ARM: zte: Add zx297520v3 platform support

This SoC is used in low end LTE-to-WiFi routers, for example some D-Link
DWR 932 revisions, ZTE K10, ZLT S10 4G, but also models that are branded
and sold by ISPs themselves. They are widespread in Africa, China,
Russia and Eastern Europe.

This SoC is a relative of the zx296702 and zx296718 that had some
upstream support until commit 89d4f98ae9 ("ARM: remove zte zx
platform").

Reviewed-by: Linus Walleij <linusw@kernel.org>
Reviewed-by: Krzysztof Kozlowski <krzysztof.kozlowski@oss.qualcomm.com>
Signed-off-by: Stefan Dösinger <stefandoesinger@gmail.com>

---

Patch changelog:
v8:
* Select ARM_PSCI_FW (Sashiko). This is an issue make defconfig pointed
out in the last patch in this series. The board does not have PSCI
firmware as far as I can tell, but the ARM_GIC_V3 option indirectly
assumes ARM_PSCI_FW is enabled.
* Include <linux/init.h> in the board file for __initdata (Sashiko),
removed other includes copypasted from another platform that aren't
needed. Let's see if Sashiko agrees.
* Add the SoC documentation to the documentation index (Sashiko)
* Add the SoC documentation to MAINTAINERS (Sashiko)
* Removed redundant if ARCH_ZTE (Sashiko)
* Point towards a sane (USB-Only) U-Boot and modify the example code for
booting from NAND to detect already fixed GIC setups.

Documentation/arch/arm/index.rst

@@ -75,3 +75,5 @@ SoC-specific documents
    sti/overview
 
    vfp/release-notes
+
+   zte/index

Documentation/arch/arm/zte/index.rst

@@ -0,0 +1,10 @@
+.. SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0-only
+
+=======
+ZTE SoC
+=======
+
+.. toctree::
+   :maxdepth: 1
+
+   zx297520v3

Documentation/arch/arm/zte/zx297520v3.rst

@@ -0,0 +1,167 @@
+.. SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0-only
+
+====================================
+Booting Linux on ZTE zx297520v3 SoCs
+====================================
+
+...............................................................................
+
+Author:	Stefan Dösinger
+
+Date  : 27 Jan 2026
+
+1. Hardware description
+---------------------------
+Zx297520v3 SoCs use a 64 bit capable Cortex-A53 CPU and GICv3, although they
+run in arm32 mode only. The CPU has support EL3, but no hypervisor (EL2) and
+it seems to lack VFP and NEON.
+
+The SoC is used in a number of cheap LTE to WiFi routers, both battery powered
+MiFis and stationary CPEs. In addition to the CPU these devices usually have
+64 MB Ram (although some is shared with the LTE chip), 128 MB NAND flash, an
+SDIO connected RTL8192-type Wifi chip limited to 2.4 ghz operation, USB 2,
+and buttons. Devices with as low as 32 MB or as high as 128 MB ram exist, as
+do devices with 8 or 16 MB of NOR flash.
+
+Some devices, especially the stationary ones, have 100 mbit Ethernet and an
+Ethernet switch.
+
+Usually the devices have LEDs for status indication, although some have SPI or
+I2C connected displays
+
+Some have an SD card slot. If it exists, it is a better choice for the root
+file system because it easily outperforms the built-in NAND.
+
+The LTE interface runs on a separate DSP called ZSP880. It is probably derived
+from LSI ZSPs and has an undocumented instruction set. The ZSP communicates
+with the main CPU via SRAM and DRAM and a mailbox hardware that can generate
+IRQs on either ends.
+
+There is also a Cortex M0 CPU, which is responsible for early HW initialization
+and starting the Cortex A53 CPU. It does not have any essential purpose once
+U-Boot is started. A SRAM-Based handover protocol exists to run custom code on
+this CPU.
+
+2. Booting via USB
+---------------------------
+
+The Boot ROM has support for booting custom code via USB. This mode can be
+entered by connecting a Boot PIN to GND or by modifying the third byte on NAND
+(set it to anything other than 0x5A aka 'Z'). A free software tool to start
+custom U-Boot and kernels can be found here:
+
+https://github.com/zx297520v3-mainline/zx297520v3-loader
+
+If USB download mode is entered but no boot commands are sent through USB, the
+device will proceed to boot normally after a few seconds. It is therefore
+possible to enable USB boot permanently and still leave the default boot files
+in place.
+
+https://github.com/zx297520v3-mainline/u-boot-mainline
+
+Contains an U-Boot version that can be used with the USB loader and sets up the
+CPU and interrupt controller to comply with Linux's booting requirements.
+
+3. Building for built-in U-Boot
+---------------------------
+The devices come with an ancient U-Boot that loads legacy uImages from NAND and
+boots them without a chance for the user to interrupt. The images are stored in
+files ap_cpuap.bin and ap_recovery.bin on a jffs2 partition named imagefs,
+usually mtd4. A file named "fotaflag" switches between the two modes.
+
+In addition to the uImage header, those files have a 384 byte signature header,
+which is used for authenticating the images on some devices. Most devices have
+this authentication disabled and it is enough to pad the uImage files with 384
+zero bytes.
+
+Builtin U-Boot also poorly sets up the CPU. Read the next section for details
+on this. It has no support for loading DTBs, so CONFIG_ARM_APPENDED_DTB is
+needed.
+
+So to build an image that boots from NAND the following steps are necessary:
+
+1) Patch the assembly code from section 3 into arch/arm/kernel/head.S.
+2) make zx29_defconfig
+3) make [-j x]
+4) cat arch/arm/boot/zImage arch/arm/boot/dts/zte/[device].dtb > kernel+dtb
+5) mkimage -A arm -O linux -T kernel -C none -a 0x20008000 -d kernel+dtb uimg
+6) dd if=/dev/zero bs=1 count=384 of=ap_recovery.bin
+7) cat uimg >> ap_recovery.bin
+8) Place this file onto imagefs on the device. Delete ap_cpuap.bin if the
+free space is not enough.
+9) Create the file fotaflag: echo -n FOTA-RECOVERY > fotaflag
+
+For development, booting ap_recovery.bin is recommended because the normal boot
+mode arms the watchdog before starting the kernel.
+
+4. CPU and GIC Setup
+---------------------------
+
+Generally CPU and GICv3 need to be set up according to the requirements spelled
+out in Documentation/arch/arm64/booting.rst. For zx297520v3 this means:
+
+1. GICD_CTLR.DS=1 to disable GIC security
+2. Enable access to ICC_SRE
+3. Disable trapping IRQs into monitor mode
+4. Configure EL2 and below to run in insecure mode.
+5. Configure timer PPIs to active-low.
+
+The kernel sources provided by ZTE do not boot either (interrupts do not work
+at all). They are incomplete in other aspects too, so it is assumed that there
+is some workaround similar to the one described in this document somewhere in
+the binary blobs.
+
+The assembly code below is given as an example of how to achieve this:
+
+```
+#include <linux/irqchip/arm-gic-v3.h>
+#include <asm/assembler.h>
+#include <asm/cp15.h>
+
+@ Detect sane bootloaders and skip the hack
+ldr	r3, =0xf2000000
+ldr	r3, [r3]
+ldr	r4, =(GICD_CTLR_ARE_NS | GICD_CTLR_DS)
+cmp	r3, r4
+beq	skip_zx_hack
+@ This allows EL1 to handle ints hat are normally handled by EL2/3.
+ldr	r3, =0xf2000000
+str     r4, [r3]
+
+cps     #MON_MODE
+
+@ Work in non-secure physical address space: SCR_EL3.NS = 1. At least the UART
+@ seems to respond only to non-secure addresses. I have taken insipiration from
+@ Raspberry pi's armstub7.S here.
+mov	r3, #0x131			@ non-secure, Make F, A bits in CPSR writeable
+					@ Allow hypervisor call.
+mcr     p15, 0, r3, c1, c1, 0
+
+@ AP_PPI_MODE_REG: Configure timer PPIs (10, 11, 13, 14) to active-low.
+ldr	r3, =0xF22020a8
+ldr	r4, =0x50
+str	r4, [r3]
+ldr	r3, =0xF22020ac
+ldr	r4, =0x14
+str	r4, [r3]
+
+@ Enable EL2 access to ICC_SRE (bit 3, ICC_SRE_EL3.Enable). Enable system reg
+@ access to GICv3 registers (bit 0, ICC_SRE_EL3.SRE) for EL1 and EL3.
+mrc	p15, 6, r3, c12, c12, 5         @ ICC_SRE_EL3
+orr	r3, #0x9                        @ FIXME: No defines for SRE_EL3 values?
+mcr	p15, 6, r3, c12, c12, 5
+mrc	p15, 0, r3, c12, c12, 5         @ ICC_SRE_EL1
+orr	r3, #(ICC_SRE_EL1_SRE)
+mcr	p15, 0, r3, c12, c12, 5
+
+@ Like ICC_SRE_EL3, enable EL1 access to ICC_SRE and system register access
+@ for EL2.
+mrc	p15, 4, r3, c12, c9, 5          @ ICC_SRE_EL2 aka ICC_HSRE
+orr	r3, r3, #(ICC_SRE_EL2_ENABLE | ICC_SRE_EL2_SRE)
+mcr	p15, 4, r3, c12, c9, 5
+isb
+
+@ Back to SVC mode
+cps	#SVC_MODE
+skip_zx_hack:
+```

MAINTAINERS

@@ -3782,6 +3782,15 @@ F:	drivers/video/fbdev/vt8500lcdfb.*
 F:	drivers/video/fbdev/wm8505fb*
 F:	drivers/video/fbdev/wmt_ge_rops.*
 
+ARM/ZTE ZX29 SOC SUPPORT
+M:	Stefan Dösinger <stefandoesinger@gmail.com>
+L:	linux-arm-kernel@lists.infradead.org (moderated for non-subscribers)
+S:	Odd fixes
+F:	Documentation/arch/arm/zte/
+F:	Documentation/devicetree/bindings/arm/zte.yaml
+F:	arch/arm/boot/dts/zte/
+F:	arch/arm/mach-zte/
+
 ARM/ZYNQ ARCHITECTURE
 M:	Michal Simek <michal.simek@amd.com>
 L:	linux-arm-kernel@lists.infradead.org (moderated for non-subscribers)

arch/arm/Kconfig

@@ -465,6 +465,8 @@ source "arch/arm/mach-versatile/Kconfig"
 
 source "arch/arm/mach-vt8500/Kconfig"
 
+source "arch/arm/mach-zte/Kconfig"
+
 source "arch/arm/mach-zynq/Kconfig"
 
 # ARMv7-M architecture

arch/arm/Makefile

@@ -223,6 +223,7 @@ machine-$(CONFIG_ARCH_SUNXI)		+= sunxi
 machine-$(CONFIG_ARCH_TEGRA)		+= tegra
 machine-$(CONFIG_ARCH_U8500)		+= ux500
 machine-$(CONFIG_ARCH_VT8500)		+= vt8500
+machine-$(CONFIG_ARCH_ZTE)		+= zte
 machine-$(CONFIG_ARCH_ZYNQ)		+= zynq
 machine-$(CONFIG_PLAT_VERSATILE)	+= versatile
 machine-$(CONFIG_PLAT_SPEAR)		+= spear

arch/arm/mach-zte/Kconfig

@@ -0,0 +1,29 @@
+# SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0-only
+menuconfig ARCH_ZTE
+	bool "ZTE zx family"
+	depends on ARCH_MULTI_V7
+	help
+	  Support for ZTE zx-based family of processors.
+
+if ARCH_ZTE
+
+config SOC_ZX297520V3
+	bool "zx297520v3 SoC"
+	default y
+	select ARM_GIC_V3
+	# This board does not have PSCI firmware, but ARM_GIC_V3 depends on
+	# ARM_PSCI_FW being enabled.
+	select ARM_PSCI_FW
+	select ARM_AMBA
+	select HAVE_ARM_ARCH_TIMER
+	select PM_GENERIC_DOMAINS if PM
+	help
+	  Support for ZTE zx297520v3 SoC. It is a single core SoC used in cheap
+	  LTE to WiFi routers. These devices can be identified by the occurrence
+	  of the string "zx297520v3" in the boot output and /proc/cpuinfo of
+	  their stock firmware.
+
+	  Please read Documentation/arch/arm/zte/zx297520v3.rst on how to boot
+	  the kernel.
+
+endif

arch/arm/mach-zte/Makefile

@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
+# SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0-only
+obj-$(CONFIG_SOC_ZX297520V3) += zx297520v3.o

arch/arm/mach-zte/zx297520v3.c

@@ -0,0 +1,16 @@
+// SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0-only
+/*
+ * Copyright 2026 Stefan Dösinger
+ */
+
+#include <asm/mach/arch.h>
+#include <linux/init.h>
+
+static const char *const zx297520v3_dt_compat[] __initconst = {
+	"zte,zx297520v3",
+	NULL,
+};
+
+DT_MACHINE_START(ZX, "ZTE zx297520v3 (Device Tree)")
+	.dt_compat	= zx297520v3_dt_compat,
+MACHINE_END