imx8mm-evk does not boot kernel 5.16

[Fabio Estevam]

Hi,

I am able to boot Linux 5.15.14 on an imx8mm-evk running U-Boot
2022.01 just fine.

However, if I try to boot a 5.16 kernel, the boot fails in most of the
attempts (like in 80% of the boots. It does boot completely in some of
the attempts).

Starting kernel ...
 (hangs here)

Using earlycon I see that it hangs around the imx-sdma driver load:
[    0.681930] imx-sdma 302c0000.dma-controller: Direct firmware load
for imx/sdma/sdma-imx7d.bin failed with error -2
[    0.689628] imx-sdma 302c0000.dma-controller: external firmware not
found, using ROM firmware
[    0.689635] imx-sdma 302b0000.dma-controller: external firmware not
found, using ROM firmware

Tried to disable the imx-sdma driver and the hang also happens, so it
is something else that causes the hang.

If I use U-Boot from NXP the problem does not happen.

I tried to select the imx8m power domain options:

--- a/configs/imx8mm_evk_defconfig
+++ b/configs/imx8mm_evk_defconfig
@@ -72,6 +72,8 @@ CONFIG_MII=y
 CONFIG_PINCTRL=y
 CONFIG_SPL_PINCTRL=y
 CONFIG_PINCTRL_IMX8M=y
+CONFIG_POWER_DOMAIN=y
+CONFIG_IMX8M_POWER_DOMAIN=y
 CONFIG_DM_PMIC=y
 CONFIG_SPL_DM_PMIC_PCA9450=y
 CONFIG_DM_REGULATOR=y

but it did not help.

The same behavior is seen with the top of tree U-Boot.

Does anyone have any ideas as to what is missing?

Thanks,

Fabio Estevam