Astrobe Forum

Hello

I am a new user and tried to install the RISC5 Version 8 System. Installation and compiling on the Host system work wonderful. But I have troubles to install the Oberon system on a CMOD A7. The installation of the Bit file worked ok, after identifying a bad USB cable. I also flashed 2 SD cards but I didn't get the embedded Oberon system working. Could it be that the SDDisk image is wrong. I tried to look in it with a Hexeditor, but I still be confused, Where is the bootfile and where does the directory start (0x10010000?). Could you please help me?

Best regards
Erwin

Sorry about the delay in replying - I didn't notice your message in the moderation queue until today. Subsequent messages from you will not require approval.

• What SD Card adapter are you using?
• What tool did you use to store the SD Card image onto the SD Card?
• Are you sure you used the correct bitstream file to program the CMod-A7? Our records show that you requested the bitstream file for the Arty A7-100.
• Have you had success with Embedded Project Oberon on an Arty A7-100?

Information regarding the format of the RISC5.img file can be found in the following message posted on the ETH Oberon Mailing List:

[Oberon] RISC.img format
Paul Reed
Sat Feb 13 12:24:46 CET 2016
https://lists.inf.ethz.ch/pipermail/obe ... 08881.html

Thanks for your response, which helped me to understand the boot process better. So my current status is that the SD card and its image is ok, but it seems that I have problems with programming the device with the Vivado Lab Edition.

Answers to your questions:
1. I use the PMOD MicroSD from Digilent (only the upper row connected with a splitter cable).
2. My programming tool is Win32 Disk imager version 0.9.5.
3. I am sure that I use the correct image for the CMOD-A7.
4. I did not use the Arty A7-100 board due to cost reasons.

Regards
Erwin

Maybe you are trying to program the xc7a35t FPGA directly instead of programming the CMod-A7 Quad-SPI Flash? Refer to Section 4 Quad-SPI Flash in the CMod A7 Reference Manual for details:

https://digilent.com/reference/programm ... nce-manual

When you have used the information there to identify the specific Quad-SPI Flash part on your board, you need to use the Vivado Lab Tools menu to:

a) Generate a Memory Configuration File (*.mcs)
b) Add a Configuration Memory Device

and then program the Configuration Memory Device using the Memory Configuration File (*.mcs) that you generated.

Its now running thanks due to your very precise and helpful tips. A quick summary of tips would be also useful for other newbies.
So in my case the problems were:
1. Bad USB Cable caused that programming the device worked only intermittendly.
2. Programming the FPGA instead of the configuration memory.
3. Selecting the wrong Quad-SPI flash device (the part number was not readable, so I did some trial and error tests)
4. Wrong sequence of generating the mcs file and adding it to the VIVADO Lab Edition.
Thank you for all your help,
Erwin