Chiral Software, Inc. Updated May 12, 2022
Install the latest Ubuntu 18.04 as usual. Note that NVidia claims the NVidia SDK Manager now supports Ubuntu 20.04 as well as 18.04 but if you do this, it will say "Linux: no available releases for Ubuntu 20.04" when attempting to flash a TX1. So do not use 20.04 or later.
Set the screen blanking to never.
It is recommended to use a fresh installation of Ubuntu on a computer that is only used for that purpose. This is the easiest option but is less convenient than having a VM. Installing the SDK on a developer desktop or general use machine is not allowed because the SDK changes the host machine's firewall rules.
Oracle VirtualBox can host an Ubuntu image which is capable of reflashing, although it is sensitive to careful configuration. This section has been tested on an Ubuntu 22.04 host system, although instructions should be relevant to other host systems as well.
Install VirtualBox from the Ubuntu packages as usual.
Unless the host user is in the vboxusers group, VirtualBox will
always show no USB devices available:
adduser my-username vboxusers
Reboot the host machine for this change to take effect. Just restarting the VirtualBox Manager will not work.
Start the Oracle VM VirtualBox Manager GUI tool. Before any other actions, install the Oracle VirtualBox Extension Pack.
To do this, go to the downloads site and select the VirtualBox 6.x Oracle VM VirtualBox Extension Pack for all supported platforms. Download it, and then in VirtualBox manager, go to File / Preferences / Extensions and add the Oracle VM VirtualBox Extension Pack. It's ok if the VNC extension is already there. This extension is necessary to be able to access host physical USB devices from the guest VM.
From the Oracle VM VirtualBox Manager, click New. Choose a name for the VM, such as Jetson Flash VM. Select the type of Linux and the version of Ubuntu (64 bit).
Set memory to 16384 MB. The minimum requirement of the SDK is is 8192, but 16 gb is recommended.
On the hard disk screen, select Create a virtual hard disk now. Click create and choose VDI (VirtualBox Disk Image). Either dynamically allocated or fixed size can be used. If the host machine has a very large disk, fixed size is reasonable. Choose a size of 100gb or more, to not run out of space when using the SDK.
Go to the settings of the new VM instance, and set the atest 18.04 desktop ISO as the optical disk. In System / Processor, select 2 to 4 CPUs for better performance. Under USB, enable the USB controller and select USB 3.0. Without USB 3.0 it will not work.
Filters must be defined. Still within VM settings / USB, click the the new filter tool (above the add filter tool). Define two filters, specific for the the TX1:
| Filter name | Vendor ID | Product ID | All other fields |
|---|---|---|---|
| NVidia Recovery | 0955 |
7721 |
blank |
| NVidia USB Ether | 0955 |
7020 |
blank |
If some other NVidia device has another product ID, add the corresponding filter.
Install the OS image, which is Ubuntu 18.04 Desktop, as usual. For convenience, allow login without a password, and pick a very short user password.
After installing the OS, perform an update and install the build-essential package. This
is necessary so the guest add-ons installation will work. Also turn
off screen blanking in Settings / Power. After
build-essential is installed in the guest, reboot and then use Devices / Insert Guest
Additions CD Image to activate the guest extensions. These will better
integrate file transfer, shared clipboard and other features.
All the following will occur on the reflash computer, whether a physical machine or a VM.
Download from the NVidia developer site. You will need an NVidia developer password. Install from DEB file and start the SDK manager. The manager will require the NVidia login.
The Target Hardware button will be available. Select either the TX1 or TX2. The Target Operating System for the TX1 will be JetPack 4.6.2 or later.
Continue to Step 2. It will ask to create a folder
~/Downloads/nvidia/sdkm_downloads. Allow it to create this folder.
- Power off the Jetson.
- Connect to the control USB.
- Press and hold the Force Recovery button. Press and release the
Power button. Wait one moment and then release Force Recovery
button. The four buttons on the lower left are labeled
RST,VOLandREC. The power button is labeledPOWERBTNto the right and bottom of the power button. TheRECbutton is the force recovery button, so the buttons to use are the third button (recovery) and the fourth (power). - (Optional) Confirm that the NVidia is in recovery mode and USB is
being passed through to the VM. Open a terminal and run
lsusbto see that the Jetson is active. The result will indicate an interface0955:771 NVidia Corp.Iflsusbdoes not show the NVidia device, it means that USB filters are not configured, or the NVidia device is not in recovery mode, or the cable isn't working. - Within the SDK, the window will say SDK Manager is about to flash
your Jetson TX1 module. Choose Manual Setup - Jetson TX1. Select
OEM Configuration: Pre-Config. For username and password, enter
jetsonandjetson. The Target Hardware should have correctly identified the Jetson TX1 or TX2. - Press Flash and let it flash. If it can't detect the TX1, try rebooting the computer and re-powering the Jetson and repeating from the beginning of the process.
- After it flashes, it will then come up into the OS and have an operating system. The SDK Manager will display SDK Manager is about to install the SDK components on your Jetson TX1 module. The OS will connect to the host computer by using USB as an Ethernet and will assign the host computer an IP of 192.168.55.100, and the Jetson .1. Use the same username and password assigned earlier. Click Install. The connection attempt will repeat several times automatically, as it will not succeed until the Jetson USB network comes up.
- The SDK will complete installing various other components.
- Log in to the Jetson by SSH:
ssh [email protected]and perform updates and other installation tasks.
The user must be added to the vboxusers group or no USB devices will
be available in the VM manager.
The Oracle VirtualBox extensions must be installed or USB devices will not be detected.
The USB type in the VM instance settings must be set to USB 3.0 or Ubuntu 18.04 will not work properly with USB.
USB filters must be defined to automatically pass through physical USB devices to the VM, or else it will get to 99% and then hang. Dynamically connecting the USB device will not work.
It would seem that defining one overall USB filter with just the vendor ID 0955 would work, but doing that results in the host taking the USB connection before the guest filter can take it, and will result in the same hang at 99%.
The VM must be configured to have a minimum of two CPUs and 16gb of RAM, or performance will be poor. The VM's disk should be 100gb or larger.
Use the official NVidia USB cables. If these are not available, use a high quality cable. Be extremely gentle with the management USB port on the carrier board. It is very fragile. Touch the ground on the Jetson board before touching any other component on the board.
Do this after flash has completed and after a reboot. The reason is to not save the iptables definitions which the SDK sets up. Reboot, and then perform this configuration.
The NVidia SDK will modify the host ip-tables and forwarding rules
so that the Jetson can connect to external websites to download
packages. This works fine inside a VM that itself is connected to a
virtual Ethernet interface. However this modification is not
stored. After rebooting the flashing machine, verify that the network
changes have not persisted:
# sysctl net.ipv4.ip_forward
net.ipv4.ip_forward = 0
iptables will also not list any rules in the forwarding chain:
# iptables -t nat -L
All chains will be empty.
To enable forwarding, set both the kernel forwarding parameter, and
add a NAT rule to iptables:
# sysctl -w net.ipv4.ip_forward=1
net.ipv4.ip_forward = 1
# iptables -t nat -A POSTROUTING -o enp0s3 -j MASQUERADE
Now the Jetson will have access to the network. The specification of
enp0s3 in the iptables command is necessary, or else it will try
to NAT packets on ALL its interfaces, which will block external
connectivity of the VM.
Ubuntu 18.04 network configuration is quite different from modern Ubuntu and other systems, so follow these instructions.
Edit the /etc/sysctl.conf file and
enable IPv4 forwarding by uncommenting the relevant line:
net.ipv4.ip_forward=1
Next install the iptables-persistent package using apt install iptables-persistent. This package converts currently active
iptables rules into persistent files. After adding the rule to the
NAT table using the iptables command above, save the IPv4
rules. This is done during package installation, so if the NAT rule is
in place before the package is installed, it should be saved,
otherwise use:
# iptables-save > /etc/iptables/rules.v4
This rules file will be processed on startup to restore the NAT rule,
and any other rules that were saved. Note that other versions of
iptables-save take a -f command line option to specify the
file. The version with Ubuntu 18.04 does not support this, and IO
redirect should be used.
Verify that forwarding is in place by observing the following line in
/etc/iptables/rules.v4 within the *nat section:
-A POSTROUTING -o enp0s3 -j MASQUERADE
Now, the Jetson will be able to reach the outside network and this change will persist through reboots.
We can set up so that the Jetson, connected by USB to the flash VM, can be reached directly by SSH from the host VM. This makes using Ansible convenient. We will do this in two steps: first enable connection to the guest VM by SSH, and then add ability to connect directly from the host machine to the Jetson by SSH.
In the Oracle VM VirtualBox Manager, to go the VM instance settings / Network / Advanced. Click Porting Forwarding. Add a rule:
| Name | Protocol | Host IP | Host Port | Guest IP | Guest Port |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SSH to guest VM | TCP | 127.0.0.1 | 2222 | 10.0.2.15 | 22 |
Make sure OpenSSH server is installed in the guest VM:
apt install -y openssh-server
Now it is possible to connect to the VM by SSH. From the host machine, using the user name defined when installing Ubuntu on the guest:
ssh [email protected] -p 2222
Now to configure direct SSH connection from the host, or even outside the host, to the Jetson. This will be done by first allowing connections from the host to the guest, and then having a PREROUTING rule on the guest to forward traffic to the Jetson. It will also need a TCP ESTABLISHED connections rule.
Go back to the VM instance settings / Network / Advanced / Port Forwarding and add another rule:
| Name | Protocol | Host IP | Host Port | Guest IP | Guest Port |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SSH to Jetson | TCP | 127.0.0.1 | 2022 | 10.0.2.15 | 2022 |
(Note that the Host IP could actually be the external IP address of the host machine, which would make the Jetson reachable on the host's external IP. This could be very useful if there is an Ansible installer on the same LAN, for example.)
Now on the guest VM, add a forwarding rule:
iptables -A PREROUTING -t nat -i enp0s3 -p tcp --dport 2022 -j DNAT --to-destination 192.168.55.1:22
iptables -A FORWARD -i enp0s12u2i5 -o enp0s3 -m state --state ESTABLISHED,RELATED -j ACCEPT
This will forward incoming port 2022, on the guest, to the Jetson's port 22. SSH will now work from the host machine directly to the Jetson:
ssh jetson@localhost -p 2022
This will allow easy control of the Jetson from the host machine. Another possible configuration is to use a bridged interface to give the Jetson an interface on the host machine's LAN.
Make these changes persistent if needed:
# iptables-save > /etc/iptables/rules.v4
If flashing several Jetsons, or re-installing the guest VM, there will be warnings about changed SSH host keys for the same domain name. To avoid these, use the following SSH options on the command line:
-o StrictHostKeyChecking=no -o UserKnownHostsFile=/dev/null
Or create a file localhost in /etc/ssh/ssh_config.d:
Host localhost
StrictHostKeyChecking=no
UserKnownHostsFile=/dev/null
Now that the flashing system is working and the Jetson has been flashed, we can install the application. All commands as root. If port forwarding is configured as above, SSH can be directly from the host machine.
The SDK installs too much on the Jetson. Remove unnecessary packages
and then use clear out the contents of /var/cache/apt:
apt remove -y thunderbird libreoffice-*
apt purge -y gnome-shell ubuntu-wallpapers-bionic chromium-browser*
apt autoremove
apt clean
and save 2.8gb of storage.
Remove large static libraries which are not needed for running:
rm /etc/alternatives/libcudnn_stlib \
/usr/lib/aarch64-linux-gnu/libcudnn_static*.a \
/usr/lib/aarch64-linux-gnu/libnvinfer_static.a
This saves another 1gb.
See this reference for background on saving space on the Jetson.
Notes on Ansible on the Jetson, and an example, will be added here.