Flashing a Pure Jetson System via USB Drive

1. Overview

Since the introduction of JetPack 7.0, a new feature for system flashing via USB drive has been introduced. This allows you to flash the system onto the mainboard using a USB drive (which must be pre-configured as a Jetson bootable drive), eliminating the need to rely on an Ubuntu PC system for flashing. The entire process is similar to how you would install the Ubuntu operating system on a laptop or desktop PC.

The USB drive must be flashed with the Jetson system BSP boot files; once completed, it is referred to as a "Jetson bootable drive."

2. Prerequisites

• A laptop or desktop PC (with at least 25GB of free storage space)

• A USB drive (16GB or larger)

3. Creating the Jetson Bootable Drive

3.1. Downloading the System ISO File

Since the factory default image uses version r38.4.0, we will use downloading version r38.4.0 as an example here.

Open your web browser to download the r38.4.0 system ISO file:

https://developer.nvidia.com/downloads/embedded/L4T/r38_Release_v4.0/release/jetsoninstaller-r38.4.0-2025-12-30-17-00-37-arm64.iso

If you need to download the latest version, you can visit the official download link and click [Download JetPack ISO Image] to initiate the download.

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https://developer.nvidia.com/embedded/jetpack/downloads

3.2. Installing the Bootable Drive Creation Tool

Use the Balena Etcher tool to create the USB bootable drive. Open the following URL and locate the program file corresponding to your computer's operating system. Using the 64-bit Windows 10/11 system as an example, download the file balenaEtcher-2.1.4.Setup.exe, then double-click to launch the program.

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https://github.com/balena-io/etcher/releases/

3.3. Creating a Bootable USB Drive

Note:

This step will format the USB drive. Please ensure that the drive contains no data or files you wish to keep before proceeding with the following steps.

You must verify that the selected target disk is indeed the specific USB drive you have prepared; selecting the wrong disk will result in irreversible data loss.

Insert the USB drive into a USB port on your computer. Ensure that the drive letter appears in File Explorer, and make a note of this drive letter.

Launch the Etcher software and select the ISO image file you previously downloaded.

In this example, we will use the file [jetsoninstaller-r38.4.0-2025-12-30-17-00-37-arm64.iso], which was just downloaded.

Click [Select target] to choose the USB drive to which you will write the image.

At this stage, you must carefully verify that you have selected only the inserted USB drive before clicking [Select (1)].

Finally, click [Flash] to begin the flashing process.

Simply wait for the [Flashing...] progress bar to reach 100%.

Note: Upon completion, the process will automatically proceed to the verification stage. Due to the inability of Windows 10/11 systems to detect Linux partitions, the system will generate an error and prompt you to format the drive once the flashing is finished. Simply click "Cancel" and close the balenaEtcher tool.

Remove the USB drive.

At this point, the creation of the Jetson boot drive is complete.

4. Hardware Connections

4.1. Installing the SSD

The M.2 NVMe SSD interface is located on the underside of the Jetson AGX Thor; an SSD is pre-installed on the motherboard by default, as shown in the image below.

4.2. Motherboard Connections

The Jetson AGX Thor motherboard requires connections for a power adapter, a display monitor, a mouse, and a keyboard.

4.3. Powering On

The Jetson AGX Thor mainboard is configured to power on automatically by default when connected to a power source. If the device does not power on automatically, please press the Power button to turn it on.

As shown in the figure below, the three buttons—arranged from left to right—are the Power button, the Flash button, and the Reset button.

5. Flashing the System via USB Drive

To view the compatibility matrix between the system version on the Jetson boot drive and the corresponding bootloader version, please visit the following URL. Currently, the USB drive utilizes system version r38.4.0, which is compatible with all UEFI bootloader versions.

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https://docs.nvidia.com/jetson/agx-thor-devkit/user-guide/latest/twa_uefi_iso_compatibility.html

1. When the Jetson AGX Thor starts up, it first displays the pre-boot options. After a brief waiting period—or upon pressing the Enter key—the system will proceed to boot from the USB drive.

2. The interface displayed after booting from the Jetson boot drive is shown in the figure below. Select [Jetson Thor options].

3. Select [Flash Jetson AGX Thor Developer Kit on NVMe r48.4.0]

4. Then, wait for the installation to complete; the entire process takes approximately 15 minutes.

5. After installing the Jetson ISO, restart the system.

If this is your first time flashing the system, the UEFI boot version will be updated. Once the UEFI boot update is complete, the device will restart automatically.

6. Remove the USB drive, then power on the device again.

Starting with Jetson ISO version r38.4.0, the UEFI boot order is automatically configured to prioritize the USB drive after installation is complete. If you do not remove the USB drive, the system will boot back into the Jetson boot menu interface. Therefore, you must remove the USB drive before powering on the device again.

6. System Configuration

After removing the USB drive and powering on the device, you can now begin the initial Ubuntu configuration process ("oem-config"). Follow the on-screen prompts to create a default user account and configure other relevant settings.

Note: You must remember the username and password you set during this configuration process, as they will be required to access and use the system.

7. Booting the System

Once the configuration is complete, the system will restart again. The process of flashing the pure Jetson system via USB drive is now finished.

Official Reference Guide: https://docs.nvidia.com/jetson/agx-thor-devkit/user-guide/latest/quick_start.html#