Overview

This is the Linux BSP (Board Support Package) for the NXP i.MX RT1170 EVK/EVKB board.

The BSP provides a software development environment for evaluation and development of Linux (uClinux) on the Cortex-M7 processor core of the i.MX RT1170 microcontroller using the NXP i.MX RT1170 EVK board as a hardware platform.

Supported Features

The following list provides a summary of the features and capabilities of this release of the NXP i.MX RT1170 EVK BSP:

• Linux:
  • Kernel v.6.1.22;
  • Serial Linux console;
  • Ethernet device driver and Linux TCP/IP networking (ping, NFS, Telnet, FTP, NTPD, etc);
  • Clock driver;
  • pinctrl driver;
  • MMC/SD driver;
  • I2C driver;
  • USB High Speed driver (Host and Gadget modes);
  • (PAID ADD-ON) QSPI Flash driver;
  • (PAID ADD-ON) ADC driver;
  • (PAID ADD-ON) CAN bus driver;
  • (PAID ADD-ON) SPI bus driver;
  • busybox v1.35.0;
  • POSIX pthreads;
  • Hardened exception handling; an exception triggered by a process affects only the offending process;
  • MPU user-level protection support;
  • GPIO device driver.
• U-Boot firmware:
  • U-Boot v 2023.04;
  • Target initialization from power-on / reset;
  • Serial console;
  • Ethernet driver for loading images to the target;
  • Clock driver;
  • pinctrl driver;
  • Device driver for MMC/SD Card;
  • USB driver;
  • Autoboot feature, allowing boot of OS images from the SD Card;
  • Persistent environment in the SD Card for customization of target operation;
  • Sophisticated command interface for maintenance and development of the target.
• Development tools:
  • Linux-hosted cross-development environment;
  • 11.3.0 GNU toolchain is used for development of user-space applications;
  • ELF / dynamic linking supported;
  • Hardware FPU enabled in the toolchain and kernel;
  • mkimage tool used by the Linux kernel build process to create a bootable Linux image.

New and Changed Features

The following is a summary of the changes in Release 3.0.4, as compared to Release 3.0.3:

1. Support MIMXRT1170-EVKB board with Emcraft BSP.
   ID: RM 6829.
2. Support LPSPI and LPSPI Flash on i.MX RT1170 EVK.
   ID: RM 6911.
3. Support I2C in Linux on imxrt1170.
   ID: RM 6923.
4. Fix defect: When re-configuring kernel options by manually editing a project's defconfig, new options are not applied if the .config has already been created.
   ID: RM 6917.

Known Problems & Limitations

This section lists known problems and limitations of this release:

1. dropbear crashes after exiting from the ssh session to rt1024.
   ID: RM 6769
   Workaround: Restart dropbear by performing the dropbear -R command on the target.
2. gcc 11.3: gdbserver crashes when attempting to start remote debugging.
   ID: RM 6821.
   Workaround: None.
3. IMXRT1170: USB gadget function can be broken in OTG mode if insert a USB flash to the OTG connector.
   ID: RM 6804.
   Workaround: None.
4. SPI Flash is not supported on imxrt1170-evkb.
   ID: RM 6930.
   Workaround: None.
5. QSPI flash in U-Boot does not work on imxrt1170-evkb board from 3.0.4 IMXRT1170 BSP.
   ID: RM 6931.
   Workaround: None.