu 8.04 has been used successfully to untar a Linux file system to an MMC/SD card with two partitions. Ubuntu 8.04.1 LTS Desktop Edition was not successful because the user could not find a way to access the second MMC/SD partition. Linux CD-ROMs are generally cheap or free.

Once you have successfully built a Linux system that runs on BeagleBoard, you can transfer future files using a FAT32 USB Flash drive or Ethernet.

= MacOS X / x86 =

Q: Can I use MacOS X as a development platform?

A: Yes. Here is a link to the codesourcery toolchain compiled for MacOS X (x86):

http://www.beagleboard.org/uploads/arm-2007q3-macosx-20080828.tar.bz2

This includes gcc, glibc, and gdbserver/gdb for debugging.

To install, untar to somewhere like /usr/local/arm.

Note: so far I've been unable to download/flash x-loader and u-boot, but I suspect that is issues with my USB->UART converter. Hopefully this gets easier when flashing over USB is working.

=TWL4030 data sheet=

Q: Where do I get data sheet for TWL4030 used at BeagleBoard?

A: You probably want to keep nagging your TI contact, the TRM for the part requires a NDA. Note that you will probably be looking at a TPS65950 manual instead (for which there is some documentation out there but the TRM still requires NDA) which is functionally equivalent to the TWL4030.

=Pico Video Projector Kit (PVPK)=

Q: What is this Pico Video Projector Kit (PVPK)?

A: See DLP Pico projector.

=Display timings=

Q: I like to configure some display timings not yet supported in patches from Mans or Steve. How do I calculate the settings needed for BeagleBoard?

A: You can use a tool like CVT Timings Program.

=Display resolutions #1=

Q: Which display resolutions are supported?

A: By recent OMAP git kernel and additional patch, the resolutions in this patch are supported.

Note: Not all of those resolutions actually work as advertised, since the pixel clock is currently limited to 72MHz. It depends on the monitor whether it the slightly lower sync rates this results in will work.

=Display resolutions #2=

Q: I checked the resolutions in patch mentioned above and can't find 1280 x 1024. Why?

A: Pixel clock is currently limited to 72MHz. With this, it isn't possible to configure 1280 x 1024 with at least 50Hz refresh (most monitors need at least 50Hz). This is a software configuration issue, somebody has to optimize kernel display driver.

=Boris=

Q: Who is Boris?

A: You don't know Boris?