Alveo - Update Satellite Controller firmware

[dsakjl]

Hello everyone,

a couple of questions about the Satellite Controller firmware on the Alveo boards:

1) Is the firmware source code open, freely verifiable, and re-compilable?

2) Can you confirm that the only available method to update the SC firmware is through

    the flashing of the latest available XDMA/QDMA shell on the card to be updated?

Thank you, best regards.

[JohnFedakIV]

Hi @dsakjl ,

1.) No, the firmware is not open source

2.) It is recommended to run the same version of SC firmware that came with the shell to avoid issues. Is there a reason that you want to update the SC firmware?

Let me know if there are any additional questions.

Regards,
~John

[dsakjl]

Hi @JohnFedakIV ,

thank you for the quick response.

1) Ok;

2) actually we would like to use Alveo boards with custom design and Vivado flow.

    As far as we know the SC firmware should be independent from what is running on the FPGA chip,

    but is fundamental to control the board status.

    So, the question is if the update of the SC firmware is always through the update of the XRT shell or not.

Thank you, best regards.

[JohnFedakIV · Accepted solution]

Hi @dsakjl ,

Thank you for the additional background. The team has let me know that in 2020.2 we will be coming up with an API for custom flow that users can use with the CMS IP to update the SC firmware.

Regards,
~John