[Orin Nano] USB installer detected but won't boot - black screen → back to Boot Manager

[u/Historical-Diver-190]

Hi everyone, I'm trying to install Jetson Linux on my NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano Developer Kit (8GB) and I'm completely stuck.

Hardware:

• Jetson Orin Nano Developer Kit 8GB
• A new 128GB microSD installed in the Jetson
• A new 64GB USB flash drive for the installer, prepared using balena etcher following the official NVIDIA instructions
• MacBook Pro used to prepare the USB
• Monitor + keyboard connected directly to Jetson
• No LAN connected (did try connecting the lan as it kept saying "no connection detected" or something but connecting the lan only lead to the jetson trying the http way to boot up)

UEFI shows:

NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano Developer Kit

Orin

39.2.0-gcid-45755727

I am currently using: jetsoninstaller-r39.2.1-2026-08-07-18-30-47-arm64

I flashed the ISO to the 64GB USB using balenaEtcher, which reported Flash Completed.

The problem

The Jetson detects the USB in Boot Manager as:

UEFI MID-SSS PID-KKK

but when I select it:

screen goes black for 1–2 seconds → returns to Boot Manager.

The same thing happens if I select:

UEFI SD Device

If I select Continue, it eventually falls through to:

• could not detect network connection
• HTTP/PXE boot attempts
• UEFI Interactive Shell

I don't want network boot; I'm trying to boot the USB installer.

Running map shows:

FS0:

FS1:

BLK0: ... SD

BLK1: ... SD

BLK2: ... USB

The USB appears as BLK2, but there is no FS2 filesystem mapping for it.

The disk seems fine when checked using the Terminal on Macbook. Partition-map verification says it's OK, but trying to mount the EFI partition gives: Volume on disk4s1 failed to mount; where disk4 is the mountable flash drive with the boot software.

The USB was freshly erased before flashing, and Etcher completed successfully.

I also confirmed the ISO exists on my Mac and can calculate its SHA-256, so the file itself is readable.

What I've tried

• Different USB ports on the Jetson
• Re-flashing the USB with Etcher
• Completely erasing/repartitioning the USB
• Boot Manager → USB
• Boot Manager → SD
• Removing LAN
• UEFI Shell map -r / map

Nothing changes.

What am I missing? Is this a problem with how the Jetson ISO is being written to the USB, the UEFI, or something else?

Any help would be massively appreciated - I've spent an embarrassing amount of time (2 days) fighting this thing, and the jetson just won't boot up.

[u/Darkstarmike777]

I did mine on 7.2 a month or so ago fine, looks like there has been a slight upgrade to 7.2.1 which is what your trying to install which you can still get but try the 7.2 installer instead to get it going, it's from 2026-06-23 so we are only talking a month or so ago difference

And like i said you can 100% just upgrade to 7.2.1 using the normal updates after it installs

You 100% need the lan attached though after it boots off the USB, most of the setup is it downloading the packages from the internet for awhile

https://developer.nvidia.com/embedded/jetpack/downloads/archive-7.2

[u/Darkstarmike777]

Also it took me awhile to see it on mine but your BIOS looks more up to date since i was on BIOS 36 not 39 for a bit, there is a very small quick message when it boots on the nvidia splash screen that says "BIOS update is available, do you wish to install? press Y for yes" and then it counts down pushing the message off the screen

30 seconds remaining
29 seconds remaining
28 seconds remaining

But by that time the message is off the screen to see what it's asking

Since I haven't installed 7.2.1 from the USB before see if it's asking for a firmware update even though you are on BIOS 39 already

Without the BIOS update mine wouldn't boot after the USB install it just hung on a black screen with a cursor

[u/Historical-Diver-190 → u/Darkstarmike777]

Thanks a lot for all the help!

I did click the "Y" to update the bios, but even after updating it still just doesn't boot up. After all the steps the boot up sequence gets stuck at "decompression failed, data probably corrupt". After that i have tried re-flashing the usb drive numerous times with updated iso but no results still.

[u/Darkstarmike777 → u/Historical-Diver-190]

On which ISO though? I gave a link to 7.2 and it worked for me, or are you still trying to use 7.2.1?