This thread has been locked.

If you have a related question, please click the "Ask a related question" button in the top right corner. The newly created question will be automatically linked to this question.

Is there 1588 timing demo for RM57 launch pad?

Other Parts Discussed in Thread: DP83640, TMS570LC4357, DP83630, HALCOGEN, CC3100

I'm looking for some sort of demo code for RM57L Launch Pad that demonstrates IEEE1588 timing capabilities.  The quick start examples seem to have nothing, or am I looking in the wrong place?

Thanks in advance!

  • Hi John,

    Nothing yet that shows off the 1588 functions.   We do have an lwIP demo on the launchpad wiki.  

    There is a 1588 software library for the phy http://www.ti.com/lit/zip/snlc036 but it's generic, not specific to the launchpad.

    This is a demo that we'd like to get working soon though.

    Thanks and Best Regards,

    -Anthony

  • Thanks Anthony - If we could get just a demo framework running with lWip, we'd have everything we need to start developing next product, and we'll buy a gazillion parts. <Grin> We need timing to +- 400nSec across a network of say a few dozen devices. These are indoor, so no GPS available - that's why we need '1588.

    I notice that there is a dev board for the dp83640 (complete with USB and parallel port), but no 1588 demo software for it either?
  • Hi John,Just a gazillion? :)
    I think the DP83640 board you're referring to is from the phy business unit - and there's a forum for the phy specifically: e2e.ti.com/.../ethernet
    However, I think the TMS570LC4357 and RM57L launchpads though are an ideal development platform for this because of the combination of the host controller (the MCU) and the phy. Plus the host controller in this case has a rich set of timer peripherals (2 N2HET, 7 ePWMs, 6 eCAPs, 2 EQEPs), and cross triggering between the timers and peripherals like SPI and ADC. Also the RTI has dual timebases - and it's 2nd timebase can be synchronized to an externally provided network clock so you could also trigger software events in a synchronized manner. There's a *lot* that can be done ... just need to start putting the pieces together.
    Not to mention that at the price point of the launchpad - $29.99 -it's very affordable to setup a test-bed of multiple launchpads for synchronization purposes.
    If you want +/-400ns I don't think this is going to be difficult just based on the capability of the DP83630. My understanding is that the DP83630 and DP83640 are almost the same part - mainly a package difference. The appnote www.ti.com/.../snla100a.pdf for the 83640 says it's got the ability to get to +/-8ns all on it's own if I'm reading it correctly - and on the launchpad we hooked up the event output signals from the PHY to the MCU's timer inputs so the timer can count and trigger events off of the PHY's timebase.
    I think most of the 1588 capability is accessible through registers that are mapped to the management interface of the phy.
    The MCU has an MDIO peripheral in hardware that makes it very easy to read/write phy registers. You basically write the PHY ID to one register, the register address and read/write to a 2nd register, and set a 'go' bit in a command register and the hardware takes care of the rest. It's very easy to even read and write phy registers through code composer studio by peeking/poking at these registers... without writing any code.
    So I think we've got a lot of the pieces of the puzzle together - but unfortunately no canned demo yet other than the (non 1588) lwIP demo.
    However if you were to pick up a few launchpads and start testing the capability - even before we have something canned - we'll be more than willing to help out via this forum and the ethernet forum -- so you shouldn't be afraid of getting 'stuck'.
    Thanks and Best Regards,Anthony
    PS - if you want to discuss the opportunity more privately for further motivation to get us moving faster on the demo - feel free to message me directly - I think you can just click on my name to do this or you can send me a 'friend' request.
  • Thanks very much Anthony!  I'll order up some of these Hercules launch pads and get to work.  It sounds like these might even be a better test platform for DP83630 / DP86340 PHY's anyway.

    I

  • So I got my RM57l LaunchPad boards today. Did I miss something? I went the website indicated to download software for this thing, and there's a blinky LED demo. Whooppdee-Doo. Is that it or did I miss something right under my nose??
  • Hi John,

    You probably went to the main launchpad page and wound up here - right?

    www.ti.com/.../launchpads-hercules-launchxl2-rm57L.html

    This is project 0 - the intent is not so much to be a silicon demo but to walk you through the steps of generating code with HalCoGen, importing into a CCS project, and getting the code running on the board.

    There are additional projects (project 1 is a safety library demo) an lwIP demo (that we talked about) and a CC3100 demo here: processors.wiki.ti.com/.../LAUNCHXL2-RM57L. That page also has the source files for the board as well as other useful info.

    Please also check out community projects: e2e.ti.com/.../m
    (Select Hercules). The community folks are my heros - they make really cool projects.

    Most of the simple code examples for the RM57 you'll find inside HalCoGen. Open the "Help" and select "Examples" and you will find instructions for a bunch of simple example projects. Most of these will explain to you in the instructions what settings to change in the HalCoGen GUI and then they'll give you a replacement for sys_main.c that has the demo app.

    Last - you can really get to know the part by spending some time viewing the options in HalCoGen. There are quite a lot of tabs and a ton of diagrams. Please keep in mind that the full TRM is probably 2000 pages - so even though there are a lot of tabs to look at in HalCoGen it's very condensed.
  • Ahhh, Gotcha! - Now if the guys in the sales department could think about including your post above in a QuickStart guide in the box, that would really improve "Out of Box Experience" for all.

    Thanks!
  • Oops.. I kind of am to blame for the QSG too ;)

    Thanks and Best Regards,
    Anthony