WM8505 script folder kernel technical question

Spudz76

Member
Jul 24, 2011
1
0
This should be a relatively easy question, hoping maybe one of the WM8505 masters (tipstir?) could answer from their research. I can't be the first one to try this.

I've recompiled the kernel for WM8505 (aka vt8500) and would like to try it out, but if I just replace the kernel in a known working (on my tablet) ROM "script" folder I know that will flash my custom kernel, BUT if the kernel is broken (which it no doubt should be, first time around) is that the same kernel it needs to load for doing updates? Or is that in the w-load (u-boot) somehow?

Or is the upgrade process kernel-less? It seems to me it partially boots at least the existing kernel with a different init to implement the /sdcard/script functionality. So I'm thinking if I break the kernel in the flash then I have a possibility of completely bricking myself out of trying again (like if my compiled one can't access flash, etc). However if you know I can load a "nasty" kernel (as compared to the "dirty" one it had originally, lol) and still retry that would be all I need to know. Not really that in to shooting myself in the foot as I've done that plenty of times with OpenWRT and routers and stuff. Also how do you pry one of these things open, I'm gonna need the serial console for sure. All this is to try and get something newer than Donut running on these (lofty target: actual real Honeycomb build, fallback target: at least a full Gingerbread) and maybe help consolidate all the clones under one kernel that works for them all instead of this weird compatibility matrix we got now.

Thanks.
 

leeb

Member
Jul 16, 2011
463
21
I dont own a WM tablet, but I DO have a few 8505 netbooks, and I can tell you this:
It starts by initializing with wload...
Starts up U-Boot which looks for the SD card with the script folder.
IF IT CANT FIND ONE
it defaults to starting up however it was preconfigured. Usually unpacking uzImage.bin (kernel) and starting from there.
SO....

If you sub in a different uzImage.bin (keeping the previous one, of course!) and it fails to load/run property, you SHOULD be able to sub BACK the original uzImage.bin, rerun the script and get the working system back.
Presuming that you do NOTHING ELSE but change the kernel --not wload or u-boot-- within the script!

If you want, dump the TEXT of the scriptcmd into a
Code:
setup here and we can look at what its doing.

For what its worth...
Lee
 
Top