Unknown chip id! 0x421

Odega · ‎2024-09-11

Hello, so I am completely new to working with STM boards in general.

I just got a brand new stm32f446re board, and I tried to upload some code to it through Linux. And I do mean brand new, I haven't uploaded or downloaded any code to it before this attempt. However, when I attempted to do so, I got an error message:

"WARN common.c: unknown chip id! 0x421"

So, I looked around for a bit and tried a simple command: st-info --probe to see some internal stuff on it. But I was told this:

"No such file or directory

version:V2J33S25

serial: 066DFF534871754867255336

flash: 0 (pagesize: 0)

sram: 0

chipid: 0x421"

After spending roughly about two weeks trying to find stuff online, I couldn't figure out anything on what to do. So, I am very much open to suggestions if anybody knows anything about this error.

Thank you very much in advance for any help.

Andrew Neil · ‎2024-09-16

@waclawek.jan wrote:
I don't think the error messages we've seen from the st-link-project's utilities are related to the mbed tools used to compile/generate .bin.

Indeed.

It looks like the st-link-project's utilities are communicating successfully with the ST-Link, but the ST-Link is not communicating with the Target MCU.

@waclawek.jan wrote:
I maintain that those utilities are of an obsolete version and/or incorrectly installed.

Plausible - and that was also @Tesla DeLorean's feeling, I think.

@Odega Where did the "WARN common.c: unknown chip id! 0x421" message (mentioned in the OP) come from?

Odega · ‎2024-09-16

That has disappeared on its own. A professor I talked to tried to use St-link GUI to get around the chip ID unknown problem. So perhaps that got rid of that particular issue. But now we have this one.

Side note, I didn't know that the unknown chip id error stopped showing up until you mentioned it XD.

Andrew Neil · ‎2024-09-16

@Odega wrote:
The rover-stm project is a file within directories.

In Linux, everything is a file - so that really tells us nothing!

@Odega wrote:
Right now, the project is to just drive a rover.

But where did you obtain it? Is it a known-good project for the Nucleo board you have?

@Odega wrote:
Since we haven't fully implemented the GPS into it yet, we are just using hardware tools to drive the device.

Who is "we" ?

If there is a team on this, then surely someone must have a working setup with all the tools necessary to build and download code? Surely, they can help you?

@Odega wrote:
For reference, I have pulled the microprocessor off of the project and disconnected it from everything and still get the issue.

So the Nucleo board isn't actually "brand new" - it could be damaged.

Andrew Neil · ‎2024-09-16

@Odega wrote:
I didn't know that the unknown chip id error stopped showing up until you mentioned it XD.

Looks like it comes from those st-link utilities:

https://community.st.com/t5/stm32-mcus-products/unknown-chip-id-0x497-error-despite-being-the-correct-one/td-p/597113

As noted in that thread, they are 3rd-party utilities - nothing to do with ST.

It looks like that ID comes from the Target chip, so reading it requires a working SWD link.

As you now don't have a working SWD link, that would explain why you no longer get that message.

This suggests that something has been reconfigured and/or broken on your Nucleo board.

Odega · ‎2024-09-16

I don't know if the project is good for the Nucleo board. It's what has been used for at least four years now.

By "we" I mostly meant the people who worked on this project in the past. As much as I wish I had team members to help me, I am all alone on this project. The only other person helping is my professor whose name is on this research project.

The board is brand new. For curiosity's sake, I did try to plug the board into all the other circuitry after my professor showed me the GUI trick. However, it still didn't work. So I don't think that is the issue.

Andrew Neil · ‎2024-09-16

@Andrew Neil wrote:
@waclawek.jan wrote:
I maintain that those utilities are of an obsolete version and/or incorrectly installed.
Plausible - and that was also @Tesla DeLorean's feeling, I think.

https://github.com/stlink-org/stlink/issues/1241#issuecomment-1366964332

As already noted, it's a 3rd-party project - so you need to take issues up with them.