Having a nightmare getting the Arducam (SKU B0273) to work on my Jetson Orin Nano Super Developer Kit. Running JetPack 6.x and the camera has literally never worked since day one.
I already tried rolling back to an older JetPack version thinking it might be a compatibility thing, but no dice. The board itself works fine otherwise, just the camera is completely unresponsive.
Anyone else run into this? Is there a specific driver I’m missing for JetPack 6.x?
Let’s get the proper driver installed first. We have a script that should set everything up for you on JetPack 6.x.
Run these commands on your Jetson:
cd ~
wget https://github.com/ArduCAM/MIPI_Camera/releases/download/v0.0.3/install_full.sh
chmod +x install_full.sh
./install_full.sh -m imx477
One critical thing — this script is verified only for the official NVIDIA Developer Kit carrier board. If you’re using a third-party carrier board (like Seeed, Waveshare, etc.), the pin definitions are different and the script will fail. Can you confirm which carrier board you’re using?
Yes, it’s the official NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano Super Developer Kit — bought directly from nvidia.com (this one: Jetson Orin Nano Super Developer Kit). So we should be good on the carrier board front.
I’ll run the script now and report back. That said, if this still doesn’t work — is there any way to get more hands-on help? I’ve been banging my head against this for a while.
Give the script a shot and let us know how it goes. If it still doesn’t work after that, I’ve sent you details privately about a remote debugging session we can set up — check your messages.
Okay, this is weird. I actually got the camera working — but not using the install script.
I ended up using the native Jetson drivers and was able to capture images successfully. The problem is, I cannot recreate that state consistently. After I disconnected and reconnected the MIPI ribbon cable, everything went south. Now I’m getting:
i2c error (-121)
What’s strange is that even with this error, ls /dev/video* still shows /dev/video0. So the system kind of sees the camera but can’t actually talk to it properly.
I’ve tried reconnecting the cable multiple times, different seating positions — sometimes it works for a minute, sometimes not at all. Can’t get it stable. Can we do that remote session you mentioned?
That i2c error (-121) is pretty telling. It’s an I2C bus communication failure — essentially the Jetson is trying to talk to the camera sensor over the I2C lines on the MIPI ribbon but getting no valid response.
What’s likely happening here: when you physically disconnect and reconnect the MIPI cable while the system is powered, you’re disrupting the I2C bus state. This can cause a bus lockup or leave the I2C controller in a bad state. The fact that /dev/video0 still appears while you get i2c errors suggests the video device node gets created (probably from the device tree), but actual I2C communication with the sensor is intermittent.
Here’s what I’d try right now:
Do a full power cycle — not just a reboot, but actually cut power to the board completely for about 10-15 seconds, then power back on. The key is that you should never hot-plug the MIPI cable. Always connect or disconnect the ribbon with the board fully powered off.
If the camera comes up after a cold boot with the cable already connected, then the issue was the hot-plug corrupting the I2C bus state.
If it’s still flaky even after a cold boot with the cable seated properly, then it could be a physical connection issue with the ribbon or the connector itself.
Regarding the remote session — I’ve sent you the AnyDesk setup instructions and a link to book a time slot privately. Please check your messages. Just note our support team is UTC+8, and the 10:00 PM slot on the booking page is for sales inquiries only, not remote support.