RPX Lite questions

QNX Newsgroups (Archives) qdn.public.qnxrtp.powerpc
1

I recently bought a RPX Lite board to experiment with and have run into
a couple areas where I am not sure of the solution.

The first area/problem has to do with the flash. I have the board
booting over tftp and have successfully brought QNX up on it. I am able
to run devf-rpx-lite and can see /dev/fs0 and /dev/fs0p0.

Previous posts in this group (Dave Green) have suggested that the
correct way to install an image in this flash is the following
(corrected to match my hardware - I think).

flashctl -p/dev/fs0 -o512k -l3092k -e
dd if=myboot_img.ifs of=/dev/fs0 bs=1k seek=512k

The first operation succeeds with no complaints, but the dd takes quite
a while and eventually fails with 1 block read and 0 written. Since I
don’t do this very often, what am I missing?


My second question is about pcmcia support on this board. I have a
pcmcia socket and one of the reasons I got this particular board was for
that reason. Unfortunately I am unable to figure out how to get the
devp-pccard running. I suspect that it doesn’t support this hardware,
which is ok, as long as there is a custom solution available. I don’t
suspect there is a ddk for this, but I am willing to make it work with
some help from QSS and then return the changes to their devp-pccard
program so they can include support for this if they are interested.

Rick…

Rick Duff Internet: rick@astranetwork.com
Astra Network QUICS: rgduff
QNX Consulting and Custom Programming URL:
http://www.astranetwork.com
+1 (204) 987-7475 Fax: +1 (204) 987-7479

2

Rick Duff <rick@astranetwork.com> wrote:

I recently bought a RPX Lite board to experiment with and have run into
a couple areas where I am not sure of the solution.

The first area/problem has to do with the flash. I have the board
booting over tftp and have successfully brought QNX up on it. I am able
to run devf-rpx-lite and can see /dev/fs0 and /dev/fs0p0.

Previous posts in this group (Dave Green) have suggested that the
correct way to install an image in this flash is the following
(corrected to match my hardware - I think).

flashctl -p/dev/fs0 -o512k -l3092k -e
dd if=myboot_img.ifs of=/dev/fs0 bs=1k seek=512k

Rick,

I think the problem is that it should be seek=512 rather than seek=512k;
currently, it’s trying to seek to (1k) block 524288, not block 512. If my
original example contained this error, I apologize; I was probably
doing it from memory, not having a system immediately at hand to test it
on.

BTW, I’m curious about the -l3092k in the flashctl command line;
I’m not sure what the block size of your flash is (64k, 128k, etc.),
but normally flash erasure is done on a block size basis, so you
might want to round the -l option down to 3072k (hmmm… maybe
the 3092k was a typo?) In any case, I’m not sure what
flashctl will do if you specify a limit which passes into a block
that you don’t want completely erased…

Dave

The first operation succeeds with no complaints, but the dd takes quite
a while and eventually fails with 1 block read and 0 written. Since I
don’t do this very often, what am I missing?



My second question is about pcmcia support on this board. I have a
pcmcia socket and one of the reasons I got this particular board was for
that reason. Unfortunately I am unable to figure out how to get the
devp-pccard running. I suspect that it doesn’t support this hardware,
which is ok, as long as there is a custom solution available. I don’t
suspect there is a ddk for this, but I am willing to make it work with
some help from QSS and then return the changes to their devp-pccard
program so they can include support for this if they are interested.

Rick…

Rick Duff Internet: > rick@astranetwork.com
Astra Network QUICS: rgduff
QNX Consulting and Custom Programming URL:
http://www.astranetwork.com
+1 (204) 987-7475 Fax: +1 (204) 987-7479

–

David Green (dgreen@qnx.com)

QNX Software Systems Ltd.
http://www.qnx.com

3

dgreen@qnx.com wrote:

Rick Duff <> rick@astranetwork.com> > wrote:
I recently bought a RPX Lite board to experiment with and have run into
a couple areas where I am not sure of the solution.

The first area/problem has to do with the flash. I have the board
booting over tftp and have successfully brought QNX up on it. I am able
to run devf-rpx-lite and can see /dev/fs0 and /dev/fs0p0.

Previous posts in this group (Dave Green) have suggested that the
correct way to install an image in this flash is the following
(corrected to match my hardware - I think).

flashctl -p/dev/fs0 -o512k -l3092k -e
dd if=myboot_img.ifs of=/dev/fs0 bs=1k seek=512k

Rick,

I think the problem is that it should be seek=512 rather than seek=512k;
currently, it’s trying to seek to (1k) block 524288, not block 512. If my
original example contained this error, I apologize; I was probably
doing it from memory, not having a system immediately at hand to test it
on.

You are right, and I was too busy copying to think about what I was
really doing. seek=512 makes it work… Now I will have to see if I can
get to the next step. :slight_smile:

Thanks…

BTW, I’m curious about the -l3092k in the flashctl command line;
I’m not sure what the block size of your flash is (64k, 128k, etc.),
but normally flash erasure is done on a block size basis, so you
might want to round the -l option down to 3072k (hmmm… maybe
the 3092k was a typo?) In any case, I’m not sure what
flashctl will do if you specify a limit which passes into a block
that you don’t want completely erased…

typo… :slight_smile:

–
Rick Duff Internet: rick@astranetwork.com
Astra Network QUICS: rgduff
QNX Consulting and Custom Programming URL:
http://www.astranetwork.com
+1 (204) 987-7475 Fax: +1 (204) 987-7479

4

On Wed, 18 Sep 2002 10:16:33 -0500, Rick Duff <rick@astranetwork.com> wrote:

I recently bought a RPX Lite board to experiment with and have run into
a couple areas where I am not sure of the solution.

As a matter of interest, which one did you buy?

5

Rick Duff <rick@astranetwork.com> wrote:

acellarius@telkomsa.net > wrote:

On Wed, 18 Sep 2002 10:16:33 -0500, Rick Duff <> rick@astranetwork.com> > wrote:
I recently bought a RPX Lite board to experiment with and have run into
a couple areas where I am not sure of the solution.


As a matter of interest, which one did you buy?

The 823E model with 128k nvram 16M ram/flash and pcmcia. It was on sale
$395 and it met my minimum requirements.

CAD$395 or USD$395?

-RK

I am trying to get a collection of at least one system for each platform
qnx supports.

Rick…

Rick Duff Internet: > rick@astranetwork.com
Astra Network QUICS: rgduff
QNX Consulting and Custom Programming URL:
http://www.astranetwork.com
+1 (204) 987-7475 Fax: +1 (204) 987-7479

–
Robert Krten, PARSE Software Devices +1 613 599 8316.
Realtime Systems Architecture, Books, Video-based and Instructor-led
Training and Consulting at www.parse.com.
Email my initials at parse dot com.

6

acellarius@telkomsa.net wrote:

On Wed, 18 Sep 2002 10:16:33 -0500, Rick Duff <> rick@astranetwork.com> > wrote:
I recently bought a RPX Lite board to experiment with and have run into
a couple areas where I am not sure of the solution.


As a matter of interest, which one did you buy?

The 823E model with 128k nvram 16M ram/flash and pcmcia. It was on sale
$395 and it met my minimum requirements.

I am trying to get a collection of at least one system for each platform
qnx supports.

Rick…

Rick Duff Internet: rick@astranetwork.com
Astra Network QUICS: rgduff
QNX Consulting and Custom Programming URL:
http://www.astranetwork.com
+1 (204) 987-7475 Fax: +1 (204) 987-7479

7

Robert Krten wrote:

Rick Duff <> rick@astranetwork.com> > wrote:
acellarius@telkomsa.net > wrote:

On Wed, 18 Sep 2002 10:16:33 -0500, Rick Duff <> rick@astranetwork.com> > wrote:
I recently bought a RPX Lite board to experiment with and have run into
a couple areas where I am not sure of the solution.


As a matter of interest, which one did you buy?

The 823E model with 128k nvram 16M ram/flash and pcmcia. It was on sale
$395 and it met my minimum requirements.

CAD$395 or USD$395?

US - take a look at the sale items on www.embeddedplanet.com.

Rick…

Rick Duff Internet: rick@astranetwork.com
Astra Network QUICS: rgduff
QNX Consulting and Custom Programming URL:
http://www.astranetwork.com
+1 (204) 987-7475 Fax: +1 (204) 987-7479