Tuning Powerpc405 to 400Mhz

From RCSWiki

Contents 1 Getting Started 2 After creating a regular 300Mhz hardware base system 3 Setting clock generator in system.mhs 4 Setting processor in system.mss 5 Design flow option in the project panel 6 Synthesize hardware design for new download.bit

Getting Started

• The Powerpc405 processor on ML-410 board was originally configured to work at 300Mhz. Since the Helium is targeting those complex software packages which may have compute burden on the processor, an exploitation on 400Mhz Powerpc405, though still slow, will really benefit the software installation, testing and performance. The PowerPC 405 core can provide up to 400Mhz by applying these modification in the FPGA designs.
• For those who are new to creating a base system, refer to Andy's tutorial here: http://rcs.uncc.edu/wiki/index.php/Creating_Hardware_Base_System_For_Linux

After creating a regular 300Mhz hardware base system

Setting clock generator in system.mhs

• Open up the system.mhs and search for this line or similar:

 PARAMETER C_CLKOUT1_FREQ = 300000000

• Make a change to 400000000:

 PARAMETER C_CLKOUT1_FREQ = 400000000 

Setting processor in system.mss

• Open up the system.mss and search for this line or similar:

 PARAMETER CORE_CLOCK_FREQ_HZ = 300000000

• Make a change to 400000000:

 PARAMETER CORE_CLOCK_FREQ_HZ = 400000000

• This will in turn generate a new xparameter.h which will be applied to linux system

Design flow option in the project panel

• In the Xilinx XPS GUI, go to Project->Project Options...->Hierarchy and Flow
  • Design Flow Options: Xplorer Scripts (multiple iterations for best result)
• This will optimize our new clock_generator design in FPGA

Synthesize hardware design for new download.bit

Continue on to the NFS setting for Helium in Linux