U-Boot for DS214

Hi everyone,

As some may know, I recently tinkered on the Synology DS216 and managed to get Debian up and running on it. I also own a Synology DS214 but I didn't do much on it until now as i was unable to get the UART interface to work, until I got it to...

UART TTL

Someone already got Debian to run on the DS214 here and properly described the UART interface pinout. It happens to be similar to the DS216 UART pinout.
However, in my unit, following those instructions led to nothing. Indeed, it happens that my DS214 won't boot if TX or RX is plugged in the header before powering on the unit.
This is a very strange behavior and it's truly annoying .
I was about to give up on this box when I discovered this, and then I found a note about it in the DS214 DTS...
I think that the DS214 Debian install guide post should be edited, as someone obviously wants to get a working serial console before digging into the DTS.

U-BOOT

With that said, let's dive to the core of the subject: u-boot.
As described here, the stock u-boot is terrible and being unable to saveenv is just infuriating. I also think that compiling the stock u-boot from source each time I want to make persistent edits to the environment isn't a great solution at all.
So here I am, tossing a bottle into the sea in the hope that someone could help me compile a mainline u-boot for this box.

I think I gathered many useful logs I attached to this post. Sadly the stock u-boot GPL tarball seems no longer available...

DDR

Unlike what has been said before, this unit isn't hard to tear down at all once you know what to do. The enclosure is exactly the same on the DS216 and probably other Synology hot swap boxes, so I may post a guide about this later.

My unit has two Samsung K4B2G1646Q-BCK0 RAM chips soldered on board (I found exactly the same two chips on my DS216 unit).
Those are 256MB DDR3 1600Mhz capable chips, but as the attached stock bootlog shows, those are run at 1066Mhz in the DS214 even though the MV78230 SoC is 1600Mhz capable.

Thanks for your help,
Robin.



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 04/15/2024 08:11AM by Robin.

Robin Wrote:
> Those are 256MB DDR3 1600Mhz capable chips, but as
> the attached stock bootlog shows, those are run at
> 1066Mhz in the DS214 even though the MV78230 SoC
> is 1600Mhz capable.
>
The MV78230 SoC has 4 speed ratings (1066 Mhz, 1200 Mhz, 1333 Mhz, and 1600 Mhz). The rating used in the DS214 is 1066 Mhz, while that used in the DS214+, DS414 and RS814 is 1333 Mhz.

Ray

@ Robin,

I think you might be able to boot with the DS414 u-boot. I will build this and post for you to try kwboot.

-bodhi
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The DS414 has 1GB vs this box has 512MB RAM. It's worth a try to see if you can kwboot it on DS214. Even if it starts and hangs, it would be a significant test.

I need to look for where the RAM is defined in this u-boot (the implementation is a bit old).

uboot.2024.07-rc2-tld-1.ds414.kwb

md5: 
828261b75f69e3fcff2e6176f2d97dc3  uboot.2024.07-rc2-tld-1.ds414.kwb
sha256:
d2df885f6243360ae011a1847c5afa14e2185023295fea0b454790476f7de11b

-bodhi
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