NAND Driver Sample Application

Description

The NAND Driver sample application demonstrates external SPI-NAND flash operations and data validation on the supported boards for this application. It performs NAND initialization, device identification, erase/program/read validation, randomizer verification, page and multi-page access tests, and throughput measurement to help confirm reliable NAND functionality.

The sample includes multiple NAND validation flows:

  • Flash initialization: Bring up the NAND flash interface and verify driver initialization.

  • Device identification: Read the NAND device ID to confirm flash detection.

  • Basic read/write/erase test: Erase a test region, write known data, read it back, and validate the result.

  • Page and multi-page read tests: Exercise page-based APIs, including page + OOB access and multi-page reads.

  • Randomizer test: Write and read back randomized page data to validate the NAND randomizer path.

  • Throughput test: Measure NAND read/write throughput using the configured test buffer.

During each run, the app logs initialization status, NAND test progress, validation results, and final pass/fail status. This makes it easy for end users to confirm that NAND setup and flash operations are working as expected.

The latest example structure uses a common application source tree with board-specific hardware setup kept under hw/<BOARD>/. For this app:

  • Common application sources such as main.c, nand_sample_app.c, and nand_sample_app.h stay in the app root.

  • Application defconfigs are stored under configs/.

  • Board and hardware-specific setup is selected from hw/<BOARD>/, for example hw/SL2610_RDK/.

The application can also be exported and built as a standalone app repository. In that flow, keep this app in its own directory, point SRSDK_DIR to the SDK root, and build from the app directory itself. For the full application workflow model, see Astra MCU SDK User Guide.

Supported Boards

This application supports:

  • SL2610_RDK

Select the defconfig that matches your target board, and the build system will pick the corresponding board-specific hardware setup from hw/<BOARD>/.

Prerequisites

Test Case Selection

Before building, select the defconfig and NAND test mode that match your target setup.

You can:

  • Select the required defconfig directly from the application’s configs/ directory.

  • Run make list_defconfigs from the application directory to list supported defconfigs.

Available defconfigs:

  • sl2610_rdk_cm52_nand_sample_app_defconfig

The NAND test flow is controlled from the application’s Kconfig menu. The available top-level test selections are:

  • APP_NAND_BASIC_TEST

  • APP_NAND_MULTI_REW_TEST

  • APP_NAND_READ_RANDMIZER_TEST

  • APP_NAND_THROUGHPUT_TEST

When APP_NAND_BASIC_TEST is selected, the app also enables:

  • APP_NAND_BASIC_REW_TEST

  • APP_NAND_READ_TEST

You can adjust related NAND parameters such as test block/page selection, page size, pages per block, and throughput buffer size through the same app configuration flow.

Logger Interface Configuration

The provided NAND defconfig enables the UART0 logger:

  • CONFIG_LOGGER_IF_UART_0=y

Observe logs on the UART0 console unless you intentionally change the logger configuration.

Connections

UART0 logging wiring (UART bridge)

REV-A

Connect UART bridge:

  • UART TX -> G8

  • UART RX -> G28

  • GND -> G6

REV-B

Connect UART bridge:

  • UART TX -> G8

  • UART RX -> G10

  • GND -> G6

Building and Flashing the Example using VS Code

Use the VS Code flow described in the respective platform guide and the VS Code Extension guide:

Build (VS Code):

  1. Open Build and Deploy -> Build Configurations.

  2. Select the nand_sample_app project configuration in the Project Configuration dropdown.

  3. Select sl2610_rdk_cm52_nand_sample_app_defconfig.

  4. If you need a different NAND test mode, update the application configuration before building.

  5. Build with Build (SDK+Project) for the first build, or Build (Project) for rebuilds.

Flash (VS Code):

  1. Use the SL2610 image-generation flow to generate the required sub-image.

  2. Open Image Flashing (SL2610).

  3. Select Flash Target as M52 Image.

  4. In Image Path, browse to and select the generated sub-image file, such as sysmgr.subimg.gz.

  5. Start the flashing operation to program the image to the target.

Building and Flashing the Example using CLI

Use the CLI flow described in the respective platform guide:

Build (CLI):

  1. Build from the application directory itself:

    cd <sdk-root>/examples/driver_examples/nand_sample_app
export SRSDK_DIR=<sdk-root>
make sl2610_rdk_cm52_nand_sample_app_defconfig BUILD=SRSDK

  2. If you need to change the NAND test selection or related app configuration, apply the defconfig without building and then open menuconfig:

    cd <sdk-root>/examples/driver_examples/nand_sample_app
export SRSDK_DIR=<sdk-root>
make sl2610_rdk_cm52_nand_sample_app_defconfig BUILD=NONE
make menuconfig

  3. For faster rebuilds when only app code changes, reuse the app-local installed SDK package:

    cd <sdk-root>/examples/driver_examples/nand_sample_app
export SRSDK_DIR=<sdk-root>
make build

  4. If this app has been exported to its own repository, use the same commands from that exported app directory after setting SRSDK_DIR to the SDK root.

Build outputs (CLI):

  • Application binary: <app-dir>/out/<target>/release/<target>.elf

  • App-local SDK package: <app-dir>/install/<BOARD>/<BUILD_TYPE>/

Flash (CLI):

  1. Build the SL2610 bootloader image.

    cd <sdk-root>
export SRSDK_DIR=<sdk-root>
make <SL2610_Bootloader_defconfig> BOARD=<BOARD>
make astrasdk

  2. Generate the system sub-image.

    cd <sdk-root>/examples/driver_examples/nand_sample_app
export SRSDK_DIR=<sdk-root>
make imagegen

  3. Flash or download the image using the SL2610 workflow.

    Refer: SL2610 Build and Flash with CLI

Running the Application using VS Code Extension

  1. Complete the UART0 console connection from the Connections section.

  2. Flash the image and press RESET on the board.

  3. Open the serial console for the UART0 logger connection.

  4. Observe NAND initialization logs, per-test pass/fail output, and the final application result.

Expected Logs

0000000000:[0][INF][SYS ]:Application drivers initialization complete without errors.
0000000000:[0][INF][SYS ]:sl2610 SDK version 1.3.0
0000000000:[0][INF][FLSH]:
0000000002:[0][INF][FLSH]:NAND Flash Test Application
0000000007:[0][INF][FLSH]:Test 1: Flash Initialization
0000000012:[0][DBG][FLSH]:JEDEC ID: 0x42CDFF
0000000016:[0][DBG][FLSH]:Nand Randomizer is enabled!
0000000021:[0][INF][FLSH]:Init successful
0000000025:[0][INF][FLSH]:Test 1 PASSED: Flash Initialization
0000000030:[0][INF][FLSH]:Test 2: Read Device ID
0000000035:[0][DBG][FLSH]:JEDEC ID: 0x342CDFF
0000000039:[0][INF][FLSH]:JEDEC ID: 0x42CDFF [byte0=0xFF byte1=0xCD byte2=0x42]
0000000046:[0][INF][FLSH]:Read Device ID PASSED
0000000050:[0][INF][FLSH]:Test 2 PASSED: Read Device ID
0000000055:[0][INF][FLSH]:Test 5: NAND Page/Multipage Reads
0000000061:[0][INF][FLSH]:NAND Multi-Page Read (2 Pages)
0000000066:[0][DBG][FLSH]:Geo: PS=2048 OOB=64 PPB=64 BS=131072 | Read Addr=0x0 Len=2048
0000000074:[0][DBG][FLSH]:NAND Read: Addr=0x0, Len=2048
0000000081:[0][DBG][FLSH]:NAND Read: Addr=0x0, Block=0, Page=0, Col=0x0, Len=2048 logical_remaining 2048
0000000090:[0][DBG][FLSH]:Checking if block 0 is randomized (skip_randomized_blks: 16) status 1
0000000098:[0][DBG][FLSH]:Geo: PS=2048 OOB=64 PPB=64 BS=131072 | Read Addr=0x800 Len=2048
0000000106:[0][DBG][FLSH]:NAND Read: Addr=0x800, Len=2048
0000000113:[0][DBG][FLSH]:NAND Read: Addr=0x800, Block=0, Page=1, Col=0x0, Len=2048 logical_remaining 2048
0000000123:[0][DBG][FLSH]:Checking if block 0 is randomized (skip_randomized_blks: 16) status 1
0000000131:[0][INF][FLSH]:NAND Multi-Page Read SUCCESS: 2 pages (4096B)
0000000138:[0][INF][FLSH]:Test 5 PASSED: NAND Page/Multipage Reads
0000000144:[0][INF][FLSH]:NAND Sample Application PASSED
0000000149:[0][INF][FLSH]:NAND Sample Application Completed!