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MSP430FG4617 & BSL

Other Parts Discussed in Thread: MSP430FG4617

Hello Friends,

in my company we use this processor (MSP430FG4617) to control a smal device. On one UART we have a Bluetooth modem conected and now we want to use an existing SSP connction via the BT to reprogramm the device via a flash based BSL.

As I understood it should be possible to jump form the normal programm into the flash BSL area. Communicate with a PC to load a new programm and to start the new load.

- Is this realy possible with the MSP430FG4617?

- Is there an example which I can try for your processortype (MSP430FG4617)?

- Which BSL example I can try to adapt for your processor.

- How I have to configure the CCS4 to load the BSL code at the right memory location?

 

thanking you in anticipation

  • Hi,

       For this device, the BSL is in the device in ROM.  It only requires UART TX/RX, and TST/RST for invoke.  In the document SLAU319, there is information on the protocol, and the zip file contains a BSLDEMO2.exe which can communicate with all 1/2/4xx BSLs (look in the "depreciated" directory)

  • Hi,

    Thanks for the Hint, but as I understood I need direct access to the UART TX/RX and TST/RST Pins at the processor?

    In our solution I have no possibility to reach these pins to place a pushbutton there / to initiate the BSL via a hardware event.

     

    What I have in our device is a Bluetooth modem connected at the normal UART.

    This Modem is handled by the SW in a way that we use a BT connection to drive a SSP connection to a PC. Our SW switches after initialisation of the modem and all normal BT stuff and successful connect of a SSP service from a PC, into the transparent mode. This means our SW communicates via UART directly with the PC and we do not see the modem any more, till we power off and restart it.

    This SW is flashed via JTAG interface at the moment.


    What we want to do is:

    • Run our normal SW and communicate with our own protocol with a PC.
    • Via this protocol we send a special command to our SW which initiates a switch to the BSL (jump to BSL).
    • Now the BSL takes over the already working SSP connection or if this is not possible we have to put the whole handling of BT Modem also on the BSL functionality.
    • At this point we can use the already defined protocol from TI for BSL control for erasing and reprogramming....
    • After successful reprogramming the BSL should start the new load of our SW.

     

    My questions to this solution are:

    • Is this possible with our Processor MSP430FG4617?
    • As I understood this should be possible with a Flash based BSL?
    • Is there an example available for the MSP430FG4617 in the CCS4?
    • Or which example could be adopted by using CCS4?

     

     

  • Gerhard Kraus said:
    connected at the normal UART.

     

    Ah, I see.  This is a problem.  The BSL uses it's own TX/RX pins, based on a Timer.  This is not modifiable, as the BSL is in ROM in this device.  You are correct, this could be changed with a Flash based (5xx) BSL.  What you would need to do for this device is to write your own 'Application' BSL, which lives next to your main application in User Code Space, and can communicate using the normal UART.

  • What can be done (and in fact we did in one project) is to connect the UART pins to the BSL port pins. After a power-up, these pins are in high-impedance mode and do not disturb any UART operation. If you disable the uart and set the UART port pins to high-impedance (input without pullups), then you can switch to the BSL and let it do its work through its own pins.

    Of course this only works if the two BSL port pins are not required for something else.

  • I would to re-visit one of the questions asked ...

    So, is it possible to jump to the start of BLS code from application space ... without the sequencing  on TEST or RST pins?

  • Yes, in the ROM BSL section of SLAU319, look for the term 'cold start'

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