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Digilent Atlys Board: Loading Firmware

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Michael Farrell edited this page Jul 8, 2013 · 35 revisions

There are multiple ways to load the Digilent Atlys board with firmware. The loading process occurs in 3 stages;

  • [Stage 0] - Flash the Cypress FX2 chip with firmware suitable for flashing the FPGA1
  • [Stage 1] - Flash the Xilinx Spartan-6 FPGA with HDMI2USB firmware
  • [Stage 2] - Flash the Cypress FX2 chip with HDMI2USB firmware (nothing happens until you complete the following steps)
  • [Stage 3] - Pull USB plug out of the computer, plug the USB plug back into the computer, the HDMI2USB device should appear.

For each stage you must use at most ONE process.

1: This Stage 0 is not needed if using the Digilent tools.

Stage 0

Digilent Tools or Xilinx IMPACT Tool

You can skip this stage as the Digilent Atlys board already Adept compatible firmware already loaded on the Cypress FX2 chip's flash.

Stage 1

Digilent Tools

To use this method you must have the Adept 2.XX.XX Utilities installed and Adept 2.XX.XX Runtime installed.

  • Step 1 - Plug the power from your power pack into the POWER port.
  • Step 2 - Plug the micro-USB cable from your computer into the PROG port.
  • Step 3 - Flick the power switch on the board, next to the POWER port.
  • Step 4 - Run djtgcfg enum, output should be as follows;
$ djtgcfg enum
No devices found
$
$ djtgcfg enum
Found 1 device(s)

Device: Atlys
    Product Name:   Atlys
    User Name:      Atlys
    Serial Number:  210178440327
$
$ djtgcfg init -d Atlys
Initializing scan chain...
Found Device ID: 44008093

Found 1 device(s):
    Device 0: XC6SLX45
$ djtgcfg prog -d Atlys -i 0 -f hdmi2usb.bit 
Programming device. Do not touch your board. This may take a few minutes...
Programming succeeded.
$
  • Step 9 - The DONE light near the red RESET button should light up.

You have now completed Stage 1 - continue to Stage 2 to program the Cypress FX2 chip.

Xilinx IMPACT Tool

IMPACT must be installed from the Xilinx Design Tools suite. The Digilent ADEPT tools must also be installed.

Using the GUI

Using the command line

To avoid having to use the Impact GUI, the following script can be used https://gist.github.com/shenki/5387626

impact -batch download.cmd

Stage 2

Once you complete Stage 2 you be unable to go back to Stage 1 without a power cycle.

fxload

WARNING: The version of fxload that comes with Ubuntu/Debian is too old*

You can download fxload from https://github.com/pbatard/fxload or you can use a prebuilt version found at the same location as the prebuild hdmi2usb firmware.

  • Step 1 - Check your fxload binary is new enough;

Too old

$ fxload -V
Jun  3 2010 (development)
$

Okay

$ ./fxload -V
Mar 12 2013 (development)
$
  • Step 2 - Load the Cypress chip with the firmware using ./fxload -vvv -t fx2 -D 1443:0007 -I uvc_bulk.hex. This command will appear to return instantly!

fx2loader

You should also be able to use http://www.makestuff.eu/wordpress/software/fx2tools/

./fx2loader --vidpid=1443:0007 uvc.hex ram

Stage 3

  • Step 1 - Unplug the USB micro-cable connected to PROG. DO NOT DISCONNECT THE POWER
  • Step 2 - Plug the USB micro-cable back into the PROG port.
  • Step 3 - Check your kernel logs via dmesg to see if the device is found. It should look something like;
$ dmesg
....
[2248378.275226] USB Video Class driver (1.1.1)
[2248383.716221] usb 2-1.2.2: USB disconnect, device number 8
[2248386.504681] usb 2-1.2.2: new high-speed USB device number 9 using ehci_hcd
[2248386.616200] uvcvideo: Found UVC 1.00 device HDMI2USB (fb9a:fb9a)
[2248386.616463] uvcvideo: UVC non compliance - GET_DEF(PROBE) not supported. Enabling workaround.
[2248386.617060] cdc_acm 2-1.2.2:1.2: This device cannot do calls on its own. It is not a modem.
[2248386.617078] cdc_acm: probe of 2-1.2.2:1.2 failed with error -22
  • Step 4 - Use the device as required.
    • See Viewing for how to view the output on Linux.
    • See Cabling for how to connect the cables to the device.

Firmware Load Script

HDMI2USB website

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