Verdin IMX8MP with IVY Plus - Running the CM7 MCU application

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Hello, and thank you for your question!

To run a HelloWorld.bin on the Verdin iMX8M Plus M7 core and set up communication (GPIO, UART, SPI, and message exchange) between the Cortex-M7 and A53 cores, here’s a step-by-step path:

1. Download and Prepare the MCUXpresso SDK

  • Get the MCUXpresso SDK for your exact module variant:

  • Set up the GCC AArch32 bare-metal toolchain (recommended: arm-none-eabi).

2. Device Tree Configuration

Yes, device tree configuration is required!

  • You must reserve memory for the M7 and setup RPMsg communication.
  • Apply the official overlay: verdin-imx8mm_hmp_overlay.dtbo
  • Make sure the imx rpmsg driver is registered:
    dmesg | grep -i rpmsg
[    0.045742] imx rpmsg driver is registered.

More on overlays: Device Tree Overlay for M7/A53 Communication

3. Build Hello World for M7

  • In your MCUXpresso SDK, locate:

    ./boards/evkmimx8mp/demo_apps/hello_world/armgcc

  • Build:

    export ARMGCC_DIR=<PATH_TO_GCC_TOOLCHAIN>/<GCC_TOOLCHAIN_FOLDER>
cd ./boards/evkmimx8mp/demo_apps/hello_world/armgcc
./build_debug.sh

  • Copy the binary to your board (e.g., via scp):

    scp debug/hello_world.bin root@<board-ip>:/home/root

4. Load & Run Firmware on M7

  • In the U-Boot terminal, set up environment variables:
    setenv load_cmd "ext4load mmc 0:2"
setenv cm_image "/home/root/hello_world.bin"
setenv cm_image_size 20000
setenv load_cm_image "${load_cmd} ${loadaddr} ${cm_image}"
setenv cm_boot "${load_cm_image}; cp.b ${loadaddr} 0x7e0000 ${cm_image_size}; dcache flush; bootaux 0x7e0000"
saveenv
  • To start the firmware:
    run cm_boot

Full steps: Freertos on iMX8MP M7 - Case Oriented Examples

5. A53 ↔ M7 Message Exchange (RPMsg)

  • Use the RPMsg examples in the SDK to establish communication:

    ./boards/evkmimx8mp/multicore_examples/rpmsg_lite_str_echo_rtos

  • On Linux, load the TTY kernel module:

    sudo modprobe imx_rpmsg_tty
ls /dev/ | grep -i rpmsg

    You should see: ttyRPMSG30

    Use this for message exchange:

    echo Toradex! > /dev/ttyRPMSG30

Reference: How to Establish Shared Memory Communication

6. Peripheral Support (GPIO, UART, SPI)

  • For GPIO: You may need a custom device tree overlay to reassign certain pins as GPIO (for pins with default I2C/SPI roles).

  • The MCUXpresso SDK contains example apps for GPIO, UART, and SPI under:

    boards/evkmimx8mp/driver_examples

    Use those as templates for your code running on the M7.

Summary Workflow:

  1. Download and build MCUXpresso SDK examples (Hello World, RPMsg, peripheral demos).
  2. Deploy your binaries to the board.
  3. Configure and apply proper overlays for memory and pinmuxing.
  4. Use U-Boot commands to run your M7 firmware.
  5. Set up RPMsg for inter-core messages.
  6. Develop your peripheral application based on SDK examples.

Feel free to ask if you need clarification on a specific part of the process or further details!

Best regards,
Toradex AI Assistant