This note explains how to set up the i.MX 6ULL SOM Starter Kit hardware.

As shipped by Emcraft, the kit includes the following hardware components:

1. i.MX 6ULL SOM module;
2. Development baseboard (IMX6ULL-SOM-BSB);
3. LCD add-on board with LCD panel (4.3" 480x272 LCD with capacitive touchscreen);
4. Mini-USB Y-cable for USB-based power and serial console.

The Starter Kit provides the following hardware components and interfaces:

To power the kit up, simply connect it to a PC / notebook by plugging a mini-USB cable into the P5 mini-USB connector on the IMX6ULL-SOM-BSB baseboard. As soon as the connection to the PC has been made, the LED DS3 should lit up, indicating that the board is up and running.

Please note that although for most use case scenarios the power provided by the mini-USB Y-cable (1A) is sufficient to run the kit, theoretically for some very extensive use case scenarios additional power may be required. For such use case scenarios, please apply the 5V wall power to the kit by plugging a power cable (not included in the kit) into the dedicated power connector on the development baseboard.

On the PC host side, the U-Boot/Linux console is available via the P5 UART/USB connector. The software installed on the i.MX 6ULL SOM configures the serial console for a 115.2 Kbs terminal.

On some Linux distributions, connecting to the UART/USB device causes the Modem Manager package to try opening the TTY device and sending modem commands to it, thus occupying the port. To avoid this effect, the ModemManager package must be disabled on the host with the following command:

$ sudo mv /usr/share/dbus-1/system-services/org.freedesktop.ModemManager.service
/usr/share/dbus-1/system-services/org.freedesktop.ModemManager.service.disabled

On the Linux host, the dmesg command can be used to figure out the TTY devices corresponding to the two serial consoles:

$ dmesg | tail
[495846.154337] cp210x 1-5.1.5:1.0: cp210x converter detected
[495846.216898] usb 1-5.1.5: reset full-speed USB device number 8 using ehci-pci
[495846.292179] usb 1-5.1.5: cp210x converter now attached to ttyUSB0

The U-Boot/Linux serial console is available on this USB TTY device. For example:

$ picocom –l /dev/ttyUSB0 –b 115200

To provide network connectivity to the board, connect it into your LAN by plugging a standard Ethernet cable into the lower slot of the dual-port Ethernet connector. The board is pre-configured with an IP address of 192.168.0.2.

Note: The kit does not include any JTAG tools or associated hardware items. The i.MX 6ULL SOM comes preloaded with the U-Boot firmware. U-Boot supports loading Linux images from TFTP or Flash providing a sufficient development and deployment environment for the Linux OS. Should you require updating the U-Boot firmware itself, it is possible with a self-upgrade capability. The implication of the above is that you do not really need JTAG tools unless you intend to use an RTOS other than Linux or have installed a faulty U-Boot image to the i.MX 6ULL SOM. If for some reason you require JTAG tools, you will have to obtain any such equipment and associated software separately, directly from respective vendors.