1================================================================================ 2Useful notes on bulding and using of U-Boot on ARC HS Development Kit (AKA HSDK) 3================================================================================ 4 5 BOARD OVERVIEW 6 7 The DesignWare ARC HS Development Kit is a ready-to-use platform for rapid 8 software development on the ARC HS3x family of processors. 9 10 For more information please visit: 11 https://www.synopsys.com/dw/ipdir.php?ds=arc-hs-development-kit 12 13 User guide is availalble here: 14 https://github.com/foss-for-synopsys-dwc-arc-processors/ARC-Development-Systems-Forum/wiki/docs/ARC_HSDK_User_Guide.pdf 15 16 It has the following features useful for U-Boot: 17 * On-board 2-channel FTDI TTL-to-USB converter 18 - The first channel is used for serial debug port (which makes it possible 19 to use a serial connection on pretty much any host machine be it 20 Windows, Linux or Mac). 21 On Linux machine typucally FTDI serial port would be /dev/ttyUSB0. 22 There's no HW flow-control and baud-rate is 115200. 23 24 - The second channel is used for built-in Digilent USB JTAG probe. 25 That means no extra hardware is required to access ARC core from a 26 debugger on development host. Both proprietary MetaWare debugger and 27 open source OpenOCD + GDB client are supported. 28 29 - Also with help of this FTDI chip it is possible to reset entire 30 board with help of a special `rff-ftdi-reset` utility, see: 31 https://github.com/foss-for-synopsys-dwc-arc-processors/rff-ftdi-reset 32 33 * Micro SD-card slot 34 - U-Boot expects to see the very first partition on the card formatted as 35 FAT file-system and uses it for keeping its environment in `uboot.env` 36 file. Note uboot.env is not just a text file but it is auto-generated 37 file created by U-Boot on invocation of `saveenv` command. 38 It contains a checksum which makes this saved environment invalid in 39 case of maual modification. 40 41 - There might be more useful files on that first FAT partition like 42 Linux kernl image in form of uImage (with or without built-in 43 initramfs), device tree blob (.dtb) etc. 44 45 - Except FAT partition there might be others following the first FAT one 46 like Ext file-system with rootfs etc. 47 48 * 1 Gb Ethernet socket 49 - U-Boot might get payload from TFTP server. This might be uImage, rootfs 50 image and anything else. 51 52 * 2 MiB of SPI-flash 53 - SPI-flahs is used as a storage for image of an application auto-executed 54 by bootROM on power-on. Typically U-Boot gets programmed there but 55 there might be other uses. But note bootROM expects to find a special 56 header preceeding application image itself so before flashing anything 57 make sure required image is prepended. In case of U-Boot this is done 58 by invocation of `headerize-hsdk.py` with `make bsp-generate` command. 59 60 61 BUILDING U-BOOT 62 63 1. Configure U-Boot: 64 ------------------------->8---------------------- 65 make hsdk_defconfig 66 ------------------------->8---------------------- 67 68 2. To build Elf file (for example to be used with host debugger via JTAG 69 connection to the target board): 70 ------------------------->8---------------------- 71 make mdbtrick 72 ------------------------->8---------------------- 73 74 This will produce `u-boot` Elf file. 75 76 3. To build artifacts required for U-Boot update in n-board SPI-flash: 77 ------------------------->8---------------------- 78 make bsp-generate 79 ------------------------->8---------------------- 80 81 This will produce `u-boot.head` and `u-boot-update.scr` which should 82 be put on the first FAT partition of micro SD-card to be inserted in the 83 HSDK board. 84 85 Note that Python3 script is used for generation of a header, thus 86 to get that done it's required to have Python3 with elftools installed. 87 On CentOS/RHEL/Fedora this could be installed with: 88 ------------------------->8---------------------- 89 sudo dnf install python3-pyelftools 90 ------------------------->8---------------------- 91 92 EXECUTING U-BOOT 93 94 1. The HSDK board is supposed to auto-start U-Boot image stored in on-board 95 SPI-flash on power-on. For that make sure DIP-switches in the corner of 96 the board are in their default positions: BIM in 1:off, 2:on state 97 while both BMC and BCS should be in 1:on, 2:on state. 98 99 2. Though it is possible to load U-Boot as a simple Elf file via JTAG right 100 in DDR and start it from the debugger. 101 102 2.1. In case of proprietary MetaWare debugger run: 103 ------------------------->8---------------------- 104 mdb -digilent -run -cl u-boot 105 ------------------------->8---------------------- 106 107 108 UPDATION U-BOOT IMAGE IN ON-BOARD SPI-FLASH 109 110 1. Create `u-boot.head` and `u-boot-update.scr` as discribed above with 111 `make bsp-generate` command. 112 113 2. Copy `u-boot.head` and `u-boot-update.scr` to the first FAT partition 114 of micro SD-card. 115 116 3. Connect USB cable from the HSDK board to the developemnt host and 117 fire-up serial terminal. 118 119 3. Insert prepared micro SD-card in the HSDK board, press reset button 120 and stop auto-execution of existing `bootcmd` pressing any key in serial 121 terminal and enter the following command: 122 ------------------------->8---------------------- 123 mmc rescan && fatload mmc 0:1 ${loadaddr} u-boot-update.scr && source ${loadaddr} 124 ------------------------->8---------------------- 125 Wait before you see "u-boot update: OK" message. 126 127 4. Press RESET button and enjoy updated U-Boot version. 128