Flash the OS and Complete First-Boot Checks

The boot medium and flashing method depend on whether the product uses a standard Raspberry Pi 5 or a CM5 with eMMC/NVMe. Follow the exact Seeed Wiki for your device rather than treating every R Series system as a microSD-based Raspberry Pi.

1. Choose the official flashing procedure

The official Industrial R2000 guide covers Raspberry Pi Imager on Windows, macOS, and Linux, plus the additional EEPROM and overlay steps required by its documented NVMe boot flow.

2. Configure the image

When supported by Raspberry Pi Imager, configure the following before writing the image:

  • hostname;
  • username and a strong password;
  • Wi-Fi country and credentials, when Wi-Fi is used;
  • SSH access;
  • locale, keyboard, and time zone.

Do not disconnect power or the USB flashing connection while the image is being written or verified.

3. Run first-boot checks

After the device starts, connect locally or over SSH and collect the basic system state:

bash
uname -a
uname -m
cat /etc/os-release
hostname -I
df -h
free -h
vcgencmd get_throttled

Expected architecture for current Raspberry Pi 5/CM5 AI software is aarch64. A throttling value of 0x0 means no under-voltage or thermal throttling flags are currently recorded.

4. Update cautiously

Before a broad system upgrade, record the current kernel and accelerator packages so a known working combination can be reproduced:

bash
uname -r
dpkg -l | grep -i hailo
hailortcli --version 2>/dev/null || true

Driver, kernel, HailoRT, firmware, and Python bindings must remain compatible. Do not upgrade only one component when preparing a device that already has a working accelerator stack.